The Brier
| Tim Hortons Brier | |
|---|---|
| Established | 1927 |
| 2017 host city | St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador |
| 2017 arena | Mile One Centre |
| 2017 champion |
 Newfoundland and Labrador (Brad Gushue) |
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 2017 Tim Hortons Brier |
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The Tim Hortons Brier, or simply (and more commonly) the Brier, is the annual Canadian men's curling championship, sanctioned by the Canadian Curling Association (CCA). The current event name refers to its main sponsor, the Tim Hortons coffee and doughnut shop chain. "Brier" originally referred to a brand of tobacco sold by the event's first sponsor, the Macdonald Tobacco Company.
The Brier has been held since 1927, traditionally during the month of March. The winner of the Brier goes on to represent Canada at the World Championships of the same year. The Brier is regarded by most curlers as the world's premier curling championship. Many Canadian teams feel it is more of a privilege to win the Brier than the World Championship. The Brier is by far the best supported curling competition in terms of paid attendance, attracting crowds far larger than even those for World Championships held in Canada.
In 1924, George J. Cameron, the president of W. L. Mackenzie and Company of the Macdonald Tobacco Company pitched the idea of a national curling championship to Macdonald Tobacco and was accepted. However, at the time Canadian curling was divided between the use of granite and iron curling stones with the latter being used in Quebec and Eastern Ontario and the former being used everywhere else. The granite camp held the advantage, as Macdonald Tobacco President Walter Stewart brother, T. Howard Stewart (also of Macdonald Tobacco) supported the use of granites, and was able to influence the decision for the new national championship to use granite stones.
Before the creation of the Brier, Macdonald Tobacco would begin by sponsoring the 1925 Manitoba Bonspiel, the provincial championship. The winner of this tournament would be sent to Eastern Canada to compete in a number of exhibition games against local teams. In 1926, the winners of the Bonspiel were sent to play in the Quebec Bonspiel. This visit was deemed popular enough to spur on the idea of a national championship to be held the year following. The first Brier would be held at the Granite Club in Toronto. Eight teams would play in the first Brier, from across the country. One team would represent Western Canada, while one team would each represent the provinces of Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, while an additional entry was given to Northern Ontario and one each for the cities of Toronto and Montreal. Games in the 1927 Brier would last 14 ends in length, and each team would play all the other teams in a 7-game round robin with no playoffs unless there was a tie for first. The first winning team would be from Nova Scotia, a rink skipped by Murray Macneill. The other four curlers on the team – Al MacInnes, Cliff Torey and Jim Donahue – were normally skips in their own right, but were added to the Macneill rink because the rest of his normal team could not make the trip.
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