By sports editor Russell Bennett
Members of the Pakenham Tennis Club are desperate for the local community’s help to join the dots of the club’s storied history.
Walking up the stairs at the Anderson Street clubrooms, what becomes immediately obvious is the proud winning tradition at the club.
They’ve got in excess of 360 flags hanging in the rooms, but yet some of the eras they belong to remain shrouded in mystery and intrigue.
Many of the club’s official historical records have been lost along the way, and now members such as Brenda O’Brien, Jean Kelsey, Ron Carroll, and Greg Marshall are searching high and low for anything that can help piece together the Pakenham Tennis Club’s formative years, right up until 1982.
Their aim is to connect the dots of the decades leading up to the 1980s, but they can’t do it alone.
They’ve been on fact-finding missions to the State Library, and even the Gazette’s Pakenham headquarters for clues – for anything that will help them better reconnect with their past.
A number of famous storylines of the club’s past only serve to spur on the likes of Brenda, Jean, Ron, and Greg in their mission to uncover more.
Margaret Court, the eventual winner of 24 singles majors – still the most famous record in tennis – once played on the Pakenham courts.
Abe Kay was another who had played at Pakenham, while Cliff Letcher – a runner-up in three Grand Slam doubles events and a former Austrian Davis Cup representative – once called Pakenham his home club.
Greg, or ‘Taurus’ as he’s known to most, even recalls a time when strong gusts of wind blew the roof off the clubrooms and all the way on to court four. His is the first name as president on the club’s office bearers board, which only dates back to 1982.
“It’s a terrible shame – you don’t want to lose your history,” Taurus explained.
“It’s what forms the identity of a club.”
Ron, meanwhile, remembers vividly the date that the first Anderson Street courts were opened – 6 November 1960, the date of his first child’s birth.
But there have been other courts at various locations right around Pakenham over the years – including near the corner of Toomuc Valley Road; the police courts on the corner of James Street and the Princes Highway; the courts at the old Presbyterian church; and the two courts built by Don Williamson on James Street, about where the senior citizens building currently sits. These courts were hired out to the club for a number of years before the existing courts were built.
Now, the likes of Brenda, Jean, Ron, and Greg are putting the call out for anyone in the local area with a historical connection to the Pakenham Tennis Club – or even knowledge of its past – to come forward and help piece together this jigsaw.
Anyone who can help is encouraged to email Brenda on brendaobrien3253@hotmail.com.
