It was perhaps the loudest national anthem ever, echoing from the old Chicago Stadium to the Persian Gulf, drenching the former “Madhouse on Madison Street” in patriotism and tears.
Wayne Messmer stood on the platform next to the famed Stadium organ and belted out the most emotional rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” that anyone could remember on Jan. 19, 1991, turning the NHL All-Star Game into all-stars and stripes forever.
Messmer, longtime anthem singer for Blackhawks games, is now executive vice president of the Wolves.
“I always refer to that as one of the rare opportunities of what you do, what you’re gifted to do, what you’ve crafted doing all come together at the right time,” he said.
“I was thinking as I sang the Canadian anthem of some guy in the backwoods of Saskatoon who’s cranking up the radio and standing there at attention. Then when I did the U.S. anthem, the place went up for grabs.”
That moment was recalled easily this week. The tragic and unspeakable terrorism that President Bush called an “act of war” reminded Messmer and others of a time when Bush’s father was the president and had the United States at war.
On Jan. 16, 1991, then-President George Bush ordered the United States to launch a massive air attack on Iraqi-held Kuwait, starting the Gulf War. Three days later the NHL had its All-Star Game scheduled, the first significant sporting event after the shooting started. Hours of discussion involving the NHL, the players association and NBC took place before they decided to play.
“Knowing that NBC was going to cover both anthems uninterrupted, it kind of tipped me off that this was an occasion where it needed to be done right,” Messmer said.
The tradition of non-stop cheering during the anthem began during the 1985 Campbell Conference finals against Edmonton, when the Hawks came home down 0-2 in games.
But that Saturday afternoon in 1991 would not be just any rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
That Saturday afternoon would not be just any performance by the fans.
Hockey executives in the stands felt the bone-rattling emotion.
“When they started the national anthem, you literally couldn’t hear the person next to you,” Vancouver general manager Brian Burke said. “I had a seat in the corner and I had my hand on a railing and it was vibrating.”
More than a decade later, the players on the ice recall the feeling.
“The emotion that ran through the people and the nation–if that didn’t give you goose bumps, nothing would,” said former Hawk Chris Chelios, an All-Star that year.
More than 18,000 fans cheered and screamed. Dozens waved American flags. Other held up signs saying “The GIs are the real All-Stars.” But Messmer noticed one thing during that red, white and beautiful moment.
“Tears more than anything else,” he said. “I could sense that it was real emotion, not noise for noise’s sake, as sometimes would happen in that building. People were caught up in a spontaneous swell of emotion that said, `We are for this one moment everything that we sometimes say that we are–Americans.’
“It was tough to sing through that because you get this lump in your throat. But I made it through.”
Barely.
“I finished and I stepped down off the platform and my hands were just shaking,” Messmer said.
“I was soaking wet sweating. Tears were streaming down my face because I think I understood the responsibility.”
The men and women fighting in Operation Desert Storm heard it.
Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf made sure of it, asking that tapes of the performance be sent to his troops in the Persian Gulf.
“I can’t tell you the number of guys who were [in the Gulf] and came up to me and said something about it,” Messmer said.
“They said, `Man, we played that thing over and over again.’ I’m thinking, `Whoa.’
“It’s not about me. It’s about this gift that I was given, a kind of underscoring of the mood.”
