The missing piece of Tim Horton's story

50 years after deadly car crash, we clear up one lingering mystery

- EDWARD BROWN

Tim Horton's Pantera after the single-car crash on the Queen Elizabeth Way on Feb. 21, 1974.

Tim Horton loved cars more than he loved coffee, and it cost him his life.

By 1973, the 43-year-old four-time Stanley Cup champion and future Hockey Hall of Famer had played 23 seasons in the NHL. Nonetheless, with the new season approaching, Buffalo Sabres general manager Punch Imlach enticed Horton to play an additional year for $150,000 and sweetened the deal with a sporty De Tomaso Ford Pantera.

Imlach preyed on Horton's lifelong weakness for fast cars, and the player couldn't resist the offer of owning the supercar. Four months later, when Horton perished driving the sports car at breakneck speed through St. Catharines in the early hours of Feb. 21, 1974, Imlach was beside himself.

Over the years there has been speculation about what happened to the car. Many people assume a salvage yard crushed the car Horton was driving to avoid souvenir hunters picking over what remained of the hockey icon's ride after the devastating accident, 50 years ago this week.

I have long been curious about what happened and recently set out to find an answer. And it turns out that parts of the automobile, including the powerful V8 engine, were salvaged and survived long after the terrible crash.

Tim Horton, born in 1930, grew up impoverished in northern Ontario. Black and white photographs from the era depict a young Horton seated on the running board of a Model T Ford or leaning over the hood of a roadster. After he signed his first professional hockey contract to play for the Pittsburgh Hornets in 1949, he purchased his first car, a Mercury. In under a year, he'd written it off. This wouldn't be the only time reckless driving cost him a car.