Born today in 1951, Karen Koch of Monroe, Michigan, became the first female professional hockey player, debuting as a goaltender for the Marquette Iron Rangers. And today in 1980, Somewhere in Time, filmed on Mackinac Island, hit theaters, enchanting audiences with the island’s beauty and sparking a lasting love for the historic Grand Hotel.
TRANSCRIPT
Today a trailblazer on the ice, the 1st female professional hockey player was born in Monroe, Michigan in 1951. Karen Koch [Cook] was a goaltender for the Marquette Iron Rangers, as part of the United States Hockey League, when she was 18 years old in the 1969 season. Despite her smaller size, as her coach, Oakie Brumm said, other goalies would quote “stop more pucks by accident then she did on purpose.”
And, by way of a love story separated by decades, millions were introduced to the charms of Michigan’s Mackinac Island today in 1980 as the film Somewhere in Time, starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymore hit cinemas. In addition to its main locale of Mackinac’s Grand Hotel, scenes were also filmed at the Mission Point Fine Arts Building and the former Mackinac College. The film still brings tourists to the island, to enjoy the vistas, and hopefully to avoid the pennies, which Christopher Reeve couldn’t.