Emil Breuer Inspired His Own Brigadoon In Niagara

By John Nicol

The human spirit endures many threats to its desire to commune.

Niagara, Ontario's Emil Breur

In Niagara, politicians play with our hospitals, amalgamate towns and create regional governments distant from our front doors. Schoolboards become such fiefdoms, ignorant of the desire for a sense of community, that they poach kids from, let’s say, Niagara-on-the-Lake, such that the town doesn’t have enough students for its own high school.

“Progress” wiped out hamlets like Homer (the Welland Canal), Glen Elgin (river mills were passé) and there are places like St. John or McNab where only the churches mark an olden day commingling at the crossroads.

Bucking these forces have been neighbourhood barbecues, ethnic clubs, and sporting organizations that allow us to form our own societies.

And then there’s the Emil Breuer Soccer Tournament, it’s own Brigadoon that, for the last 25 years, has sprung to life every Simcoe Day weekend on the once-remote grounds of German Village in Niagara Falls.

The weekend is a community gathering at its finest, a magical snapshot of what life should be, all inspired by a charismatic man named Emil Peter Breuer.

Despite being a lean 5-foot-10, Emil was big man on campus at Stamford Collegiate in the mid-1970s. Sports, like most things, came easily to him, and he made life look easy.
He could wear a hot pink blazer to a dance—a la his hero Mick Jagger—and still be the coolest guy in the gym. He had a mischievous smile that would have made the Artful Dodger proud, and he liked mischief. In high school he left crazy cartoon characters in textbooks for the next year of students to enjoy, said Donna Senese, a high school sweetheart of Emil’s and now a professor in Kelowna, B.C.

“Yes, he may have loved the (Rolling) Stones and (David) Bowie but he made the polka cool,” said Senese. “When we danced at the Village I felt like I was flying—with Emil your feet never really touched the ground.”

She boils the Emil mystique down simply: “His shy modesty made him easy to admire—the girls loved him and the boys wanted to be like him.”

But on the cool, drizzly morning of October 23, 1985, six weeks before his 28th birthday, Emil finished some ju-jitsu training and felt violently ill. He had a massive heart attack on the way to the hospital.

Emil and Marion Mullen were just about to have a baby. Emily Breuer Mullen was born 17 days later. Amidst all the turmoil, Marion had an inordinate sentiment: “My biggest fear was that people would forget about Emil.”

As they say in Niagara-on-the-Lake: “Pshaw!”.

Friends and family rallied to put on a soccer tournament the next year, and the logical place was the German Village. Emil, the son of Germanic immigrants Joseph and Martha Breuer, grew up at the village, and even performed in their ethnic dances, and later starred for the Village soccer club.

The Village bond, the bond the athlete had with past and present soccer players, and the magnetism he created in his everyday life led to an onslaught of volunteers and participants.

Donnie Antonio, the tournament convenor, said Marion and Martha have been stalwarts in the kitchen over the years, but it is the dedication of his friends and people who didn’t even know him who have given up their civic holiday weekends for the cause.

“His high school friends—Red, Garch, Clutch, Giz and Richie—have manned the bar religiously over those 25 years,” said Antonio, referring to Hill, Rob Gartner, Kevin Hay, Gary Gizzie and Rich Legare. “Johnny Vanstone has been on the burgers, and Rich Ludchen, like his father Hans before him, makes sure the fields are ready.

“And the refs donate their time for free—on a long weekend.”

There is a spirit of giving that infuses the crowd—money from the tournament has gone to good causes like the hospital CT Scan, Project Share and Heart Niagara—but it has also been an opportunity to enjoy life and friendship, with so many of Emil’s friends reconvening for the cause.

“It brings me back to my youth,” said Hill. “Emil is what brought us all together, but the message is live for the moment, live for today. We’re outdoors, there’s music, friendship, and we talk about all the stuff back when we were young.

“These are the things that are most important.”

Emil’s daughter Emily has attended all the tournaments, often giving out the trophies to the winning teams, but Gartner said the volunteers’ kids have all grown up at the tournament, and they book off time to return as young adults.

The same goes for Gartner’s parents who have attended regularly, along with friends of their era. The link of the generations—even Emil has a two-year-old grandson who now attends—makes it easier to deal with Emil’s sudden departure from their lives, said Gartner.

“The past is important but so is the future,” he said. “We miss Emil and think about all that could have been, but then we think about all of the good that has come as a result of this tournament held in his honour. 

“It is bittersweet.”

Unlike Brigadoon, the mythical Scottish town that appears every 100 years, the people at the Emil Breuer Tournament age—both the players and the volunteers. The tournament used to be about players in their 20s, and now it is filled with graying over-35 teams. This being the 25th year of the tournament might be just the year to end their homage.

With that in mind, the Jonesy band will play Saturday July 31 at 8 p.m. at the Village.

On Sunday at the closing ceremonies, Marion said it will be difficult to contain the emotions when they do their annual moment of silence for Emil. What she loved about the tournament was that it was mainly “about getting people together. You see everybody once a year. It kept the memory of him going.”

(John Nicol is a former columnist from Niagara who once had the honour of living in Emil’s shadow.)

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