Hall of Famers come in all shapes and sizes. They have all sorts of backgrounds, resumes and traits that make them who they are. And no rule or law says only players can go into a Hall of Fame. 

Never has that been more true than this summer, on Sunday, July 12, 2026, when The New York State Hockey Hall of Fame is set to induct a man who rose from humble beginnings on Long Island, with a desire to pursue journalism, only to end up as a long time executive for the New York Islanders and is currently the Executive Director of the marvelous Companions in Courage Foundation. It’s important to note that Companions In Courage has built 20 interactive game rooms in children’s hospitals across North America and recently served its one millionth patient. 

That man, correction, that Hall of Fame electee, is none other than Jim Johnson. 

Johnson has seen and done it all. He has led people and departments to high levels of success and is even the reason behind Section 329 at Islanders home games. 

*Editor’s note: Questions and Answers have been lightly edited for clarity.

Question: What was your reaction when you got the call that you were chosen for induction?

Johnson: “Well, I get calls from Rene (LeRoux) pretty frequently. We discuss potential other candidates for The Hall. He had called me; this is part of my story, I guess. I’m in the process of going through cancer treatments, experimental treatments, in Los Angeles. I really had to apply a lot of what I learned in hockey towards my health situation. 

“I have spent quite a bit of time out in California with a very unique doctor, who has figured it out and basically, he’s cured me. It’s an unbelievable story. 

“But what wound up happening was, I was in the process of (going) back and forth to California. I had been flying there once a week to get treatments. So Rene had called me about, I don’t know, three or four times and I hadn’t had a chance to call him back. When I finally called him back, he said, ‘We had a meeting with the committee and I’m proud to welcome you to the Hall of Fame.’ 

“I thought he was kidding. I just kept on with the conversation. And then he said, ‘That’s your reaction to being inducted into the Hall of Fame?’ I was like, ‘I thought you were kidding.’ He said, ‘No.’ He said, ‘We have a five-person committee and we considered all that you’ve done in the game and around the game and we would like to welcome you to The Hall in July.’ And I am still humbled by that conversation and completely flattered by the honor.”

Question: Everyone always says that going through cancer treatments is a very dark time, so was that call a beacon of light for you?

Johnson: “It was. There were a whole bunch of things going on at that moment. I was not having the best of weeks. I’ll just put it that way. When he called me with that news, I literally felt, ‘Okay, this is just a bad joke. One of my friends must have told him to do this to cheer me up or something.’ And then, it was a completely independent event that closed out what had been a pretty bad week for me, emotionally. As I said, I’m still humbled by the whole honor.”

Question: What are some of the things you learned in hockey, especially during your time working for the Islanders, that you’ve carried over in everyday life?

Johnson: “Well, the whole involvement in hockey was an accident. I was probably 22 or 23 years old and I was working for a magazine for people who collected sports memorabilia. And as part of those responsibilities, I had to go to baseball card shows and things like that, represent the magazine and then also do stories. 

“I was looking for angles on stories and I was at a baseball card show in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, and I met this guy who had a booth set up. The Islanders had just won their second Cup and this guy had the best photographs I had seen to that point; autographed and framed of the team celebrating on the ice with the Cups. So, I bought two of his photos and it turned out that he was from Long Island and we became fast friends. 

“His name was Mike Klein and Mike had grown up in The Bronx, was a big hockey fan. He lived in Garden City. He had four or five kids and they were season-ticket holders. He and I were friends. The magazine I worked for moved to San Diego; it was a husband and wife team primarily. My friend Mike called me and he said, ‘What are you gonna do?’ Because I was working for them. 

“I said, ‘I’m gonna go out and help them get set up, but then I’m coming back to Long Island and New York. I’ll probably go to work at a chain of weekly newspapers or at Newsday, but I’m gonna be back.’ And he said, ‘Before you do anything, why don’t you give me a call, come over to my house and let’s talk about a possible business arrangement.’ I was like, ‘Okay.’ 

“Again, I’m 22 years old. Prospects were what they were. So I went over to his house and we sat on his porch and we had a beer. He said, ‘The Islanders have just won their second Cup. I don’t think the local media does a good enough job covering them the way they should. Why don’t we start a magazine for the Islanders?’ He goes, ‘You’re a good writer. I have plenty of money.’ He had retired from Wall Street. I don’t think Mike was 50 years old and he had already retired. 

“So I said, ‘That sounds like a great idea. How do we get started?’ He went inside his house, got a phone book and dialed a number. Now I think he’s pranking me. He goes, ‘Hello, this is Michael Klein. I’m a season ticket holder. I’d like to speak with Mr. Torrey.’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, yeah, I can hold on.’ The whole time, I’m listening to one end of this conversation, going, ‘The hell’s he doing? There’s no way Bill Torrey’s gonna take a phone call from a guy off the street.’ 

“Obviously, somebody picks up the phone on the other end and he says, ‘Hello, Mr. Torrey, my name is Michael Klein, season ticket holder. My friend and I have a fantastic idea for a publication for the Islanders and we’d like the opportunity to set up a meeting and come in to tell you about it.’ And then he says something like, ‘Oh, 20 minutes? Yeah, sure, we could be there.’ He hangs up the phone and Mike says, ‘Come on, let’s go.’ I go, ‘Come on, where?’ He said, ‘We’re going to The Coliseum. We’re gonna meet Bill Torrey.’ 

“I said, ‘What the hell are we gonna tell him?’ He goes, ‘Well, we’re gonna tell him that we have this idea for a magazine. Don’t worry, I’ll do all the talking.’ I said, ‘Okay, as long as you’re gonna do all the talking, I’ll go.’ 

“So the two of us jump in his car, we drive over to The Coliseum, it’s 10 minutes from his house. We go to the front desk and they usher us into Bill Torrey’s office. I’m wearing shorts and a golf shirt. I was totally unprepared. We go into Bill Torrey’s office and he’s got these big leather chairs. He’s got a replica of the Stanley Cup behind the desk and Bill Torrey walks in. And I’m just blown away. 

“I’m like, (to myself), ’10 minutes ago I was sitting on a guy’s wraparound porch in Garden City drinking a beer and now I’m shaking Bill Torrey’s hand. I can’t believe this.’ So Mike says, ‘Mr. Torrey, thank you for taking this meeting on such short notice. We have this great idea and Jim’s gonna tell you all about it.’ 

“I was like ‘homina, homina, homina.’ I made up something, I don’t know. Bill is looking us over. He says, ‘You know what? I like you guys. See my attorney on the way out. He’ll write up the papers that allow you to use the team’s logo and good luck with your venture.’ Eight weeks later, the first edition of ‘Islander News’ rolled off the presses and we had a business where it was a monthly publication. We sold it at newsstands in New York. We sold by subscription, too. And it was pretty successful. 

“The team loved it. You had such great access to this amazing team. I guess, about two or three years in, Mike had purchased land in Arizona and he was gonna go out to Arizona to start developing a residential neighborhood and some commercial property. He said to me, ‘Do you want to continue on?’ I said, ‘Yeah, but I can’t do this by myself. I need at least you to help me.’ We were selling the ads, getting the subscriptions and writing the stories. 

“The thing that was great about the publication was that we gave voice to people who, ordinarily, Jiggs McDonald, as an example, was the broadcaster. But he had so many great stories that he just didn’t have time to share on the air. We had young people like Kenny Albert and Paul Fichtenbaum, who went on to be the publisher of The Athletic. Michael A. Berger, who’s still with Fox NFL in California. So, we did that. Obviously, we had Stan Fischler. We had a great column from Bill Chadwick. 

“It was a unique blend of coverage of the Islanders and of hockey. So, I went to the Islanders and I said, ‘Listen, Mike’s gonna go.’ And they said, ‘We’ll buy the publication and you come and work for us and do the publication in-house.’ So that’s what I did for a year. By that point, the Islanders had won their Cups. We went to The Final in ’84, and then things started going south. The dynasty started breaking up. We had guys like Pat LaFontaine come in and Pat Flatley. Brent Sutter was still around. Kelly Hrudey. But the team was not going to be the dominant team that the world had come to expect. 

“At that point, the team had exactly two sales guys. They would come in and supposedly, they had a waiting list from during the Cup years. As soon as we started losing subscribers, I said, ‘We’ll go to their vaunted waiting list,’ and it didn’t exist. So, Mr. Torrey came to me and he said, ‘Listen, can you find somebody else to do the magazine?’ I interviewed and hired Chris Botta to come in and do that, and Mr. Torrey said, ‘I want you to run our sales and marketing.’ 

“So, I moved over to that side of the house and I had to basically build a sales team from scratch. Ticket sales and some of the marketing and so forth. I brought the first computers, Apple Macintoshes, probably in 1990, into the Islander office. To that point, the season ticket base was contained on four-by-six index cards in the controller’s office. It was just a different time. We probably had 40 employees. I think almost half of them were accountants. They were just there counting money. 

“It was really an unusual time that could never be replicated. But it really taught us to serve as kind of grassroots developers of a sales organization, which was weird because you had already had so much great success. But the sales were really driven by the performance of the team and not the sales department.”

Question: If he were still alive today, how do you think Bill Torrey would react to hearing, Jim Johnson, New York State Hockey Hall of Famer?

Johnson: “He’d be enormously proud. It was a family. The Islander front office was a family. We had some older people that Bill had hired. Estelle Ellery was the first employee of the Islanders. She worked for Eddie Shore! (Laughs). She knew Bill and Bill knew that he could trust her to get the Visas done and get all of the player stuff done. 

“We had Barney Kremenko, who was the guy who gave Willie Mays the nickname ‘The Say Hey Kid.’ Barney worked in marketing. Barney was at the end of the line, but Bill had a soft spot for him. He gave a start to guys like Greg Bouris. 

“We were one big family and I think he would be enormously proud of the success. I mean, listen, my Hall of Fame thing is an accumulative success story for what he built. And then he went and replicated it in Florida. 

“I think he would just be proud to know that his legacy was carried on by a group of people who he had a significant influence over. And I’m proud to be one of Bill’s kids. I still am very close with all four of his boys. It’s a shame Bill’s not with us, but time passes and just the fact that I had him in my life was a blessing.”

Question: Last question, what’s your connection with Section 329?

Johnson: “I’m the ‘Founder’ of Section 329, the ubiquitous group of fans that has evolved since the 1990’s and followed the team from The Coliseum to Barclays Center and now to UBS! In the ‘dog days’ (and I don’t mean Duane Sutter!) of the early ‘90s, a group of college-aged fans parked themselves in a corner of The Coliseum on a night when the building was dead. 

“Late in the first period, the small group erupted with such gusto, during a TV timeout, that even the players on the ice stopped and looked up at them. Intrigued, I moved down to a section over and watched as a leader led them in cheers. I ran down to the box office and pulled 20 tickets for our next game. 

“During the second intermission, I pulled the leader aside and introduced myself. I learned they were students from Hofstra and Nassau Community and they were just blowing off steam before midterms. I told them how I loved their energy and asked if they might be able to attend our next game. 

“The deal was cinched when I handed them 20 free tickets. I encouraged them to bring drums and noisemakers and they attended every game while school was in session. They brought such life to the building. 

“I later learned that current Tampa Head Coach, Jon Cooper, was among those early 329ers. The group has evolved, but they remain ‘Section 329,’ even when we played in buildings that didn’t have that numbered section!”

For more of Sportsology.com’s coverage of The 2026 NYS Hockey Hall of Fame Class, you can see our interviews with fellow inductees, Josh Bailey, Nick Fotiu, Don Stevens and Steve Janaszak. We will be on-site in Troy, covering the event live on Sunday, July 12th.