The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Saturday mornings in Northern Manitoba just wouldn't be the same without the rumble of bingo balls and numbered squares neatly spread out on the kitchen table. Rotary Radio Bingo celebrates 30 years on the air this year, a milestone that undoubtedly earns the game an extraordinary distinction ? institution. "I think that after this many years, you almost have to call it that," says Doug O'Brien, past president of the Rotary Club of Flin Flon, which operates the fundraiser. "That's a long time to sustain something." Since hitting the airwaves, the bingo has dished out some $2 million in prizes, not to mention untold excitement, to listeners in Flin Flon-Creighton and The Pas, and more recently Thompson. At the same time, Rotarians have used the bingo revenues for a host of Flin Flon area projects, from the Rotary Court seniors complex to upgrades at Camp Whitney. Any club project undertaken in the past three decades has benefited from the fundraiser. Along the way, those half-hour broadcasts, hosted by various members of the Rotary Club from CFAR studios, became something more than a game. They became a part of northern culture. "I think because we broadcast at 11 o'clock on a Saturday morning, it's become a social event," says O'Brien. "You have groups of ladies get together to have coffee and play bingo. People have gotten into the habit of playing it at a specific time every week, and it's just part of their life." The tradition began in 1974 when the Rotary Club of Flin Flon borrowed the concept from two previous organizing groups. Flin Flonners first dabbed cards beside their radios in 1972 when CFAR became the only station outside Winnipeg to pick up the feed of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet radio bingo. Less than two years later, the ballet company remained dissatisfied with the revenues and turned the bingo over to the Rotary Clubs of Manitoba, which only kept it for about six months. A few months later, Flin Flon Rotarian Jack Gordon purchased time on CFAR to broadcast a bingo to raise money for his daughter's run at the Queen Mermaid crown. Gordon's success was surprising, prompting him to recommend that his club, eager for a new revenue stream, host its own radio bingo program each week. Rotary Radio Bingo was born, and it didn't take long for a loyal base of listeners to develop. "I know there are some people who still play today who have played right from day one," says Wayne Fraser, who has spent the past 15 years as bingo chairman. See 'New' P.# Con't from P.# Yet the loyalty of its core players hasn't always been enough to keep the bingo in the black. Competition from growing gaming opportunities very nearly spelled a permanent blackout for Rotary Radio Bingo around the turn of the new century. "We came extremely close to shutting it down," says Fraser. "Sales had dropped to the point where there was one run when where we went half a year and lost money on every game, and you just can't run things that way." In what Fraser describes as a desperate move, the club introduced a new prize structure. The $10,000 prize cap was abolished, replaced with a system that saw the jackpot increase by $1,000 each week until it is won. Some longtime players balked. Though the prizes went up dramatically ? one jackpot awarded last January totaled $94,000 ? the odds of winning were no longer as great as they once were. Nevertheless, the move paid dividends and most likely rescued the program from cancelation. "It's worked reasonably well," says Fraser. "It's not as successful as it was four or five years ago, but it's making us a few dollars." Dabbers are notorious for taking their game seriously, but that doesn't mean the bingo hasn't been without humour and the occasional goof-up over the years. During one broadcast, after just four numbers had been called, Fraser attempted to liven things up. He spontaneously announced that players with a straight bingo ? a vertical or horizontal line ? would be treated to a free bucket of chicken. "I didn't think there was a chance anybody had a straight bingo already," he recalls with a laugh. "The phone rang off the hook for half an hour. We gave away over 25 buckets of chicken. My fellow callers that day didn't much like me." In another instance, the program was in Cranberry Portage for a special outdoor broadcast. Rather than moving their electrical bingo machine from Flin Flon, they used a hand-cranked raffle cage. Without the familiar background rumble of the electrical machine, some listeners thought the bingo had gone off air every time the Rotarians stopped talking. "We didn't use that again," says Fraser. Today with an estimated weekly audience of around 900 people, Rotary Radio Bingo promises to continue to add a few thrills to Saturday mornings for many years to come. Not many radio programs manage to last three decades and nearly 1,600 broadcasts as this one has. O'Brien chalks up the longevity not only to the lure of the jackpot but also to the generosity of northerners eager to support community projects. "I think people, because it's a service organization that is hosting the bingo, they see that the money that is raised is put back into the community," he says. "And that's a solid plus." Flin Flon's Joanne Skeavington, who has had her dabber out and radio on most Saturday mornings for the past 20 years, agrees. "I play because of the hope I'll win and knowing that I'm supporting the community," she says.4/8/04
