What do Don Cherry, Sidney Crosby, and the Saskatchewan Roughriders have in common?
They’re all involved with sports, yes, but also, memorabilia from each will be available for auction right here in Humboldt on Nov. 29 as a fundraiser for new Humboldt Public School playground equipment.
“We were looking at fundraising ideas, something a little bit different from what other places do,” said organizer Vicki Mulhern. She had organized something like that before, and she decided she needed a project, so the Take Me Out to the Game Sports Memorabilia auction was born.
Mulhern started acquiring sports items through writing letters and then following up. She already has a uniform signed by Lyndon Rush and a football signed by Kelly Bates.
“We tried to tap our Saskatchewan athletes,” Mulhern said, though she got memorabilia from a wide variety of athletes.
She got a beer jug signed by Jon Montgomery, skeleton racer and Amazing Race Canada host, when she realized she was going to drive through Russell, Man. and ended up Facebooking him.
She’s gotten a pretty good return rate from athlete, though she’s had a bit of trouble getting items from American teams since they just get too many requests to accommodate everyone. Still, she did end up getting items signed by Peyton Manning and Sidney Crosby. These big ticket items came from a patnership with Ramjak in Saskatoon. The company obtains memorabilia and consigns it out. There is a minimum bid, which goes to Ramjak, and any proceeds beyond that go to the fundraiser.
Other items include a shirt, hat, bobblehead, and postcard signed by Don Cherry, a voucher for tickets to a St. Louis Blues home game, and snow goggles autographed by Mark McMorris.
The auction takes place at the Humboldt Legion Hall. Cocktails are at 5:30, a ballpark dinner (which offers hot dogs, chili dogs, pretzels, popcorn, and cracker jack) is at 6:30, and the auction starts at 7:30. Tickets are $10 in advance and $15 at the door. Tickets are available at the Humboldt Public School and Scotiabank, but if attendees get tickets through Scotiabank, they will match the funds. Only 300 tickets will be printed.
“The more we can raise from this, the sooner we can get playground equipment for our kids,” Mulhern said.
