Bowling club hits 100
Community support and voluntary work have been vital in the Nightcaps Bowling Club reaching its centennial year.
There are only 17 members, aged from 55 to 88, but they all love the game and contribute when things need to be done.
A united membership had been a big part in the club’s survival, president Kevin Harvey said. ‘‘That’s a strength
. . . and it’s the only way it can be for us to keep going.’’
The western Southland club celebrates 100 years this weekend. It operates alongside the Nightcaps Golf Club on the same block of land and both are under the governance of the Nightcaps Golf and Bowling Club Incorporated.
The golf club has 31 members and there is a small number who have membership of both clubs.
Nightcaps and Ohai were busy coalmining areas until the industry began declining from about 1987, Nightcaps Bowling Club greenkeeper and secretary Gordon Bennett said.
By the mid-1990s increasing numbers of families were moving away and the bowling club membership was getting low. The club entered talks with the Nightcaps Golf Club about the possibility of sharing facilities at the golf course. A partnership was formed in 1999.
‘‘It’s worked out good for both clubs,’’ Harvey said.
Bruce Proctor, a past president, said that back in the 1970s the Nightcaps and Ohai bowling clubs had about 100 members between them.
The miners’ lamp trophy was keenly contested between both clubs up to 2016 when Ohai’s club closed. About six or seven of its members then joined the Nightcaps club.
Proctor’s mother, Violet, the club’s first female life member and winner of at least eight Southland titles, and Kitty Laidlaw were the best women bowlers in the club.
Bryan Harvey, who has won a South Island title and multiple Southland titles, is the best among the men to ever play for Nightcaps. He now plays for a club in Invercargill.
Nightcaps president Kevin Harvey said younger members were needed for the future of the club. ‘‘This is a focus we’ll have to look at . . . [to] try and get young people involved.
‘‘We’ve got to get the message out [to young people] that bowls is a good thing to play.’’