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A Captain Wastie has the honour to be named “the Father of Curling” in Brandon. It is thought that the game arrived in Brandon on the afternoon of Saturday January 16th in the winter of 1883-84 when the first Rink was made just north of the CPR tracks.  
 
There were three sheets of ice available for play, with a canvas roof overhead to keep the snow off the ice surface. The rocks were purchased in Winnipeg for $25 a pair, but unlike today’s rock’s they were not all a uniform size. The first game was between Captain Wastie, and Judge D. M. Walker who played the last end with the aid of lamps, the score was 13 to 8.  
 
The games were 16 ends long and teams played 4 games in one day. Andrew Kelly, A. R. Erwin, John Hanbury, Peter Payne, Captain Wastie, and John Hurst promoted these early games.  
 
Sometime later the Caledonian Curling Rink was located on the southeast corner of 10th Street and Princess Avenue, and the third Rink was on the northeast corner of 10th Street and Victoria Avenue.  
 
The Caledonian Rink (history)  
 
Murdoch McKenzie, (later to become an Alderman), and William Hopper built the Caledonian Rink in 1903. It was the Rink situated on the southeast corner of Tenth Street and Princess Avenue West of the Prince Edward Hotel.  
 
A bank sold them the land for $1.00 and loaned them $85,000 to cover the cost of construction. Messer’s McKenzie and Hopper believed in shopping at home and insisted that their contractors purchase all the lumber from Hanbury’s Mill: only local lumber was used through out the building except the roof.  
 
This was covered with sheet iron plates because on the east side was the Canadian Northern Railway, (C.N.R.) spur line, and on the south side was the Brandon Electric Light Company generating station, both renown for spewing hot sparks from their respective chimney’s.  
 
During the summer months the arena floor was covered with sections of spruce surfaced with maple, twenty-four feet by twenty-four feet, bolted together to make a smooth surface to roller skate upon. In the winter starting in November when it was sufficiently cold to maintain an ice surface, young boys in exchange for skating privileges carried condensed steam from the next-door electric plant in pails.  
 
At this time this Rink was the major sports facility of Brandon. In 1905, the community witnessed its first summer theatre season at this Rink: it became the home of the newly formed Brandon Operatic Society, who had among its illustrious patrons, Senator Kirchhoffer, Dr. S. W. McInnis and Mayor Fleming.  
 
On a Sunday in 1906 the caretaker of the Rink, Mr. Robert McKelvie allowed Mr. William Sutherland to warm himself. Later it was discovered that the Ice Palace refreshment room had been forcibly entered.  
 
Chief Boyd soon located a suspect, and charged him with break and enter, and also charged him with the several months old Mutter and Lynch safe robbery. Mr. Sutherland pleaded guilty and received two years less a day.  
 
When World War One broke out, there were no Military Orchestras available to supply music to the skaters, so the owners recruited their music from elsewhere. They signed contracts with the senior members of the Salvation Army, but as they were purveyors of peace they refused to perform military music.  
 
Instead, couples had to skate to inspirational music like, “When the Roll is called up yonder”, and “I’ll be there.” In 1915 there was a Real Estate boom and the “Callie” as it was known became publicly owned after a Tax Sale.  
 
Towards the end of the War, it was used during the day for military purposes, and by night for mixed skating. The rink was finally turned into coal sheds for electric power interests.  
 
By 1920, it became a danger to pedestrians on the street when spring gales blew the metal plates from the roof, and severed the tops of adjacent trees. The city condemned the structure before any ratepayers were decapitated and it was dismantled.  
 
The wreckers helped young hunters to salvage from the debris over four dozen pucks lost during the hundreds of hockey games played in this old structure. The lumber and sheet iron plates were then sold at Auction.  
 
Source: The Wheat City, by Fred McGuinness. Daly House Museum Archives. Brandon, a City by G. F. Barker.