As the 2020 Tim Hortons Brier, Canada’s men’s curling championship, gets ever closer, we continue to check out the sport at a local level.
One of the biggest names in Kingston curling is Ted Brown, who represented the province and the Cataraqui Club at the 1975 championship in Fredericton, New Brunswick.
“Great memories,” Brown recalled.
“We had a super week and we had a lot of good games. Good competition — certainly can’t complain.”
That Brier foursome, which finished with a record of 6 and 5, included skip Dr. Alex Scott as well as Mike Boyd and Tom Miller. Brown says they had a pretty solid foursome.
“Especially our front end, we were super strong,” he said.
“I think they were voted one and two on the all-star team.”
Brown is a Kingston and District Sports Hall of Famer. Not only has he played the game at the highest level, he’s also coached provincial and national champions as well as being a curling innovator with the Brownie Brush
“Being in the upholstery business, I took a couple of brooms over and cut the hair off of them and had my guys glue some foam on it and cover it with a nylon fabric,” he said, describing how the brushes got their start. “Bill Lewis said ‘make me up four of these,’ so we made up four.
“They didn’t look very pretty, but anyway, he was the start of getting me involved in it.”
Brown says they ended up selling six or seven thousand Brownie Brushes a year, so it became a pretty good business for a while.
Brownie Brushes were made in Kingston from 1980 to 2005. As for this year’s national championship, the wild card game is set for Friday, Feb. 28, as Glen Howard takes on Mike McEwen.
The tournament begins the following day on Feb. 29.