Rangiora Bowling Club

Many thanks for your comments, stars and hearts for yesterdays 'Little Critter', it's extra special to be near the top of the spotlight page - I'm very proud of this image, thank you :))

The Rangiora Bowling Club was established in 1905 incorporating the Tennis and Croquet Clubs. In 1911 the new pavilion was built. A wooden structure with spacious balconies on two levels supported by light pillars and facing out on three sides over the greens. The open and glassed balconies and the steeply-gabled roof with its flagpoles gave it a high tent-like appearance and the character of a true pavilion. It was perhaps the most interesting building, architectually, to have been built in Rangiora between 1880 and 1930, when the second and third phases of major building construction took place.

The pavilion stands as a monument not to the early settlers but to their sons, the second generation, and a new group of business and professional men who had come to the town about the turn of the century to enjoy the first really propsperous period since the beginning of the settlement. It was designed by William Wadey and built by Arthur Vincent and John Golding at a cost of 945 pounds and was opened on 28 October 1911, replacing an old cottage as clubrooms. It is an Historic Places Trust building.

The Bowling Club pavilion has stood as a social and sporting haven. In its day it has seen billards and snooker tournaments, card parties, euchre evenings, table tennis and monthly socials. In the late 1940's the tennis club no longer existed and its courts were replaced by another bowling green while indoor bowling facilities replaced billards. An additional social and indoor bowling room was built in 1973-74.

Today it sits proudly, completely repainted and windows replaced from our continuing earthquakes - it made me smile as I passed by to see the scaffolding gone at last. I'm not sure how long it will continue to be a Bowling Club pavilion as the insurance costs have more than doubled since the earthquakes and the club is now struggling to keep ahead. This shot was taken with the camera resting on a high iron fence, much taller than my 4ft 10" and not at all level, with me standing on tippy toes on a busy main road - The Rangiora Bowling Club Pavilion.

A day of research, a trip to the library and then some home jobs - I left them till last :)

Enjoy Sunday everyone :)