Rollin’ on Kelvin Ladies bowlers knocking ’em down and having a ball, for the long haul By: David Sanderson Posted: 12:29 PM CST Friday, Feb. 21, 2025

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 21/02/2025 (235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Upon delivering her ball, a bowler named Elsie performs a bit of body English by animatedly kicking out her left foot, as if to will the slow-moving sphere into knocking down a lone corner pin. (Good news! It worked!)

Two lanes over, another bowler, Pearl, high-fives her cheering teammates on her way back to her seat after firing a third-frame strike.

Meanwhile, a voice coming over the in-house public-address system reminds everybody there is free coffee and birthday cake to be enjoyed, in honour of two bowlers who today are toasting their 80th trip around the sun.

Welcome to Billy Mosienko Lanes, home of the Kelvin Ladies bowling league, likely one of the longest-running five-pin bowling leagues in the city.

Although none of those who currently belong to the 30-week, Monday-afternoon circuit can say for certain, the consensus seems to be that the league, reserved for women age 55 and over, got its start close to 75 years ago.

That makes complete sense, one bowler points out, given that until 1963, a lengthy stretch of nearby Henderson Highway was called Kelvin Street. The way some understand the story, female bowlers from “the other side of the (Red) river” founded the league in the early 1950s, a few years after Winnipegger Billy Mosienko, a Hockey Hall of Fame inductee best-remembered for scoring the fastest hat trick in National Hockey League history, established his namesake locale in 1947 at 1136 Main St.

“It was called the Kelvin Ladies league when I joined 40 years ago, and we see no reason to ever change that,” comments Joanne Winiosz, 78.

League president May Hample, 88, picked up the sport in 1955. She was 19 years old and living in Edmonton when her co-workers convinced her to join their weeknight league, which kicked off at 5 p.m., 30 minutes after their shift ended.

“I remember we had to be off the lanes at 7 p.m. sharp, because that was the next league’s start time. Back then, the lanes were full, seven nights a week,” she recalls. (During the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, an estimated 10 million North Americans belonged to either a five- or 10-pin bowling league, but by 2019, that number had dwindled to 1.3 million.)

Hample and her husband moved to Winnipeg from Ottawa in 1975. Soon thereafter, she took up lawn bowling at St. John’s Park, close to where they were living. It was there she heard about the Kelvin Ladies’ group. She was “retired” at the time, she says with a wide grin, and since the league ran from September to April, the same way it does today, she figured it would be a great way to meet people, especially since the 3 p.m. finish time allowed her to get home before her young ones returned from school.

The league consisted of 10 five-person teams when Hample joined. Present-day participation — seven squads of four each — make up roughly half of that number, owing to numerous factors, she says, cradling a reddish-pink ball, one of two she brings with her in an equipment bag, week in and week out.

“When I started, nobody worked — we were all housewives. That and hardly anybody went away in the winter, at least not the people we were hanging out with. Nowadays, everybody’s either working or gone off to Mexico… or they’re at the casino. We try to get new members every year, but it’s really tough.”

Although their association is classified as a leisure league, Hample, who entered her fair share of tournaments back in the day, says the competitive juices still burn within her. She fractured her right arm six years ago from slipping on a patch of ice, except rather than take even a week off, she taught herself to bowl left-handed.

“I also wear a brace on my left knee, not that it does me much good,” she continues, nodding to a teammate who has just called out to let her know her turn’s up. “My best score ever is 357 but these days, I’m lucky to break 100. Not that that prevents me from having a good time.”

At 90, Anna Tynes is one of the league’s senior members. She already belonged to a Thursday-morning mixed league at Mosienko Lanes when a lady on her team mentioned the Monday-afternoon goings-on. Now she bowls there twice a week, for the camaraderie, sure, but also as a way to get some exercise.

“It’s like I tell my grandkids, if I come here and throw 90 balls a day, it has to be good for something, right?”

Tynes lives a few blocks away, on Cathedral Avenue, but her fellow bowlers show up from all corners of the city, as well as from East and West St. Paul.

“Mosienko Lanes has been an institution in this part of town for years and years,” she says.

“Most of the people here are either from the North End, or they grew up in the North End.”

Rod Squires has been with the company that owns Mosienko Lanes for 43 years. (They also operate Uptown Alley on St. Matthews Avenue, and Westwood Lanes and Games, on Westwood Drive.)

He started on Main Street 10 years ago as a maintenance mechanic, but he has since morphed into a jack of all trades. Forty-five minutes before the Kelvin Ladies league commences at 1 p.m., you’ll spot him behind the main counter, laying out pairs of rental shoes — he’s memorized everybody’s foot size — and preparing a multi-gallon urn of coffee.

“Years ago, league play was every alley’s priority, but when glow bowling became a thing in, I want to say the 1980s, open play really took off,” Squires says, folding towels he’ll place at each lane momentarily for those who want to dry their palms between tosses.

“It’s still like that today, depending on the house. Plus the pandemic didn’t do leagues, here and elsewhere, any favours. Personally, we lost our Monday-, Tuesday- and Wednesday-morning leagues, and are down to nine from what was over 20 (leagues) in total. Even this group dropped in numbers for a while there, but they’re back to seven teams now, which is nice to see.”

Lori Sanderson (no relation to writer) was out for a stroll with a neighbour of hers last summer when the topic turned to bowling. Sanderson’s companion mentioned she was looking forward to the start of her Monday-afternoon league at Mosienko Lanes, to which Sanderson remarked, was that alley even still around?

“I bowled here probably 30 years ago in what, back then, was more of a drinking league,” Sanderson says with a wink. “I stopped after having my kids, but when my neighbour told me they were looking for new members, I thought why not give it a try again? This is my first year in the league and I’m absolutely loving it.”

With an average score of 154, Sanderson, in her late 50s, is currently the league’s fifth-highest-ranked bowler. Not that she’s overly impressed with her performance to date.

“Let’s just say I’m glad I’m better at other things than I am at bowling,” she says, preparing to take her turn. “Plus I don’t want (my average) to be too high, otherwise there’s pressure to keep it up.”

A passing bowler chuckles, hearing Sanderson use the word “pressure.”

“That word doesn’t exist in this league,” she says, pausing to gobble down a forkful of birthday cake. “We’re definitely here for the fun of it.”

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca