Don Blackburn was among many pro hockey players from Northern Ontario, born in 1938 in Kirkland Lake, he played junior hockey in Hamilton before turning pro.

His playing rights owned by the Boston Bruins, Blackburn arrived in Kingston in the fall of 1960 as a third-year pro joining the EPHL Kingston Frontenacs.

A big winger Blackburn played three EPHL seasons with the Kingston Frontenacs in the early 60’s, culminating with a 42-goal season in 1962-63 when the Frontenacs won the EPHL championship and the Tom Foley trophy.

Blackburn was a first team EPHL all star that season and in January was called up to play a half dozen NHL games with the Boston Bruins collecting 5 assists.

The EPHL folded in 1963 and Blackburn went on to play four years in the American Hockey League with Quebec and Rochester.

When NHL expansion arrived in 1967 Blackburn was drafted by the Philadelphia Flyers in NHL’s Expansion Draft (he was property of the Toronto Maple Leafs).

One of the original Flyers, in the 1967-68 playoffs Blackburn scored the first overtime goal in Flyers history, a double overtime winner against Glenn Hall of the St. Louis Blues. The Flyers lost the 7-game series.

In his second season in Philadelphia one of his teammates was Kingston’s Dick Cherry.

In the fall of 1969, Blackburn was sent back to the American League scoring 27-goals for the Buffalo Bisons and they won the AHL Calder Cup championship in 1969-70. The Bisons folded when the Buffalo Sabres joined the NHL.

Blackburn would return to the NHL and played briefly with the Rangers, North Stars and Islanders.

In 1971-72 at the age of 34, Blackburn won the American Hockey League scoring championship with Providence putting up a 99-point season.

Blackburn played over 1,000 games of pro hockey in the NHL, WHA and in the minor leagues seeing action with 17 different teams.

Blackburn’s former wife was from Kingston and he would spend more than a decade living here, making it his off-season home during his pro hockey career. Through the 1960’s and into the early 1970’s he was involved with Kingston summer hockey schools, charity golf tournaments and played competitive fastball.

Growing up in Kirkland Lake he played on a baseball team with future NHL players Larry and Wayne Hillman. Bob Plager was the team bat boy, Plager would also play in the NHL including against Blackburn in the ’68 NHL playoffs for St. Louis.

For several summers in the 1960’s Blackburn sold cars at Kingston’s Ace Auto Sales. Later he had his own business as a soft drink distributor, selling ‘Lucky One’ soft drinks.

In 1973 he moved to Connecticut where he would play, coach and scout for the WHA’s New England Whalers. He had two stints coaching the Whalers. Including when the Whalers joined the NHL in 1979 and Blackburn coached Hartford those first two NHL seasons.

Following his coaching career Blackburn spent several seasons working as a colour commentator on the Whalers TV broadcasts in the mid 1980’s on SportsChannel New England.

He retired to Sarasota, Florida where he lived near hockey legends Scotty Bowman and Al Arbour.

Blackburn died in Sarasota in 2023 at age 84.

Written by Mark Potter. Longtime Kingston broadcaster & honoured member of the Kingston & District Sports Hall of Fame.