"I was looking straight up at this behemoth of a man."
Richmond firefighter Bobby Whitty still remembers the day 44 years ago when he was plucked out of the stands at a Vancouver Canucks practice and invited to watch the players go through their paces up close, from the bench.
Quinn, who at the time was perhaps best known for a bone-crunching bodycheck he laid on superstar Bobby Orr in 1969 and who had been claimed by Vancouver in the 1970 NHL expansion draft, came over to the eight-year-old boy that year and had his picture taken with him.
"I remember it very well," Whitty, now 52, recalled in a Monday interview.
"I was sitting in a lucky seat and we went to an open practice. They came up and asked if I wanted to watch the practice closer. I sat on the bench and then Pat Quinn came over and I had my picture taken with him. He was very nice and let me talk to him for about a minute.
"I laugh ever time I look at the picture. My mom has the original."
Whitty, who has four daughters and lives in Tsawwassen, said that he was in shock at the time, and very shy.
"I sat there in awe and didn't say much. And I was there for about an hour watching the practice. Then my mom came down and got me."
Whitty said he crossed paths again with Quinn six years ago on a golf course and they talked for a short time. "He was very nice."
Whitty's dad, Larry Whitty, said that his son - "just a shrimp, maybe seven or eight" - was "on Cloud 9, something like that" when the photo was taken of Quinn and Bobby wearing a Canucks jacket given to him by the team.
"He was certainly excited, and his brothers were quite envious."
Whitty's mother, Donna Whitty, recalls Bobby was so excited about meeting Quinn, that "he just about fell down the stairs."
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