Ed Chuckrey, a 12-time winner of the National King Miner Contest - a "really remarkable" feat in the words of USW Local 6166 president Murray Nychyporuk - was named by the union as Honorary King Miner for Nickel Days 2014 June 18 at the invitation-only Nickel Days Corporation President's Reception at the Thompson Regional Community Centre (TRCC), kicking of this year's summer fair, which dates back to 1970.
The National King Miner Contest, which begins at noon Saturday, June 21 with the awards to be presented on Sunday, June 22 at 1 p.m., features 11 events, including stoper drilling, jackleg drilling, crib building, which many miners consider the most demanding event of the contest, log sawing, ladder climbing, slusher mucking, hand mucking, steel packing, muck machine mucking, pipefitting and nail driving.
Last year's National King Miner Contest winner, Brian Woytkiw has won the competition now for five straight years, and has won all but one of the King Miner competitions since 2007.
In 2013, Woytkiw placed in the top four in seven of 11 events to win the $2,000 prize along with the $1,600 combined he picked up in the individual events. He was first in only one event last year: ladder climbing. But he picked up second place in both pipefitting and nail driving, third in jackleg drilling, and fourth in stopper drilling, hand mucking and steel packing for the title.
Chuckrey couldn't be at the opening Nickel Days Corporation President's Reception because of an illness in the family in southern Manitoba but was expected back June 19 for the remainder of Nickel Days, Nychyporuk said.
Chuckrey, from Rossburn, moved to Thompson in 1975, and started in the smelter because he was "too small to be a miner at that time," he told Nychyporuk earlier. By 1976 he was at T-3 as a labourer and later moved into development mining where rock is excavated in order to gain access to the nickel orebody by removing previously blasted material, scaling, installing support and reinforcement, drilling face rock, and loading and blasting explosives, and in 1995 became a non-union staff manager working as a production supervisor and then later in safety toward the end of his Vale career, Nychyporuk said. He won the National King Miner Contest event 12 times, a feat Nychyporuk described as "really remarkable."
This year's Honorary Driller is Dale Hysert, originally from Shelburne, Nova Scotia, who moved to Thompson in 1979. He started in the refinery, and then in 1980 went to T-1 as a driller. Later he worked in Birchtree Mine, Thompson Open Pit, and T-3, worked in production and drove scooptram. "He's done it all over the years," said Nychyporuk, turning to Hysert and adding, "There's nothing I don't think you have done in the mine."
Hysert said he was underground mining for 31 years and has been retired now for four years.
Some other recent Honorary King Miners have included men such as Jean-Guy Saucier, in 2005; Lorne Spicer in 2006; Louis Oosterbaan in 2008; Al Meston in 2011 and Henry Turriff last year. Honorary Drillers have included Ray Cheetham in 2005; Jim Hickey in 2006; Bruce Cameron in 2008, John Crossley in 2011 and Goran Aksic last year.
Nickel Days and the National King Miner Contest date back to July 1970, the year Thompson was elevated from town to city status. Carl Kolada, a stope leader at T-3 Mine, won the first King Miner title in a field of 40 competitors.
The non-profit Nickel Days Corporation board of directors is comprised of chairperson Wendell Fitzpatrick, treasurer Mike Krentz, secretary Tamy Burton and board members Lona Barnowich, Dallas Bray, Graham Brown, Darwin Graham, Jim Howitt, Conrad Hykway, Serena Kraychuck, Bill Loke, John Maskerine, Joe Roque and Torrence Sukhbir.
"Set 'em up," said Nickel Days Corporation President's Reception emcee Bruce Krentz, regional health promotion co-ordinator for the Northern Regional Health Authority in Thompson, as Mayor Tim Johnston, Nychyporuk, Hysert, Fitzpatrick, Sukhbir, and Ryan Land, manager of corporate affairs and organizational development for Vale's Manitoba Operations, each chugged back a "Nickel Belt," a closely-guarded recipe that creates a concoction made up at least partially of generous proportions of vodka, tequila, beer, champagne and - and perhaps more vodka - from the 16-inch tap-modified waterproof rubber mining boot, as Nickel Days 2014 was declared officially open.
