Cold comfort

CAMBRIDGE -- He was unaware that his favorite pastime qualified him as a novelty. All Leon Lewis knew was that he loved the way his grandfather glided across Fresh Pond, and he wanted to feel that unencumbered, too. Back then, if you skated long enough, the boys would come around with their hockey sticks and a game would begin, just like that, without voice-mails or carpooling or text messaging to arrange it.

Fresh Pond, the Charles River, the Nook. That's where hockey was played in the 1940s and 1950s if you were from North Cambridge, not in some indoor rink with ice so polished you wondered whether it was real.

Lewis wound up as a goaltender. They nicknamed him Shrimpy, and the Cleary boys, Bobby and Billy, used to shoot pucks at him behind the old Rindge Tech.

''Nobody made a big deal of it," Lewis said. ''I was just doing something I enjoyed."

Yet as we celebrate Black History Month, it's important to understand that there was something undeniably distinctive about Leon Lewis. He was an African-American playing hockey. From 1954-58, when he was at Rindge Tech, he was the only minority player on his team. In fact, Lewis contends, he might have been the only one in Eastern Massachusetts playing high school hockey.

''I never saw another black kid," said Lewis. ''Not even in the stands. Blacks just didn't like hockey. Nobody went to the games, except my uncle Billy. Even my own father didn't go to the games."

His uncle, Billy Berry, had become a hockey fan in the 1930s, primarily because of a black friend who lived upstairs in their two-family home on Saville Street in Cambridge. Dickie Johnson was a small, quick forward who scurried up and down the ice with a sniper's aim, and Berry used to sharpen his skates.

''He wasn't a big guy, but he could handle the puck," said Berry, now 82. ''And he was a beautiful skater. Just an outstanding player. He used to play on the ponds with George Ford of Belmont, who later played on the Olympic team, and Paul Guibord from Medford, who went on to Dartmouth. Dickie could have played college hockey, too. He had an offer to play at McGill, in Canada. But Dickie was one of those family guys. He took a job near home, and that was it."

Former Olympic coach Jack Riley, a member of the United States Hockey Hall of Fame, grew up in Medford, and when he cruised the Mystic Lakes, Belleview, and the Pit on skates in the '30s, he was always on the lookout for Charlie Booker, a black hockey player who seemingly would materialize out of nowhere to play pick-up, then vanish again when darkness fell.

''He was unbelievable," Riley said. ''Whenever we met up, I always tried to get him on my team. I saw him so many times on the ponds, but we never talked about school, or anything like that."

When Riley was old enough to attend Medford High, he expected to see Charlie Booker sauntering down the hall, waving at him with those soft, deft hockey hands.

''But I never saw him there," Riley said. ''I never saw him again. It was too bad, because he could have easily played for our team. Of all the guys I played with back then, he was as good as any of them."

Berry was sure his friend Dickie Johnson was a trend-setter back in the '30s, but it would be nearly 20 years before he saw another African-American suit up. His nephew, Leon Lewis, was drawn to the sport because of his grandfather, but he stayed on skates because of the large population of Canadians in his neighborhood. Nobody bothered to note the color of his skin.

''We were brought up in Cambridge," Lewis said. ''There were all types of people who lived there. We were not brought up to expect racial tension."

Rindge Tech wasn't exactly a powerhouse back then. Lewis, who split time in goal, endured the barrage of flying pucks from game to game with a measure of joviality and goodwill. He was a regular at Cunan's pool room on the corner of Concord Avenue, where the team hung out.

''He was a character," recalled Charlie Driscoll, who played for Cambridge Latin, then later for Boston College. ''It was a different time, before the era of racial tension. It didn't matter to any of us if someone was black. Three of our four class officers were black. The Civil Rights movement hadn't started yet. There wasn't all that anger.

''Shrimpy was one of the guys. He was no different than anyone else."

In all the years he played hockey, said Lewis, no one ever uttered a racial slur at him. If anything, the color of his skin made him somewhat of a celebrity.

''When we played games at Boston Arena, the place was packed," he said. ''I think people were curious about me."

Lewis followed the career of Canadian Willie O'Ree, the first black in the National Hockey League, who played for the Bruins in 1957-58 and 1960-61. Lewis loved to attend the local college games, and he would be admitted for free because he was often the only African-American in the building.

''Everybody liked him," Billy Cleary said. ''We all kind of got a kick out of him. He was a funny guy. A big, husky kid. And he had the courage to play goal. We could all appreciate that."

Hockey remains one of Lewis's most cherished memories. But he soon discovered the rest of the world wasn't as color-blind. He took a job with the Cambridge Police Department in the late 1960s, when the city was attempting to integrate its ranks, and a small faction of officers resisted.

''I can't say for sure why it was so bad, other than they didn't want us," Lewis said. ''The racial tension was obvious. It helped me later in life, but at the time, I found it very difficult to handle."

Sometimes, Lewis said, he would call for backup, and no one would answer his call. He said he witnessed officers roughing up African-Americans who were brought into custody for trumped-up infractions such as reckless driving.

''I'd say, 'What are you doing?' and they'd say, 'Just sit back and relax and do what we tell you,' " Lewis said. ''In other words, 'I'm the boss, and you don't have any recourse.'

''You go home at night, and that stuff stays with you. It stressed me out. It ran me right out of the job."

Lewis was an Army National Guardsman when forced busing came to Boston, and he was mobilized into riot control duty. He was on the front lines in South Boston.

''That's where I learned about black vs. white," he said. ''I was called names I couldn't believe. Everyone was so angry. The women, in particular, were very, very loud and very vulgar. The obscenities just shocked me. They hated me so much, even though I had never done anything to them."

Lewis said he developed high blood pressure, nearly suffered a breakdown, and left the force in 1977. He stayed in the National Guard, became a commander of American Legion Post 290, and continued to follow hockey, but only from a distance.

Nearly 30 years have passed since Lewis wore the Cambridge badge. His brother Loyd is a member of the Cambridge Police now, and he said, ''I can tell you things have changed."

''It's far more relaxed," Loyd said. ''There's not so much racial tension. That's all calmed down."

There have been changes in sports, too. The competition has been ratcheted up more than ever -- from the pros down to youth sports. Lewis has followed it, and doubts he would be embraced in hockey the same way he was more than 50 years ago.

''People don't view sports in the same way anymore," he said. ''It used to be congenial."

David Yancy took up hockey in the '60s because everyone in his Natick neighborhood was playing. He loved the youth programs and was oblivious to the fact he was one of the few African-American kids on the ice, if not the only one. But once he got to high school, with his Afro flowing out from under his helmet, he experienced a rude awakening.

''I had a target on my back," said Yancy. ''I had to learn to defend myself. My parents taught me not to fight. But my father showed me how to brace myself when they hit me, so it wouldn't hurt." (It was a tactic he later would share with Natick teammate Vinny Nelson).

Jack Riley, impressed with Yancy's skills, recruited him for Army. Yancy reported in July 1974. Riley converted him from a forward to a defenseman, and Yancy took a regular shift with the team. In his sophomore season, the team qualified for the ECAC tournament and played Bowdoin.

It was a game Yancy -- and Riley -- will never forget.

''There were a couple of early penalties," Yancy recalled. ''I checked a guy -- legally -- into the boards, but he hurt his arm. He may have broken it. After that, I was fair game. Guys started running at me."

Riley seethed as Yancy absorbed shot after shot. And, when a small group of fans began chanting a racial epithet, he exploded.

''I looked over at his mother and father in the stands, and the expression on their faces was enough to kill you," Riley said. ''I was so mad I went over to Yancy and said, 'Forget about winning the game. I want you to flatten every guy on the ice.' So he did. He was one of the toughest kids I ever had."

Yancy was a one-man wrecking crew, leveling every player that came at him. The crowd became even more incensed and the slurs intensified.

''The bottom line is, I had more penalties in that game than I had in my career," Yancy said. ''It got so bad and so ugly, at one point the coach told me to go to the locker room.

''I remember sitting in there alone. I could still hear those fans."

Riley and Yancy received numerous letters from Bowdoin officials and fans apologizing for the horrific behavior of a few.

''But it wasn't a few," Yancy said. ''It was more than that."

The incident did not stop Yancy from completing his hockey career at West Point. Nor has it steered him away from hockey. Both his son and daughter are part of the youth program in Natick.

''I know that without hockey, I wouldn't have gone to West Point," Yancy said. ''Hockey got me through. It's a good sport. And now I want to give back."

In 2006, there remains a dearth of African-American hockey players. Yancy believes it has to do with interests of black parents, who steer their children toward their preferred sport, as well as the convenience of playing basketball or soccer, which require minimal equipment and no ice time.

''Also, the cost of the sport is prohibitive today," Cleary said. ''The sticks they make, the synthetic ones, cost $190 a pop, nothing like the wooden ones we used to take out there. Skates cost you a couple hundred dollars, and we haven't even talked about the cost of renting ice time.

''It's too bad. It keeps a lot of people from playing, especially kids in the city."

Leon Lewis is 66 now, retired and disabled and living on the Cape. He enjoyed the career of Boston University star Mike Grier in the '90s, but wonders why he stood out almost as much as Lewis did in 1958.

''I'm a little disappointed," Lewis said. ''I guess I thought I might pass some kind of torch to someone, but there wasn't anybody. I don't see anyone coming, either.

''It's like Tiger Woods. He was supposed to change golf. But I still don't see many black golfers."

The uncomfortable truth is that you likely will pay a price today if you are an African-American playing hockey. You will not skate through untouched. Pioneers like Lewis actually had it easier.

''Hey, I wasn't a pioneer," Lewis insisted. ''I was just a kid who liked hockey."