On Saturday night, the Estevan Bruins held a pregame presentation to honour one of our longest tenured volunteers who will be retiring at the end of the season.
Gail Chilman has been involved with the Bruins organization since 1992, when Gail and her late husband Ed moved to Estevan. They began billeting players in 1995 in addition to helping with selling 50/50 tickets on gamedays. In 1999, Gail took over as the Bruins’ Billet Coordinator, helping to facilitate homes for the players, streamline communication between the team and the billet families, organize team events, and several other duties over the years.
Gail has continued to be a familiar face around the rink during Bruins’ games, as she has also been heavily involved in ticketing for regular season and playoff games as well as being an integral volunteer during the 2022 Centennial Cup in Estevan.
This offseason, Gail plans to move to Calgary, AB to be closer with her grandkids. Gail will hand over the Billet Coordinator duties to Mandee Park who has worked with Gail on her transition out over the past few seasons.
The Estevan Bruins are sincerely grateful for the thousands of hours of time Gail has dedicated to the team over the past 30 years, and over 100 former Bruins’ players who billeted with Gail and Ed over the years continue to speak fondly of their time in Estevan thanks in large part to the welcoming home provided by the Chilman’s.