Members of Ashburton’s exclusive Ashburton County Club are celebrating its centennial anniversary tomorrow with a luncheon event.
It is for members, partners and invited guests.
The club, on Tancred St, was bought and founded in 1926.
It was initially set up as a way to bypass prohibition and drinking laws of the time which enforced bars to close at 6pm.
As a private club, each member had a secured locker, stocked with their own drink of choice where they could enjoy an tipple with their peers, unrestricted by time.
At its peak it had a membership of up to 200 men-of-standing in the community.
Members included business owners, dentists, bankers and stock agents.
It was a good place to network.
President Ken Baker, 80, a third generation business owner in Ashburton, has been a member since 1991.
He said while alcohol laws had changed, and membership dwindled to 20, it continued to be a meeting place of kinship for like-minded peers.
“It’s quite nice just to have a quiet environment rather than sitting in a pub with 200 other people.”
He initially joined after being invited by a current member.
“(I) decided it might be good for business, so joined.”
Now, even in retirement, Ken still enjoys the camaraderie among those friends who, at the time, mixed in a different circle.
Fellow member, Roger Smith, 73, agreed.
He was a fourth generation dairy farmer with “an inquiring mind” who joined in 2011.
He still “very much enjoyed it.”
“There were quite a few more members back then, but they have all passed away.”
Club members met regularly, played snooker or cards.
And had a laugh, Roger said.
Ken said members often talked about getting new members and had gained four to six new members in the past 12 months.
It appealed to people in different ways.
Members of the Cavendish Club, a female equivalent, used the club house as well.
The club has a billiard room where snooker was played, a large reading room, a card room and was open to members 364 days of the year.
It features plush leather seats and well-used card tables.
Snooker cues hang locked in wall-mounted protective cases – some have not been opened for 60-70 years since their owners passed away – and photographs of Winston Churchill and a young Queen Elizabeth oversee the action in the reading room.
In the past, club members have played in snooker competitions among the other club and pubs around town.
In its heyday, the club employed a stewardess to provide food at members request as well as to clean and look after the club house.
That staff member lived with their partner in a flat attached to the club.
Service bells wired into the walls still exist today in each of the rooms, but nowadays go unanswered as the flat has been rented out to tenants to help with ongoing costs.
An extension was added in the 1970s, which included a kitchen and dining area and offered additional seating space.
The first club president was Colonel John Findlay, a decorated Boer War veteran.
In those days, the club enforced a neat and tidy dress code and each year organised various functions to provide good fellowship for members and their partners.
‘‘Up to fairly recently you had to wear a collar and tie,” Roger said.
‘‘And there was the odd-tie hanging up in the tie rack you could put on if you were in town without one.”
