Clarence ‘Taffy’ Abel: A pioneering US Olympic hockey star who hid his Indigenous identity to play in the NHL

On Dec. 26, 1926, 16,000 hockey fans packed Madison Square Garden to witness the birth of a rivalry between the New York Americans and the brand-new New York Rangers. The game would later be remembered for establishing a foundation of popularity for the sport in New York City.

The only American playing for the Rangers that night also happened to be the largest player in the history of the NHL up to that point, defenseman Clarence “Taffy” Abel.

Standing over 6 feet tall and weighing 225 pounds, Abel was a brutal behemoth on the ice. Yet off the ice, he was a quiet, personable man who charmed sportswriters.

Despite being a foundational figure in American hockey – an Olympic silver medalist and a two-time Stanley Cup champion – Abel has been largely erased from the national memory. His story is not just one of athletic prowess, but of a secret identity maintained for survival and a career ended by a league that turned against him. As a scholar of Olympic media history, I recognize Abel’s story as an important but overlooked example of how race and labor issues can influence public memory.

Passing as white: Abel’s secret identity

Taffy Abel, who earned his lifelong nickname from his childhood love of candy, was half-Ojibwe, born in 1900 in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. One of Abel’s few surviving relatives, George Jones, a nephew by marriage, recalled that his mother, Charlotte, an Ojibwe woman, encouraged Taffy and his sister to “pass” as white to protect them from the era’s rampant racism and the threat of being sent to an Indian boarding school. Though his heritage remained an open secret in his hometown, Abel maintained his whiteness throughout his hockey career.

His mother died in 1939, and it was only after her death – and years after his retirement – that Abel began to speak openly and proudly of his Indigenous roots. This forced silence is a primary reason his legacy remained obscured; for decades, he was categorized simply as a white American athlete, masking his status as a racial trailblazer.

Pioneer on the ice

Abel’s hockey journey was historic. At the 1924 Chamonix Games – the first official Winter Olympics – he was chosen to carry the U.S. flag during the opening ceremony. He led the American team to a silver medal before being recruited by Conn Smythe for the inaugural New York Rangers roster.

Because of his size, and perhaps also because of his biracial identity, which was likely known to many players in the NHL, Abel was forced to fight often in his rookie year. He led the Rangers with 78 penalty minutes, and soon became famous around the league for his jarring and ferocious checking.

In Abel’s second season playing for the Rangers, the team won the Stanley Cup. He became the first American player to win a medal at the Olympic Games and the Stanley Cup, cementing his legacy as one of the finest hockey players in the world. In 1929, he was traded to the Chicago Black Hawks, where he anchored the defense on a team that won the Stanley Cup in 1934.

Hits the wall

The end of Abel’s career was not dictated by age or injury, but by a stand for labor dignity. After the 1934 championship, he held out for a salary that reflected his value as a star attraction. Black Hawks management responded by insulting him in the press, portraying Abel as an ungrateful prima donna.

Around the league, executives mocked Abel’s weight, telling newspapers that Abel walked out because he wouldn’t respect a team-mandated diet. Abel believed a team would sign him for 1935, but it soon became clear he had become effectively banned from the league due to his advocacy for equitable pay.

He had been a star attraction for the Black Hawks, and despite leading the team to the Stanley Cup in his final game, Abel never played another game in the NHL. At age 34, he returned to Sault Ste. Marie, operated a café and coached youth hockey, quietly fading from the national spotlight.

Complicated reckoning

Only recently has the NHL acknowledged Abel’s Native American heritage. However, his story presents a challenge to the league’s historical narrative. To celebrate Abel as a pioneering person of color requires the NHL to confront its own role in the systemic racism that forced him to hide his identity. Only recently has the league’s longtime, historical ban on nonwhite players – dating from its founding in 1917 – been an open and popular subject of public discussion.

Furthermore, the history is messy. Because Abel passed as white during his playing days, some modern observers find it difficult to reconcile his achievements with those of later pioneers who broke the color barrier more overtly.

Ultimately, Clarence “Taffy” Abel was a resilient path breaker who navigated artificial borders – between the U.S. and Canada, and between white and Indigenous identities. He was a charter member of the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame in 1973, and his memory inspired future Indigenous stars like T.J. Oshie.

Yet his name remains largely unknown because, I believe, his life forces a reckoning with a society that dehumanized him. Even Abel’s U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame biography minimizes his heritage, noting “Thought by some to be the first Native American to play in the NHL.”

Abel fought for fair pay, against racism and through physical pain. He died in 1964, but the issues he grappled with – labor exploitation and racial identity – remain at the forefront of the American story today.

Michael J. Socolow does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.