Henri Richard

It started almost two decades ago with a $20 hockey stick once wielded by a forgotten player for a string of mediocre teams.It ends at the auction block this week when millions of dollars are likely to change hands. This may be the world's largest game-worn collection of memorabilia from the world's best player from the sport's last dynasty.Shawn Chaulk owns a hoard of everything Wayne Gretzky. He says it's all for a singular cause that only a full-blooded hockey lover can savor."When you're a fan, fans are usually at a distance," he recently told The Canadian Press in the basement office of his home in Fort McMurray.The space is a forest of game-used Gretzky hockey sticks, a dressing room of game-worn Gretzky jerseys and a trainer's bag full of assorted pucks, gloves, helmets and skates — all touched, used and sweated in by the Great One himself."You love the game. You love the athletes, at a distance. At best, you get to attend an event and see them in person. Again, from a distance....

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