Among the interesting jobs I’ve held over the years, one of the most interesting was working as a security guard for the Minnesota Fighting Saints hockey team during their inaugural year in the World Hockey Association.

That first season the city of St. Paul was in the process of building the new St. Paul Civic Center when the WHA season opened, so for a few weeks the Fighting Saints played in the old St. Paul Auditorium, home of the old minor league St. Paul Saints. They dressed the old auditorium as best they could, replacing the chicken wire above the boards with plexiglass, for example, but there wasn’t much they could do about the tiny locker rooms.

The players barely had room to change in the locker rooms, so an area was set up outside the locker rooms with benches where they could bend and tape their sticks and stretch out a bit before the game. The area was cordoned off with big curtains, but there was very little privacy. My job was to stand in front of the locker room door, which was just a curtain, and keep out curious fans and others who didn’t belong there. As a result, I got to see a lot of what was going on.

One day the Winnipeg Jets were in town. The Jets were led by Bobby Hull, who had already earned a spot in the Hockey Hall of Fame with the Chicago Blackhawks. His signing with the Winnipeg team gave the fledgling WHA a big boost of credibility. Whenever he was in town, the crowds were bigger and the mob of autograph seekers were more impassioned.

Early one evening, before the crowds arrived, I was at my post outside the locker room, and Bobby Hull walked out without a shirt on. He wasn’t a big man, just 5-10 and 190 pounds or so, but he looked like he had been sculpted by Michelangelo. He was built like a Greek god. It was especially impressive, given that professional athletes in those days weren’t devoting much time to weight training. He was all natural.

Before another game, a hockey stick salesman came to deliver a load of sticks. Hull, of course, had one of the hardest slap shots in the game and he went through a lot of sticks. He had his sticks specially designed. The toe of his sticks tapered up, so they looked a little like an axe blade, and the curve of the blade was exactly the way he wanted.

The stick salesman had about four dozen sticks for Hull, and he tested them all the same way. He’d take a stick, place the toe of the stick on the ground and push down. The first stick went “CRAACK!” Hull smiled apologetically to the salesman and took the second stick. “CRAACK!” Stick after stick would go “CRAACK!” Out of the four dozen, about 12 sticks held up to the test and were strong enough to withstand his slap shot.

Hull didn’t get mad at the salesman or complain about the quality of the sticks. He seemed almost embarrassed.

But what I remember most about Hull was the way he treated the fans. After the games, as I said, the kids would gather in droves outside the locker room. One day, when the St. Paul Civic Center had finally opened, a crowd of kids was waiting patiently for Hull to come out. Other players, a lot of them players nobody had ever heard of before or since, would slip out the door, see the kids, put their coats in front of their faces and scurry out before someone would ask for an autograph.

When Hull came out, he smiled and held court. He stayed for 45 minutes or more, signing every autograph, answering questions from the kids, asking them about themselves.

“You play hockey? What level?” he’d ask. “What position do you play?” He’d hold little conversations.

“Do you ever get into fights?” one kid asked him. “I can’t fight,” Hull said, holding up a clenched fist. His pinkie stood straight up. “I broke my finger once and I can’t bend it. I can’t make a fist.”

Hull was the biggest star in hockey, and he spent as much time as he could connecting with all those kids.

Hull died on Monday, at the age of 84. The news reports on his death mentioned the fact that he had some legal problems, being accused of battery and abuse against his wives, and those accusations should not be ignored.

But I will always remember the Golden Jet who stood so patiently, talking with the kids in front of the locker rooms in St. Paul, making them feel special. It takes a special man to do that.

Kevin Sweeney is a retired editor for the New Ulm Journal.