Hockey Museum opens in City Park Ice Rink

Budapest (MTI) – Hockey Museum opened in the City Parks Ice Rink, where many former professionals of the sport had appeared.

As Bela Tejfalusy organizer, founder of the museum said: historical committee formed in the Hungarian alliance 5 years ago, which has always wanted to collect relics and present them to the general public. So far, there were only temporarily exhibitions, but since now they will have a permanent home.

“I talked to anyone on establishment the museum; it was an unanimous opinion that this can only be possible in the City Park Ice Rink” – added Tejfalussy, who was a referee at hundreds of league and national games, MTI says.

Zoltan Molnar, director of the Budapest Sports Center (BSK) emphasized: all Hungarian skating sports started from City Park and they want to commemorate with a monument – in addition to the museum and the Hall of Fame – to the owners of the two silver and four bronze medals earned in the Winter Olympics. He added: four thousand children learn to skate every year and they want to make hockey more attractive to them by opening this museum.

Lajos Szabo, director of Sport Museum – which gives professional advices to the organizers of the Hockey Museum- called pleasing that it is primarily the Hungarian celebrity photos, relics have been focused. These will affect the children as role models – he said.

Tejfalussy noted in this respect that they would like to provide temporary exhibitions for Hungarian clubs and clubs beyond borders, especially for the ones in Szekelyland, MTI says.

The first ice hockey national team match was held in the City Park Ice Rink on January 24, 1929 (Hungary 1-0 England), while the first league meeting (BKE BKE-II. 18-3) was on January 15, 1937. In 1929, the facility has also hosted the European Championship. After 1956, it was only the location of training and recruitment clashes and after the renovation in December 2013, it has been the home of outdoor national and Austrian league matches.

Currently, nearly 600 relics are exhibited from the beginning up to the present in the Hockey Museum. The exhibition is aligned with the opening of the ice rink in winter, and those who buy skating tickets can enter even with ice skates. In the summer, exhibition is also free.

At the museum’s opening, there were present former stars like Gyorgy Pasztor and Laszlo Schell, who played match in the ice rink even in 1933, the two members of the International Federation Hall of Fame; as well as Jozsef Baban, Janos Balogh, Peter Kovalcsik, Peter Bikar and Janos Ancsin national team players.

based on the article of MTI
translated by BA

Source: http://mti.hu