Grafton Curling Club

About Grafton Curling Club

Grafton Curling Club: Home of Two U.S. Men’s National Champions

Grafton Curling Club has been a fixture of winter life in this Red River Valley town since 1956, when Glenn Gilleshammer founded it and became its first president. Gilleshammer, who had already helped start the Walsh Curling Club in Park River in 1952, went on to win five North Dakota state titles between 1958 and 1964 and the 1960 U.S. men’s national championship, and he was inducted into the USA Curling Hall of Fame in 2000.

Grafton produced a second national champion in 1972, when Robert LaBonte’s rink won the U.S. title and came agonizingly close at the world championship before losing to Canada after an unlucky tenth-end deflection.

Today the volunteer-led nonprofit, affiliated with USA Curling and the Dakota Territory Curling Association, curls at its club on East 7th Street with an upstairs lounge for members. Leagues run from youth programs and social play to competitive curling, and Learn to Curl sessions welcome newcomers. The bonspiel calendar includes the Extra End Open, now in its seventh year, and a Cosmic Curling Bonspiel in March.