French Creek Curling Club - Erie Gives

Our Story

We are proud to operate at LECOM Sports Park in Erie, and our curling season runs from fall through early spring yearly. Our activities are made possible in part through your generous support. French Creek Curling Club's mission is to grow and promote the game of curling in Northwestern Pennsylvania with curling leagues and opportunities to learn to curl.

Founded in 2016, a group of enthusiastic curlers and supporters got together with the idea of bringing curling to extreme Northwestern Pennsylvania. It was a natural fit with our long winters, clubs in surrounding cities like Buffalo, Cleveland and Pittsburgh, as well as lots of fun-loving people looking for friendship and activity.

The group included curlers that had been traveling to a club in Cleveland and several supporters from Allegheny College that had spent part of their academic careers in Minnesota and New York where curling clubs had been a part of the culture.

The name "French Creek Curling Club" was chosen as French Creek, with its own long and important history, is a significant geographic feature flowing through parts of Erie, Crawford, Venango, and Mercer Counties in Pennsylvania as well as Chautauqua County in New York.

Previously in our history we have curled at the Meadville Area Rec Complex and Flo Fabrizio Ice Center. While founded in Meadville, we have called Erie home since 2021.

How You Can Help

Unfortunately, a major technical outage at LECOM Sports Park this past winter disrupted the spring portion of our season. This meant we were unable to capitalize on the popularity of curling during the 2026 Winter Olympics as we had to refund multiple sold-out learn-to-curl events. We were also unable to host our club's first bonspiel - a curling tournament welcoming teams from different clubs in the region.

Your generosity this year will help support our efforts to regain interest from all those potential curlers who would have joined us in the winter if we were able to host events, and to finally launch our first bonspiel!

Any gift - big or small - is greatly appreciated and helps us continue serving our mission of growing the sport of curling in Northwestern Pennsylvania. Sponsoring a Curling Stone ($275) will allow you to showcase your business, show your personal support for curling or commemorate a loved one by engraving a message into one of our curling stones. The useful life of a curling stone handle is at least 10 years, allowing your message to be seen by our curlers and guests for years!

With a gift of $500 or more, you can Sponsor a Curler for the 2026-27 season! This new sponsorship option will allow us to provide financial assistance for those who would like to participate in the sport but lack the means to do so. This option could sponsor a curler from their first Experience Curling, becoming a French Creek Curling Club member, and participating in the club's leagues during the season. We will review financial assistance applications for financial need and seek to make the biggest impact possible with your gift.

Our Goal

This year, we're hoping to raise $4,000 to host additional events that were canceled in the spring as well as our first bonspiel.