Whitehorse Daily Star

‘Terrible accident’ claims local hockey figure

A Sport Yukon Hall of Fame inductee and longtime hockey coach has drowned after he went for a skate on Marsh Lake Sunday night.

By Rhiannon Russell on November 17, 2014

A Sport Yukon Hall of Fame inductee and longtime hockey coach has drowned after he went for a skate on Marsh Lake Sunday night.

Jim Fowler headed out at about 7:30 p.m., telling his wife he’d be home in two hours.

He never returned.

A search began early this morning, and his body was recovered at about 10 a.m. in the lake near the Judas Creek subdivision, Kirsten Macdonald, the Yukon’s chief coroner, told the Star.

“There were no injuries, no suspicion of foul play,” she said. “Just a terrible accident.”

The family had been out skating in the area the previous day.

“What I’m hearing from witnesses is that some time Saturday afternoon, they heard a large crack and some of the ice broke off and floated off,” Macdonald said.

“At this time, it looks like he went out skating and potentially went off the edge of the ice.”

When reached by phone early this afternoon, a member of Fowler’s family did not wish to comment.

A retired schoolteacher, Fowler would skate from Marsh Lake to Tagish, Macdonald said. It was common for him to go out skating on his own.

He began playing hockey as a teenager in Ontario. He moved to the Yukon in the 1960s, when he got involved with coaching.

He ran a hockey school for new players for 20 years, and coached several rep teams from 1965 to 1986.

Fowler was one of the founding members of the Yukon Amateur Hockey Association.

He was also the first hockey coach in the Yukon to achieve Level 5 certification, the highest level attainable in Canada.

For his contributions to hockey, Fowler was inducted into the Sport Yukon Hall of Fame.

Ron McFadyen came to know Fowler when he was covering sports for CBC radio from in the late ’80s and ’90s.

“He was absolutely spectacular with the kids,” McFadyen remembers.

“He was strict, but the strictness came from knowledge.

“While he was strict, he was strict in a way that he taught them things. Kids remembered.”

And though he was firm, he always “had a chuckle in his voice,” McFadyen said.

“The other thing is that he was extraordinarily fair with the kids. He gave everybody an equal chance. He helped them whether they were future stars or whether they were just out to have fun.”

John Berg formerly of the Yukon Amateur Hockey Association didn’t know Fowler through the game – they missed each other by several years – but said his daughter grew up playing with Fowler’s grandchildren.

“He was an excellent guy,” Berg said this afternoon.

“Turns out, he grew up in the same hometown I grew up in, so we had some commonality there.

“It was wonderful to go visit and chat and catch up with him, his background and the history of the Yukon, and his experiences up here. Especially with sports, the hockey world. He was very involved.”

Macdonald said she won’t be performing an autopsy, but will request a toxicology test.

Comments (4)

Up 94 Down 86

Rick Noonan on Nov 22, 2014 at 9:10 am

I was with Jim at St. Mikes for 3 yrs. he could skate through the wind and was a caring and sincere person.

Up 101 Down 87

JD Dunphy on Nov 19, 2014 at 1:19 pm

Sincere condolences from the Dunphys-John, Liz, Matt, Debbie.
We are saddened to hear this news.
Having known Jim during our 12 years in Whitehorse, we know what a tremendous loss his untimely passing is to his family, relatives and friends. The Yukon has lost a genuine and valuable asset.

Up 107 Down 86

Simon LeBlanc on Nov 18, 2014 at 5:54 am

What shocking news! Jim was my roommate when we taught school together at Christ the King High School . Life was always a great adventure for him and he lived life to the fullest. My sincere condolences to his family . RIP, my friend.

Up 111 Down 86

BnR on Nov 17, 2014 at 5:21 pm

Almost all of us had Jim as our teacher or hockey coach at some point. Great guy and a real Yukoner. What a tragic loss. Condolences to his family.

Add your comments or reply via Twitter @whitehorsestar

In order to encourage thoughtful and responsible discussion, website comments will not be visible until a moderator approves them. Please add comments judiciously and refrain from maligning any individual or institution. Read about our user comment and privacy policies.

Your name and email address are required before your comment is posted. Otherwise, your comment will not be posted.