BELFAST – What started as the dream of a local doctor and his pals a half-century ago has evolved into the Belfast Curling Club, a thriving organization that provides winter fun and games for people of all ages and abilities.

The club – the only one in Maine – is marking its 50th year this season with a number of events and a new focus on youth curling.

Dozens of youngsters were at the club during Saturday’s open house for kids and their parents.

And a few years ago the club on Route 3 was modified to accommodate wheelchair curlers.

“I love it,” first-time curler Abigail Blakeley, 10, of Hope said Saturday as she lined up a shot with the 42-pound curling stone. “It’s a lot of fun. I want to come here a lot.”‘

Carolyn Gaiero, co-chair of the club’s youth program, said there had been times when the club sponsored youth teams, but this year’s program is a more concerted effort. She said the club wants to develop a youth curling league for children 8 years old and up.

“It’s more of a strength issue than an age issue,” Gaiero said. “If they’re too small, they can’t usually push a 42-pound stone down the ice. [But] we want to get a lot of kids interested in curling.”

The sport sank roots in Scotland some 500 years ago and was exported to North America by early settlers. The first curling club on the continent was established in Montreal in 1807, and the sport remains incredibly popular in Canada.

It took hold along the northern border of the United States, and the first American club was formed in Michigan in 1832. Gaiero said Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin and New York have scores of clubs.

Curling is played on an ice “sheet” painted with concentric circle targets at each end or “house.” Two four-member teams, or “rinks,” compete against each other by curling eight 42-pound stones toward the target. Team members use special brooms to control the speed and direction of the stones by sweeping in front of them as they glide down the ice.

Each team member curls two stones per match. The object is to leave as many stones within the circle as possible.

The Belfast Curling Club was founded by Dr. Norman Cobb, known to all in town as Doc Cobb, who arrived in Belfast from Calais in the early 1950s.

Cobb had curled in St. Stephen, New Brunswick, and it wasn’t long before he convinced a few of his buddies to accompany him on curling excursions over the border. They took to the game immediately and started talking about building an ice sheet of their own.

Until that came about, they curled on outdoor rinks or headed out of town.

“We used to go to Colby College to curl on their ice skating rink,” recalled Laurene Wright with a chuckle. “We used to take our house brooms – house brooms and old stones.”

Wright said that her former father-in-law, Melvin Wood, owner of State Sand and Gravel, donated the land where the Belfast club was built in 1957.

She said Doc Cobb and scores of other volunteers would gather at State Sand and Gravel on weekends to make the more than 5,000 concrete blocks used to build the clubhouse and ice rink the following year.

“They did it every weekend until they had enough,” she said.

Belfast businessman Jim Black, whose late father, Dr. Russell Black, served a term as club president in those days, recalled helping his dad make blocks and build the club when he was a boy.

Black still has an original share of curling club stock given him by his father.

He said it was a convivial group of volunteers that pitched in to build the club.

And the builders left some artifacts behind for future archaeologists, he said.

“I can’t tell you how many beer cans are in those blocks because that club was built on beer. Beer and water,” Black said.