By Mark Clairmont

Scotty Bowman was there, Bob Pulfer, Kris King and the entire Chicago Blackhawks hockey team.

They were in Gravenhurst a few weeks ago for the visitation and funeral of Stan Tallon at St. Paul’s Catholic Church.

They were there to pay their respects and to honour and support friend and former NHLer Dale Tallon, GM of the league’s hottest young hockey team.

Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, Adam Burish….

It’s a heartening story that has captured the hearts of fans in the Windy City who have dubbed it “Millionaires Behaving Properly.”

And it’s why Canadian fans know their players are the best in the world – on and off the ice.

“It might have remained nothing more than local lore if not for the efforts of a few persistent e-mailers and fan message boards,” writes AP wire service writer Jim Litke.

The Blackhawks, an Original Six team, were in Toronto Nov. 22 to play the Leafs and I and editor Lois Cooper were there in centre ice seats with loyal fans who were cheering the induction of former captain Wendel Clark into the team’s hall of honour.

And it was a game, with the Leafs leading until the Hawks came back to win it in OT.

But as we caught a late supper and prepared to head back north the next day, home to snowy Gravenhurst, little did we know the same thoughts were going on in the visitors’ dressing room at the ACC.

The Hawks, who had a flight booked back to Chicago decided to stay over and come north the next day – instead of going home for the U.S. Thanksgiving.

Dale Tallon’s father had just died at The Landing retirement home in Huntsville. And he was staying over to help his mother, who was living in a condo at Taboo, with the funeral.

“It was a no-brainer that we were going to be there for Dale and his family,” Burish explained in a video posted on the Blackhawks website, in response to numerous queries the club received.

“Every guy in this locker room would say he’s a guy you would do anything for.”

So the team charterd a couple of buses Sunday and showed up at Cavill’s Funeral Home about 6:30 p.m. for the visitation. Twenty-four hours after the game they were back at the airport to fly home for Thanksgiving.

Litke said in his column: “What’s unique about the Blackhawks’ tale, and maybe hockey players in general, is that no one involved thought it was unusual enough to share with the rest of us. Part of it, no doubt, is because hockey resides at the edge of America’s crowded pro sports radar – at least until one player caves in a rival’s head or tastelessly talks about his girlfriend. But the other part of it is hockey’s ethos.

“When people ask which athletes are the best interviews, I always say, ‘Hockey players, hands down.’ Not because they come up with the most colourful or controversial quotes, but because they’re usually the most honest. For whatever reason – the game’s tradition, its Canadian roots, the fact that most players still labour at the low end of sport’s stratospheric salary scale – hockey guys tend to be more open, more polite and less impressed with their own stardom than their pro counterparts.

“That very sentiment was expressed countless times in the e-mails that pinged around the Internet the last few weeks. As classy and worthy of attention as team’s show of unity turned out to be, the consensus was no one in the Blackhawks thought to make a big deal out of it because they just assumed any hockey team would have done the same.

Tallon agreed, wrote Litke. “At first, I was, ‘OK, a couple of guys came.’ But then, as more and more of them came through the door, I almost forgot where I was,” the GM told Litke.

“I thought for a moment we were back in Chicago. “But I looked around and saw all these kids and it made me feel really good about what we’re doing,” he added. “It’s been our goal to have those types of players.

“I tell people my draft priorities are, in order: character, speed, skill, size and then more character. You never have enough of that. Litke continued.

“Somewhere along the bus ride back from Gravenhurst, a few of the players decided it would be a good idea to pull off the road and into a McDonald’s. Burish said it was Kane’s idea, or maybe it came from Jonathan Toews, since both budding superstars figured their trading cards would be at the bottom of the sacks of burgers and fries everyone ordered – and they couldn’t wait to rub it in. Sure enough, posters of both players were tacked to a wall.

“And this being hockey-mad, small-town Ontario, it didn’t take people in the place long to figure out who the two dozen millionaires in suits dropping by in the middle of a Sunday afternoon were. Any doubts were removed once Kane and Toews started showing off the trading cards to teammates, then signing autographs for some of the patrons. Kane insisted in another video clip that he didn’t know the promotion was going on, and denied Burish’s claim the McDonald’s stop was Kane’s idea.

“He is probably just mad he didn’t have one in there,” Kane said, referring to a Burish trading card. But Burish, being a hockey player and all, probably couldn’t have cared less.”

Manager Barry Gottschalk, who was busy behind the counter, told TODAY the staff and customers didn’t pay much attention at first, when they came in about 9 p.m.

There was only one male staff, and he was in back making all the Big Macs for the Hawks.

“They were just customers,” said Gottschalk. “Then one of the team staff told us who they were.

“It’s too bad there weren’t more people here,” he said, admitting NHLers often come in when they’re at the Kris King Hockey School or at a Musoka cottage.

Nicole Morris, who was one of five serving them triple Big Macs and McFlurries, said they bought two or three packs of the hockey cards looking for Toews or Kane cards, which come in random packs of three. But she doesn’t think they found one.

“It’s nice of them to stop in,” said Gottschalk, especially when there’s a Hortons across the road.

“It’s unique to have a whole team,” who stayed about a half hour.

Then it was back to Toronto and 24 hours later back on the plane home to family in Chicago with lots to give thanks for.