Abel, Sidney Gerald

▪ 2001

“Sid” 

      Canadian ice hockey player and coach (b. Feb. 22, 1918, Melville, Sask.—d. Feb. 8, 2000, Farmington Hills, Mich.), was a longtime star with the Detroit Red Wings, helping the team to win three Stanley Cup titles (1943, 1950, 1952) and four consecutive regular-season titles (1949–52). Together with Gordie Howe and Ted Lindsay, he was a member of the “Production Line,” Detroit's famed high-scoring trio. He began his professional career with the Red Wings in 1938 and played with the team—with the exception of three years during World War II, when he served in the Canadian military—until 1952, when he began a two-year stint as player-coach for the Chicago Blackhawks. He amassed career totals of 189 goals and 283 assists. He later served (1957–71) as coach of the Red Wings and was also a Red Wings radio and television broadcaster from 1976 to 1986. He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1969.

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