Rowing Regatta 1956
Westover Rowing Club
The Westover
and Bournemouth Rowing Club traces its history back to 1865, but celebrated its
centenary in 1977. Confused? Well the club is the child of many parents: one of
its antecedents was a drinking club formed in a cave at the foot of Richmond
Hill in the early days of the town, and one of its members Alderman W. H.
Ridout afterwards became president of its successor, the Bournemouth Bicycle
Club, founded in the Belle Vue Hotel (now sire of the Pavilion); its members
set on their penny farthings every Whit Monday from the Pembroke Commercial
Hotel on Poole Hill.
The Bicycle
Club amalgamated with the Bournemouth Amateur Rowing Club, which had been
founded in 1871, to form the Westover Club in 1877. It occupied premises on the
West Beach seafront, which had leased the land from the Meyrick Estate in 1865.
The Rowing Club element lapsed in 1911 and was reformed in 1924. The club
celebrated its centenary as a Rowing Club in 1865 and as the Westover Club in
1977.
The club has
remained proud of its heritage as Bournemouth’s oldest non-political club;
speaking in 1953, the president Mr Montague said that its members liked to play
bridge or snooker, read, sip lemonade, or go onto the balcony for a snooze. The
more active members also rowed. In recent years the club has relocated to joint
sites in Meyrick Park and at Hengistbury Head, and the old club house being
demolished in 2012.
Michael Stead, Heritage
Team, Bournemouth Libraries
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