The Gimli & District Lawn Bowling Club recently held the second annual Marcel Cherlet Memorial Tournament to honour one of the club’s founding members.
The Gimli Lawn Bowlers officially started in 1996 when Stonewall’s Lawn Bowling Club shut down. Cherlet and a few other Gimli lawn bowlers began with that club’s old equipment. Twenty-eight years later, they decided to start a club at home, and it has more members than ever before.
The club plays on a lawn owned by the rural municipality, but members maintain it. Cherlet was instrumental in securing the land the club still uses today, building the greens and the clubhouse, installing the irrigation system, applying for grants, and writing donation letter requests. Gimli Lawn Bowler Elaine Thompson said Cherlet would follow up on every single letter he wrote, letting no opportunity for the club pass him by.
When Thompson and her husband moved to Gimli in 2003, Cherlet was one of the first locals they met. He welcomed them to town—and to the lawn bowling club—with open arms.
Cherlet passed away two years ago but kept lawn bowling until the very end, showing up to every match with his grandson until he couldn’t anymore. Last year, the club held the first annual Marcel Cherlet Memorial tournament, with family members from across Canada attending. This year marked the second annual event, and Thompson said they have no plans to stop it in the future.
Along with lawn bowling, the tournament included a pulled pork lunch with salad and dessert and a lot of reminiscing, visiting, and camaraderie.
Twenty-four people participated in the tournament on Aug. 24, playing in six teams of four. Lawn bowling can be played in several ways — one-on-one, in pairs, three-on-three, or four-on-four. The Gimli & District Lawn Bowling Club meets every Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, playing cutthroat on Mondays (four people playing for themselves against each other), four on four on Tuesdays, and open pickup on Thursdays. Right now, the club has 40 members, more than twice as many as before COVID-19. Members are as young as eight and as old as 89. Anyone and everyone is welcome to join the club. Membership is $75 a person, which goes back into the upkeep of the greens, or people can pay $5 to play with the club once a week.
