Wild Bill: Bill Hunter's Legendary 65 Years in Canadian Sport

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His name is William Dickenson Hunter, but to generations of Canadian sports fans he's known best as Wild Bill. Part showman, salesman, rebel and visionary, and 100 per cent lover of the game of hockey, Bill Hunter has been witness to, and part of, the lore of Canadian sport for 65 years. Bill Hunter formed his first team at age 17 and toured a baseball club through dust bowl Saskatchewan before he'd even finished high school. Since then he's owned or managed more franchises than there are teams in the NHL -- from ladies softball to junior hockey to pro hockey to big-money curling. And when he couldn't get into the leagues he wanted, he started his own. The Western Hockey League -- the world's biggest junior league -- would never have happened if Bill Hunter hadn't taken on the hockey establishment. And pro hockey changed forever when he threw his weight behind the short-lived, colorful World Hockey Association. He brought Edmonton the Oilers, and he fought valiantly to bring Saskatoon the Blues. Bill Hunter has known the greats of every era from Max Bentley to Wayne Gretzky. He's known the movers and shakers, too, from Conn Smythe to Allan Eagleson to Peter Pocklington. And along the way, his on- and off-ice antics were grist for sports pages for decades. He was called Wild Bill for a reason.