On the east wall of the
Quesnel Curling Centre, a six sheet facility built to replace the rink which burned to the ground in the early morning of Monday January 4, 1965, Quesnel's largest mural, at 3,000 square feet, overlooks LeBourdais Park below. The new rink was built in 1965 at a cost of $88,100 as a four sheet rink, officially opened on Saturday, March 19, 1966. It was later expanded to six sheets. Ostensibly the artist, Leigh Cassidy hid no less than 43 small animals within the mural, keeping kids busy for years searching for them.
As mentioned below, the club's lounge is available to rent year round. As well the club has a full service kitchen and dining room, open whenever curling is on.
Below, to the right, is a half page newspaper ad the curling club posted in the November 25, 1995 issue of the Quesnel Cariboo Observer prior to the club's reopening following the fire.
The Quesnel Curling Centre started in 1935 with the help of a Mr. Harry Joyce who had just won $10,000 in a sweepstakes, actually a Newfoundland Sweepstakes. Mr. Joyce used the money to buy materials to build a 2-sheet curling rink and he sold $200 demand notes to curlers and also charged dues. Harry Joyce, Lloyd Harper, Gavin Dezell and George Miller were the founders of what is now the Quesnel Curling Centre. The original building was with natural ice and curlers had to buy their own rocks or borrow them from someone else.
The Quesnel Curling Centre was incorporated as a non-profit society in 1953 and has maintained that status ever since, run by volunteers and now has one full-time and two part-time staff.
We have six sheets of excellent curling ice available from the long weekend in October to the middle of March. Our ice technician and Manager is Dave Plant.
We have a concession with a full menu selection and is generally open whenever there is curling taking place. Come down and have lunch or supper. They also do Catering for all kinds of functions large or small. For information regarding catering please see the Kitchen Manager.
Our upstairs Lounge has a pool table and other games available and has an excellent view of the curling sheets below. There are TV’s showing the far house on every sheet of ice. This area is great for banquets and special occasions and is available to the general public to rent.
From the Quesnel Curling Centre