‘Cool little piece of history’: Century-old Manitoba curling pin found in the wall of Seattle home

Alexandra Holyk reports on the Washington homeowner who’s hurrying hard to figure out a Manitoban mystery.

A piece of Manitoba curling history has been found, but not in the province and not even in the country. Instead, in the wall of a Seattle home.

Ian Leach and Flora Worley made the discovery when they decided to renovate a closet in their soon-to-be newborn’s room.

Leach started pulling apart the wall and found a small pin medallion inside.

It reads “Winnipeg to Dawson” on the top of the pin and “20th Bonspiel 1908” on the bottom. In the middle is a large black bison that appears to be running.

“I’m a carpenter, so every once in a while we find stuff in walls, like notes or somebody’s stash. But this was the first time I found anything that was that cool. I was like, ‘Oh wow, this is pretty cool,’” said Leach.

With the discovery comes a lot of questions - the first being, how did this get here?

“That’s the thing that I don’t really understand. The pin is from 1908. The house was built in 1926. So I figure that one of the carpenters in the house must have been a curler, I guess? I don’t know.”

Leach posted about his discovery on social media and said it has garnered a lot of interest.

“It’s just a cool little piece of history that somehow made it down here to the States. It’s just pretty, pretty cool. And it’s pretty cool all the interest that is happening from it.”

Leach did send a picture of his find to the Manitoba Curling Museum, hoping to get more answers.

Resby Coutts, a Manitoba curling historian, said he is fascinated by the pin. He doesn’t know exactly where it came from but has been speculating how it came to be.

“The Manitoba Curling Association Bonspiel was established in 1888 – the first and largest bonspiel in western Canada at the time, and still is actually. So 1908, you say, ‘Well, the 20th anniversary refers to that.’ But of course, if you count on your fingers, 1908 is really 21. So you wonder, did they simply make the same mistake that a lot of people make when they said 20th? So those are the things we know, then you begin to speculate,” said Coutts.

Back then, the Manitoba Curling Association Bonspiel was the one to attend if you were a skilled curler, so it might be possible that someone or a team from Dawson City, Yukon, attended the event and the pin was a gift when Winnipeg curlers went to the Dawson Bonspiel the next year.

“But one of the things that I wonder - the bison on the pin appears to be raised…it’s very reminiscent of the bison on the official Manitoba Curling Association pin of that era. That pin also had a raised bison image on it. And so then you speculate, was it somewhat official?”

The pin by itself is as big of a mystery as it is for Coutts, but how it ended up in the wall of a Seattle home adds a whole other dimension to the story.

“That’s the really fascinating question, because while Seattle has been well known in United States curling, it certainly was not in as large a way at that time as Winnipeg and probably even Dawson,” he said.

“Was it somebody from Winnipeg who moved there and was building? Was it someone from (Dawson)? It’s fascinating to think about.”

Delving into his own speculation, Leach said someone sent him a link pointing out it could have been part of the prize given out during the O’Grady Challenge.

The Challenge was named after Colonel J.W. DeCourcy O’Grady, who was the president of the Manitoba Curling Association. The first trophy for the O’Grady Challenge was handed out in 1908.

“They gave out pendants and cufflinks, so I was thinking, maybe it could be that,” said Leach.

Leach and Worley have a little bet on what they think it is; Leach thinks it’s a pin, while Worley is certain it is the top of a cufflink.

As for what they plan to do with it, Leach said he still wants more information first before he decides next steps.

“Maybe the museum needs it for their collection,” said Leach.

Coutts said he knows the museum would love to have it.

“If there is a connection between Winnipeg and the Manitoba Curling Association and this pin and the bonspiel in Dawson, it ties things together in a way that I’ve never seen in any of our collections…Our Manitoba Curling Museum would love to have it in our collection if it were made available to us,” said Coutts.