Can you identify the Flyers fan who joined the handshake line after 1974 Cup clincher? A reward awaits.
The Flyers Alumni Association is offering a reward to anyone who can provide a lead to finding the fan who got into their handshake line after the team won the 1974 Stanley Cup against Boston at the Spectrum.
Forty-six years later, the search for the Spectrum’s mystery person continues.
The Flyers’ Alumni Association is looking for the shaggy-haired person – he appears to be in his late teens – who joined the handshake line after Philadelphia defeated Boston, 1-0, and clinched their first Stanley Cup on May 19, 1974.
The young man had a bottle of champagne in his left hand as he shook hands with the Bruins with his right hand.
“The Handshake Kid mystery is unsolved,” Brad Marsh, a former Flyer who is president of their alumni association, tweeted above a “Wanted” poster that had a photo of the young man in the handshake line, just ahead of the Flyers’ Orest Kindrachuk. “There is a reward for your successful lead.”
“Turn your buddy in” to receive some prizes, Marsh said in the tweet.
The reward: An autographed Flyers jersey and a call from Terry Crisp, a member of that Stanley Cup championship team. Crisp was handed the puck by a linesman when the ’74 Cup-clincher ended and he still has the valuable keepsake.
Marsh later tweeted: “I hope this bounty pays off – Crispy really wants to talk to this guy!”
“It is hilarious,” Crisp said in a video posted on Twitter. “… I sure hope we can find this young mystery man and, you know what, shake his hand again. You’ve got to admit, that was daring and innovative."
The subject came up during a recent Flyers Decades show, which had several members of the 1974 champions as guests. A rebroadcast of the show was shown Thursday night and included a new live chat.
The show was on the Flyers’ alumni channel on YouTube.
“We’ve had lots of people sniffing around, but nothing yet,” Marsh said in a phone interview Thursday about the mystery person. “We just want to find him and have fun with him and maybe have him on one of our shows if he’s up for it. And if he chooses that he doesn’t want to be identified, that’s fine, too.”
Marsh believes numerous fans who charged onto the ice after the famous 1974 clincher were not at the game.
“A lot of people came in from the parking lot, I’m told, because they opened the doors as soon as the game ended,” Marsh said. “Just another fabled story in the history of the Broad Street Bullies.”