There may be no right answer in the current discussion about parking lot, affordable housing project, and future of the Granite. I have to admit I would not want to be a Granite CC Board member OR a City of Winnipeg Councillor or bureaucrat right now. For sure, I wouldn’t want to be member of The Municipal Board charged with the final decision. (That Board reconvenes todayfor the four day of hearings.)

However, curling has been my sport from the time I played my first game with my dad at the age of seven – so I have an obvious bias.

Manitoba’s rich curling history is important to me and it should be to all Manitobans – not because it is curling but because it is Manitoba history.  

I admit I get excited every time I stumble upon a “new” curling pin from 1895, a “new” Yearbook from 1923, a “new” sweater from the 1940’s. There is no doubt in my mind these old things are an important part of curling history and of early Manitoba life. I believe it is vitally important for the young curlers of today to have an appreciation for the history of their sport – which began in the Red River settlement days and progressed to formation of the first curling organization west of Ontario in 1888.

For example, the Manitoba Curling Museum’s collection includes several curling “irons”. I think it is important for the people in our sport to know that the Granite Curling Club formed about 1880 when a group of curlers splintered from the existing Winnipeg Curling Club because they wanted to play the game with granites – not irons.

So obviously, I think it is important for not just young curlers but all Winnipeggers and all Manitobans to have the same feeling of awe and appreciation that I have for the nearly 150 year history of the Granite Curling Club when they drive by and especially when they walk into the grand old club building at 1 Granite Way in Winnipeg.

Admittedly, the building itself is ONLY 110+ years old but the club is such a central part of Manitoba’s great curling history. Soon after the club itself was created, Granite took the lead role (along with the Thistle) in forming the forerunner of the Manitoba Curling Association when five rural clubs were invited to a meeting for just that purpose. In the early 20^th century, it was a primary site for games in the annual Winnipeg bonspiel – deemed to be a sort of unofficial world championship of the time, attracting teams from as far away as Yukon, from the northern United States and occasionally even from Scotland. When Manitoba started its first Men’s Championship in 1925, it was played at the Granite. When the Brier was played outside Toronto for the first time (1940 in Winnipeg), it was a Granite team skipped by Howard Wood Sr. which represented Manitoba and won! Granite’s Ray Turnbull helped develop the first curling ‘how-to’ program, travelled the curling world teaching the sport and gets much of the credit for creating the first European World curling champions. When Manitoba won its first world championship, it was Granite’s Don Duguid team who were undefeated in 1970 and repeated, undefeated in 1971.

No question, that history will always exist whether or not the Granite CC building exists. However, it saddens me to think that the time may come, sooner than later, when the magnificent heritage which lies in the photos on the walls and the trophies in the showcases of that building will only be available in a Manitoba Curling Museum and not in the building where that history occurred.

I do not have the knowledge or wisdom to know what is right in the current debate about parking, affordable housing and the future of the club.

So yes, I am glad I am not one of the decisions makers on this.

Does the fate of the legendary club truly hang in the balance? I just don’t know how you make a decision which could add the iconic Granite building to the list of curling clubs which have disappeared in the last half century.

From the very first game that I ever played in the MCA bonspiel (in 1967 on sheet #2 at Granite against Bruce Hudson), I have played in every curling club in the city at one time or another. In addition to Granite, I have been a member of seven other clubs – four of them (Highlander, Wildewood, Transcona, Grain Exchange) all closed because their business model no longer worked.

I have played in many other clubs which no longer exist – West Kildonan, Victoria, CFB Westwin, CFB Fort Osborne, Strathcona, Civic Caledonian, Highlander, Thistle, Valour Road, Rossmere and Winter Club. All but Thistle, which burned down, closed because for various reasons, their volunteer board members believed their business model no longer worked. Winter Club and Rossmere, of course, still exist but their curling business model no longer worked. The second iteration of the Thistle, in the former Valour Road CC building, also closed because the business model no longer worked.

I do not know the Granite Curling Club’s business model particularly well. However, I do know that most curling club board members in Winnipeg and rural Manitoba face the fact daily that they are probably one major problem (like a broken down ice plant, a roof replacement or an irreversible drop in membership revenue) from having to debate the question – do we try to find the money or do we close the doors?.

At one time Winnipeg was unquestionably the “centre of the curling world”. That may no longer be the case; certainly other jurisdictions can make the argument that they now are.

That is as it may be. However, I will suggest this – if you offered any curler anywhere in the world an expenses paid trip to visit any curling club anywhere, the vast majority choice (perhaps the unanimous choice) would be Winnipeg’s Granite Curling Club. It is that well known and that important around the world.

I will never argue against the importance of the proposed housing project. I just don’t envy the position that the decision makers are in – if their decision about a parking lot and a housing project truly could lead to the demise of all that history and heritage.

Once in my life I had the chance to play golf at the Old Course at St Andrews. I said at the time, if it wasn’t so special, you’d plow it up. The same might be said for the Granite Curling Club – it is just an old building, no reason not to knock it down. The simple fact is that the Granite Curling Club is special. The decisions which affect its future must be made with that specialness, with all of that history, in mind.