Who is Bill Buss?
 
Not many people today are aware that William Buss started the Lakeview Hockey Club. He began in 1943 with a boys' club that met in the Baptist Church on Alexandra Avenue and went on to head the hockey committee of the Lakeview Recreation Association. Since those early 1940's "Bill" as he was familiarly known, become coach, manager and organizer of every minor hockey team in Lakeview. In 1947 with one team and annual budget of $250 he developed hockey in Lakeview, arranging games and practices before were any arenas in what was then Tiny Township.

Mrs. Margaret Buss signed the boys up in the kitchen at her house on East Avenue where they dropped in after school. They each paid one dollar with their application to cover insurance. She and her husband made up the teams at home and if they had too many kids for one team they made two teams out of them so that all the boys played. They were of all ages on the teams: their ages did not matter because they played for fun.

In 1955 he instituted the formation of the Lakeview Hockey Association. Until that year he and his wife had been the "only association" in the area. Most of the boys walked to Dixie arena from Lakeview. Mr. Buss remembers that he would call for the Aviator Taxi, fill it boys and the driver would take all them all to Dixie Arena for 25 cents. William Buss would come home from work on Saturdays at noon and went to the arena; his wife took him his dinner and he stayed until eleven o'clock. He coached all thirteen of the Lakeview teams at first. Boys came from the whole area from the edge of the Credit up to the QWW. When the cloverleaf was put in at Highway 10, teams started up from that area and those boys left the Lakeview teams to go to Port Credit Arena.

Toronto Township Police Chief Garner McGill said in 1960: "Bill Buss has been a great worker among the children of Lakeview for many years and was often to be seen dashing about the community picking up children, taking them to and from Dixie Arena so that they could take part in hockey games; ha has done much to help the youngsters of the township through the years: parents of children in Lakeview should elect him Citizen of the Year".

Gradually they acquired more coaches for the teams and organized the League for the smaller minor atoms and up. By 1961-62, the Lakeview Minor Hockey association contributed in eight divisions: Tykes, Tadpoles, Atoms, Peewee, Minor Bantams, Bantams, Minor Midgets and Midgets. In April 1960 at the L.M.H.A. dance, Reeve Robert Speck presented a trophy to him stating "I am proud to play a part in this tribute to a man to whom the Township owes a great deal of gratitude. The whole Council of the Township of Toronto holds Mr. Buss in high esteem for the work he has done among our children." This trophy was offered by Mr. Buss for an annual hockey competition in the Township of Toronto, to be known as the Bill Buss Trophy. Whenever Mr. Buss was honoured for his commitment to hockey he always included his wife to stand with him for her tireless support. For his contribution to hockey, Bill Buss was elected to the Mississauga Hockey League Hall of fame in 1965.

For many years the Bill Buss Hockey Tournament was well known but regrettably the tournament lapsed in more recent years. Mr. Buss passed away in 1995 at the age of 72. Applewood Hockey Association is proud to have this opportunity to revive the name and to recognize someone who gave so much to the youth of what is now Mississauga.