The Early Years
Honoured Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,
My task - in just three minutes you tell me President – is to look back at the early years and recall some of the more humorous episodes in the Club’s History. I can only think that I have been asked to do this, based on how old I look rather than on my actual age - I don’t go back to 1949 – I only joined the Club in 1976. The Club was of course then 26 years old, so I can only recall some of the events from the last 34 years.
I might have been able to do better as -
Some years ago I had the pleasure to meet up with Fredi Hawkins, not long before he died. Fredi was a founder member of the club and its second president. In his later years he had retired to the Island of Sark in the Channel Islands and I spent a happy few hours with him when visiting the island. What an opportunity that would have been to capture some of the highlights of those really early years - but Fredie wanted to hear about the club’s current activities – what we were doing and what we were planning for the future. I like to think he epitimised Rotary. – Focused forward not back - looking for new things to do – proud of things achieved but not resting on them.
But anyway what of the last 34 years?
Well you have heard from the President details of some of our achievements in helping our community here in Andover and well beyond. However Rotary is about having fun as well - or that is our intention – but it doesn’t always quite work out that way, even although we may laugh after the event! I have vivid memories (especially as I had been responsible for organising it) of an away weekend in Bath, Well supported by about 30 members and wives. We were staying at what purported to be a good quality hotel – of high repute – certainly it wasn’t cheap. We sat down for dinner and not surprisingly we ordered wine. Halfway through the meal - no wine had arrived. It was then explained that the wine waiter had gone home and taken the keys of the cellar with him – ‘but don’t worry sir – he is on his way back.’ We were duly offered the wine just as we finished coffee. The management seemed quite surprised and put out to be told that they could put the wine back in the cellar - or words to that effect! (The whole episode could well have found its way into a script for Faulty Towers.)
I don’t want to give the impression that our social activities revolve around eating and drinking. Although of course it is part of the Rotary tradition to take a meal together during our weekly meetings.
The Club has been quite itinerant over the years. It first met at the old Central Hotel, moved on to the Western Cafe, and then to The White Hart. That was where I started in 1976. From there we moved to what was then the Rothsay Hotel and stayed for a number of years. That suddenly went bust (nothing to do with Rotary I hasten to add), so in a hurry we moved on to The Redrice Squash and Country Club. That was not an ideal venue as they could not provide us with a private room. However the food was reasonable and some members – mark you only some, found the young short skirted waitresses a very considerable bonus. But as I say not an ideal venue and so to the disappointment of some but to the benefit of their blood pressure we moved and returned to the White Hart, but not for long as the new management didn’t really want us. And so here we are at the Quality Hotel where we have been for many years now and Mark makes us feel very welcome.
Other fond memories - well the progressive suppers as we used to have them – we still do from time to time and they are enjoyable but much more sedate. Thirty years ago – I shudder to think what a breathalyser would have recorded and some participants never made it to the final course – they wisely left their car with their hosts and went home by taxi .
The Solent Slurps were other occasions when hospitality flowed. In the 70s and I think into the 80s we had at least half a dozen serious sailors with their own boats and several times a year other members of the club were invited on board for a cruise to the Isle of Wight. Water was not the only liquid in plentiful supply and for those visitors who were assigned to the ‘gin palace’ run by one owner, particularly so. I am prepared to swear that more gin and whisky went on board than fuel for the round trip.
Finally just to blend the fun and the fund raising together I recall the substantial funds raised by a very special group of members who came to call themselves the ‘Hellarwee Walking Club’. They raised over £12,000 for the Hospice in various walks over Dartmoor and an ascent of Scafell Pike to name but two. They clearly enjoyed the experience - well that’s what they told us when they returned. I have to say I was always a little surprised when they did return. Map reading was not their strength. That was the reason for their name – they claimed that they often had to stop and ask ‘Where the hell are we?’. That I readily believed. I was never a member of the group, as a walker I was not in their league but I did venture out with them once on a training walk near to Combe Gibbet and I will never forget one of their members, map and compass to hand looking straight into the setting sun and confidently declaring that we were heading North!
Stuart Bevan
Club President 1991 - 1992
This speech was made by on 23rd November 2009 as part of the evening of celebrations to mark the 60th anniversary of the formation of the Rotary Club of Andover.
