TORONTO -- Foster Hewitt, the voice of hockey in Canada, died Sunday after a long illness. He was 82 years old.
Hewitt, famous for the phrase 'He shoots, he scores,' died of kidney failure at Providence Villa nursing home at about 5:45 p.m. EST, family and friends said. His wife, Joan Darlie Moxon, was at his side. Hewitt underwent surgery at Christmas.
'He was a very strong Canadian figure and will be very missed, not only by the sports world but by many people,' said Fred Dixon, Hewitt's business manager for 10 years. 'Even outside of hockey they know Foster. He was a dominant Canadian figure. He was a true Canadian.'
A moment's silence was held Sunday night at the Montreal Forum for Hewitt, a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame and Sports Hall of Fame.
Hewitt, born in Toronto Nov. 21, 1902, brought hockey to Canadian and American fans. He broadcast Toronto Maple Leafs games on his own radio station, CKFH, for 28 years.
Hewitt broadcast his first play-by-play at an amateur game in Toronto in 1923 for radio station CFCA. For the next 54 years, his was the most distinctive voice in Canadian hockey broadcasting.
Hewitt, who was named to the order of Canada in 1972, started CKFH in 1951. It was sold in 1981, after Hewitt had broadcast his last game in 1977, Dixon said.
'I think hockey is the greatest game there is,' Hewitt once told an interviewer. 'It's basically excitement. There's bodily contact, there's danger, not to the viewer but to the participant. But it has about everything that helps to create a thrill in the minds of the spectator.'
He was known to Canadian airmen during World War II. His broadcasts were edited and sent to Europe, where they were picked up by Canadian air force pilots returning from missions, Dixon said.
Hewitt did the play-by-play during the 1972 hockey series between Canada and the Soviet Union.
Hewitt's first wife Kathleen died of cancer in 1969. He is survived by his second wife, Moxon, whom he married in 1972. He is also survived by two children, Bill Hewitt, 56, and Wendy Rowan, 52. A third child, Ann Somerville, died in February 1977.
Funeral services will be held Wednesday in Toronto.
