Old-time Hockey at Fair Park

There's a new sheet of ice for those of us who work downtown and want more conveniently timed open ice. Dallas Ice at Fair Park opened recently (although you'd never know it from the lack of available info). It's in the Fair Park Coliseum, where the Dallas Blackhawks used to play. I haven't been yet, but it sounds old school. Think Hanson brothers.

Anyway, I called Jim From, who runs the place, to get the skinny since the Fair Park website fairly well SUX. Here's what he told me about open ice. In short, there's a lot of it.

• There's daily open skating from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. It's $6. It's strictly skating, but From said you can do sticktime if there's no one else there. "As a rule," he said, "you're not going to have anybody else here." Sounds like a good plan for lunchtime workouts.
• He said if there were a half-dozen people who wanted sticktime on a weekday afternoon, he'd convert it to sticktime.
• He has started what he calls the Dallas Fair Park Hockey Association. They trying to form two teams now and up to eight teams later. Let me explain about this league. It's open division. He said there will be players of all levels on the same teams. Sounds kind of kooky. Really, it sounds like pickup hockey although he kept saying they're going to keep the teams together each week. The cost is $15 per session. They skate in two sessions on Tuesday nights -- 7:15 p.m. to 8:45 p.m. and 9 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. When the teams are put together, they'll play twice a week, once for practice and once for a game. Just show up if you want to play.
• He said you can call the rink at all hours for an updated recording of ice times: 214-421-7800. Soon they'll have a website. For all other questions, call From at: 817-235-1652.
• Don't count on a lot of amenities. Like I said, it's old school, even rustic.

According to a history on the Stars' website (http://www.dallasstars.com/stars/history.jsp), Fair Park was the first site of professional hockey in Dallas, way back in 19 and 41. Quoth the history: "It was a strange and unusual site, as the Fair Park Ice Arena welcomed the sport from the North to the citizens of Dallas for the first time. Advertised in the papers as 'The most dangerous game in the world…murder on ice, it has been called…with playing speed, flashing blades and crashing bodies,' the lights came up on a debut unlike any other."

Amen, brother.