For a lot of people, sports is seen as a way to get out, to escape poverty and a difficult life. This was certainly true in the case of former Argo quarterback Jerry Doucette, who played with the team for six years in the 1950's.
As Doucette would readily admit, he and his wife Mildred "both came from, you could say, the wrong side of the tracks". Growing up in "the Junction", a tough working-class neighbourhood around Keele and Dundas in Toronto's west-end, Doucette was raised by his grandparents and attended Etobicoke Collegiate, where his football talent would first come to the surface.
"One of the people who helped straighten me out was (Etobicoke football coach) Pete Jackson," said Doucette, who last Sunday helped his former teacher celebrate his 91st birthday. "He hammered the (crap) out of me. But seriously, he's really a nice man."
Aside from Jackson, Doucette also gives a lot of credit to his wife, the former Mildred Grosse, a promising track star and Ontario's female athlete of the year in 1950, who missed the Olympics in 1948 because she couldn't afford to go.
"They tell me, 'Jerry, you're lucky you married that woman," said Doucette, whose been married for 42 years and has four children (Mike, Stephen, Jill and Sue) and five grandchildren.
The year they got married was the year Doucette joined the Argos, and in 1955 they almost made it to the Grey Cup, and it was the closest they would come in his career.
"We were playing (the Eastern final) in Montreal and we were up by a pretty good score at halftime," said Doucette. "But they kicked a late field goal to win the game, and I still don't think it went in."
For the most part, Doucette was a back-up quarterback, as well as the punter and kickoff specialist, to go along with playing some defensive halfback. However, he finally got his chance to play as the first-string pivot in 1959.
"The only real chance I got was when Ronnie Knox was here and we were playing against Ottawa at Exhibition Stadium," said Doucette. "I went in for him and won the game, and he quit the team after that game. We had four games left in the season, and we went 3-and-1 with me at quarterback."
Doucette was pencilled in as the starter the next season, but had a disagreement with assistant coach Teddy Morris about the offence and was promptly let go.
"I was given a good chance and I blew it because of my big mouth," admitted Doucette, who finished his career with single seasons in Calgary and Montreal.
Away from football, Doucette worked for Vardon Reid Accountants for three years ("I was going to be a C.A., but that was set aside"), and then he went into the packaging industry, where he worked for Price Wilson Limited for eight years and then Atlas Paperboard Boxes for 30 years, before retiring three years ago. In between, he also had a one-year stint as the Argonauts director of ticket sales.
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