Melville Sydney "Butch" Keeling - Born August 10, 1905 in Owen Sound, Ontario – Died November 12, 1984 in Toronto, Ontario was a professional ice Hockey left winger and referee.

Keeling began his Hockey career in his hometown, learning the game at Victoria Public School under the tutelage of principal Henry Kelso, for whom Owen Sound's Kelso Beach was named. Several Victoria students, including Keeling, eventually ended up playing for the city's junior club, the Owen Sound Greys. He was a key member of the Greys when they captured their first Memorial Cup as Canadian junior hockey champions in 1924. Stats say he scored an incredible 37 goals and 46 points in only 15 playoff games.

Following his junior success, Keeling played one year of senior Hockey with the London Ravens, scoring 14 goals and 3 assists in 20 regular season games, and 2 goals, 1 assist in 4 playoff games.

Keeling's pro career began in 1926–27 with the London Panthers of the Canadian Professional Hockey League / CPHL, scoring 13 goals in 12 games and then he was quickly elevated to the NHL's Toronto St. Patricks, with whom he had signed as a free agent on September 7, 1926. Keeling played his 1st NHL game on December 30, 1926 vs the Boston Bruins, and would score his 1st NHL goal on January 8, 1927 vs Jake Forbes of the New York Americans.

The St. Pats changed their name to the Maple Leafs later that season. Despite playing in only 30 of Toronto's 44 games, Keeling finished fourth in team scoring with 11 goals and 13 points, right behind fellow Owen Sound native Hap Day. He repeated that showing in 1927–28, again placing right behind Day with 10 goals, 6 assists.

Keeling was then traded to the New York Rangers on April 16, 1928 with John Ross Roach for Lorne Chabot and Alex Gray.

Keeling slumped to only six goals and nine points for the Rangers in the 1928-29 season, although he did lead the league in playoff goals and points as the Rangers marched to the final against the Boston Bruins. Boston swept the best-of-three series for its first Stanley Cup win. Among the victorious Bruins was Cooney Weiland, who had starred with Keeling on the 1924 Greys.

On March 21, 1929, he scored only the second overtime goal in Rangers history when he accounted for the winner in the quarter-finals versus the New York Americans.

Keeling was a regular left winger with the New York Rangers in the 1930s. Playing behind the famous Boucher-Cook brothers line, Keeling pulled second line duty often with Murray Murdoch and either Cecil Dillon or Paul Thompson.

Keeling continued to rebound in 1929–30, registering career bests in goals (19) and points (26). Once again, he ended up fourth in team scoring. The Rangers went back to the Cup final in 1931–32 against Toronto but were again swept aside. It was another bitter disappointment for Keeling to see even more of his old mates skating off with the Cup.

But he and his new club got revenge in a rematch the following year, on April 13, 1933. Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens was the site of Game 4 of the 1933 Stanley Cup final, and the Rangers held a 2–1 lead in the best-of-five series. The contest was scoreless through three periods but was decided at the 7:33 mark of sudden-death overtime. According to an article which appeared in the April 24, 1933 edition of Time magazine,

"Butch Keeling took the puck at a face-off, whipped through the Toronto defense on the left side of the rink, made a pass all the way across the ice of which he later said: 'If I hadn't seen that Bill was there, I would have kept the puck myself.' Bill was Bill Cook, oldest active player on the Rangers, leading scorer of the National Hockey League ... (Cook) took the puck without breaking his stride, feinted to bring tall Lorne Chabot away from the Toronto net, then flipped the puck over Chabot's shoulder for the goal that ended the game 1 to 0, the series 3 to 1 and the 1933 Stanley Cup championship.

Keeling had finally won the Stanley Cup, but his finest campaign points wise as a professional was still yet to come. In 1936–37 he led the Rangers with a career-high 22 goals (third in the league) and matched his previous career best with 26 points. He was fourth in team scoring for the fifth time (he never did place higher than fourth in any of his NHL seasons) and also posted high-water marks in the playoffs, notching three goals and five points as the Rangers advanced to a fifth and deciding game in the 1937 Stanley Cup final against the Detroit Red Wings, but the Wings would become the first U.S. based team to win the Stanley Cup two years in a row.

Keeling left the NHL after the 1937–38 season and played one year with the Philadelphia Ramblers, a Rangers farm team in the International-American Hockey League / IAHL. Keeling was also the team's captain. He then became a player-coach with the Kansas City Greyhounds of the American Hockey Association / AHA during the 1939-40 season.

During Keeling's NHL career, he played in 526 regular season games, scoring 157 goals and 220 points. He added five goals and 11 points in 26 playoff contests.

Keeling later returned to the NHL, spending three seasons as a referee.

In 2009, Keeling was ranked No. 45 on the all-time list of New York Rangers in the book 100 Ranger Greats (John Wiley & Sons).

NOTE
McLauchlan was a Canadian candy company that produced a rare set of black and white Hockey cards. They featured players from the Owen Sound Greys, a local junior Hockey team.