Remembering a legend of freshly-flooded ice

By JAMES TUBB on October 26, 2024.

If ice could talk, the sheet of painted lines at The Arena would spout poetically about the late Fred Beaupre.

Beaupre, who passed on Sept. 20, was the longtime Zamboni operator and rink supervisor at The Arena. He was known around the rink and city as ‘The Fly,’ earning the nickname for always buzzing around the rink and being everywhere else but where former coworker Jim Hill was looking for him.

“He definitely was always on the go,” Hill said. “He was high energy, he would just be buzzing all over the place. A lot of the Tiger players one year started calling him, ‘Freddy the Fly,’ and it stuck.”

Beaupre started at The Arena in the first few years it opened and was the go-to face of its resurfacing. He moved to working at the Hockey Hounds Rec Centre in 1996. He was inducted as a member of the Zamboni hall of fame in Kelowna in 1996, earning himself a glossy picture hanging on the wall of Sturgeon Hall, a restaurant with Canada as its theme.

Hill has many a story of his late friend and coworker, who spent long hours at the rink either on the ice or wherever he could find reprieve in the old rink. Hill says Beaupre could always be found in the same pair of orange overalls and he loved his moniker of ‘the fly.’

“He just ate that up, he would wallow in that,” Hill said. “He’s just a really good guy and he had a big heart.”

The two shared moments of poking each other’s buttons only to be laughing at one of Beaupre’s famous stories minutes later.

“He’d get a guy riled up, and 10 minutes later you’re laughing at each other because he was such a nut,” Hill said.

“He was good, he was just such a good guy … there’s so many ways I loved him.”

Beaupre spoke with the News in 1996 about his induction into the hall of fame and what his job meant to him.

“It sort of puts a feather in my hat and gives me some recognition for the work I’ve put into the city,” Beaupre said. “It’s going to be a little prestigious.”

“I remember when I was a kid I used to take care of the outdoor rink and I had to flood it at night with the fire hose,” Beaupre said. “Standing in a hockey rink and watching a Zamboni going around is like stepping into the next century.”

Longtime Medicine Hat Tigers broadcaster Bob Ridley remembers Beaupre and his passion for the job well. He describes him as an outstanding Tigers fan and remembered when he called on a Tigers player to fix the Zamboni one night at The Arena.

“The defenceman put the tape on his skates and came out of the locker room and went out and did some tinkering on the Zamboni and had it fixed in no time so Fred could finish what was left to do on the ice,” Ridley said. “I’ll always remember that, because at that particular time, John Hilworth was the hero of the hockey game and so was Fred, because he got the ice ready to go for the next period. So that was one thing that I’ll always remember about Fred.

“He didn’t miss a beat and always tried to get things done for you.”

A celebration of life will be held at 3 p.m. Saturday at Pattison Funeral Home and Celebration of Life Centre.