The grand old days of the ‘Old Ex’ grounds

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 12/07/2021 (1881 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

From the 1960s through to the early 1990s, the Old Exhibition Grounds was one of the city’s prime locations for amateur sport.

To reach the grounds, visitors would enter off Dufferin Avenue at the east end of the area, which ran west almost to McPhillips Street. The north boundary was Flora Place. A long parking lot on the south side backed against business yards on Jarvis Avenue.  

Players and fans who spent weekday evenings and weekends there called the location “Old Ex.”

In the 1960s and into the 1970s, the four softball diamonds were used on a regular basis by fastball leagues. Fans will remember some of the top teams from the Winnipeg Men’s Industrial League, such as the Manitoba Government Norquay Cafeteria squad with ace pitchers Gerry Edmunds and Bernie Ziemanski, a City of Winnipeg team called Civics managed by league and Manitoba Softball Association president Jim Adams, and Canada Packers, which featured future Manitoba Softball Hall of Fame honoured member Lorne Jasper.

In 1967, the city’s first lighted softball park was built near McPhillips Street in time for that summer’s Pan Am Games. It was named Charlie Krupp Memorial Stadium in honour of the North End athlete, coach and philanthropist. Krupp became home to the men’s and women’s senior A fastball leagues, which had been playing at the West End Memorial Grounds, further south on McPhillips.

When time slots were available at Krupp, the Industrial League also scheduled games there. In the summer of 1967, the Molson Canadians managed by Ray Charambura won Manitoba’s only Canadian Amateur Softball Association (CASA) senior men’s title and the following year the Krupp-based team finished second at the world championship in Oklahoma City. The Molson lineup included HOF members pitcher Ken Dilk and captain Ted Lanyon, a pro hockey player in the winter.
In 1968, when Manitoba hosted the CASA senior women’s championship, CUAC Blues and Tigerettes represented our province.

So much rain hit Winnipeg that Krupp became unplayable and the tournament was moved indoors to the Winnipeg Arena. Saskatoon Imperials won the title. In 1970, when the Canadian men’s championship was held at Krupp, the final games were washed out and the championship was awarded to London Cable TV with a 6-0 record. Concord Knights represented Manitoba.

In 1973, the Western Major Fastball League came to Krupp with the Winnipeg Colonels playing weekend doubleheaders against teams from Saskatchewan and Alberta. Led by pitcher Ralph Ens and a nucleus from the Knights, the Colonels won the championship that season. During the 1970s, fans packed Krupp and Old Ex on the August long weekends to watch men’s and women’s teams compete in elimination tournaments for the right to represent Manitoba in the CASA national senior championships. The men’s champions included long-gone teams such as Terry Balkan Yu-Betchas, Ste. Anne Saints and Steinbach A&W Stealers.

When slo-pitch began to dominate the local softball scene in the early 1980s, first division teams from the Winnipeg Men’s Slo-Pitch League such as the Beavers, North End Flyers and Blues played at Old Ex. Elimination tournaments were held there to determine the teams that would represent Manitoba in the Canadian and Western Canada championships.

The 1982 season at Old Ex and Krupp is a special memory for this columnist. His slo-pitch team, the Labatt’s Touring All-Stars, first won the open senior B elimination tournament, beating the Hawks from the North End in the final at Old Ex and earned the right to play in the Western. The less said about that experience the better.

Then, at Krupp, the team won the first Twilight provincial championship for teams with players aged 30 and up. Winning an open and an age-group title in one season with the same players was a unique accomplishment for a softball team.

Future Old Ex columns will look at the success of the Winnipeg Hawkeyes football club, which built a clubhouse to the north of Krupp that is now home to the North Winnipeg Nomads organization, minor hockey at one of the first indoor rinks built by the city and opened in the 1963-64 season, and earlier activities at the grounds that can be traced back to late in the 19th century.