articles, Lifestyle reporter Lawrence Trott looks at how times have changed in the clubs.

The recent sale of National Sports Club could be a sign of the times with other clubs facing a similar demise, warns the club's last president Donald MacPherson.

Speaking for the first time since the sale of the club to the Montessori school in January, Mr. MacPherson disclosed that the club had been struggling with membership participation for a few years, how he reluctantly took over the helm when no one else wanted it and how he did all he could to prevent the sale of one of Bermuda's premier sporting grounds.

"I took over knowing they were in trouble, but I just tried to see if I could do something to bring it back,'' explained Mr. MacPherson who began a third term as president in April 1998. He was also elected president in 1978 and 1988.

"This third time I was very reluctant but the club was in dire straits,'' said the president, acknowledging that three years ago the writing started to appear on the wall.

"I went down there as a returning officer and had absolutely no intention of running for president but we couldn't even get somebody to run for president.

"Jimmy DeCouto was the president for several years and Danny Fagundo before him had done several years and these were frustrated guys. They put a lot of time, effort and their own funds into the club to try to keep it going.

"I was begging from the floor, saying `you can't run a club without a president or vice president' and finally I took it over for what I thought was going to be for a short period until somebody else was forthcoming.'' Mr. MacPherson has seen the club go through some changes since he first became involved as a member in the early 1970s when they had a thriving cricket team under the captaincy of Rupert Scotland. They won the league in 1971 and had a solid team during the 70s with players like Clarence Parfitt, Fred Trott, Barry DeCouto, Douglas (Blip) Morris and Barry Sousa.

But the club didn't do something then that Mr. MacPherson feels was one of the reasons for its ultimate demise...launch a strong youth programme.

"The main reason, in my opinion, was we never had an active and productive junior programme in the last 25 years,'' said the president. "We did have junior cricket and junior soccer many years ago.'' In later years the membership declined and things got worse when those surviving members participated less and less in club activity. So much so that even the bar hours were changed to compensate for the decline in business through the bar and canteen.

"We changed the hours considerably but in the last two years there was virtually no attendance at the club on a day to day basis,'' said Mr.

MacPherson who explained that when the club was sold there were 155 members in various classifications, but no junior members.

"From my point of view the closure of the club came just as much from the inactivity of membership as much as declining membership. The members we had there really didn't support the club.'' Veteran member Alfred (Frudae) Mello agrees. "Nobody wants to work, but you can't pay for everything,'' said Mr. Mello.

"It's not enough to get two or three guys doing all the work. It's sad to see it go, but they did all they could with a little help from the members.'' At 86, Mr. Mello is old enough to remember when the club started as National Cricket Club in a barn on the Tank Field property on White Sandys Road in Paget around 1927 as a place to play cards and socialise.

Mr. Mello joined the club in 1929 and there were moves to the Arcade Building in Hamilton near the Telephone Company, the Melbourne Building, then near where Gosling's are now on Reid Street before another move to Front Street near the old Fire Station where the club then became National Sports Club.

In the early 1950s the opportunity came to buy the land on Middle Road, Devonshire which had a small grocery store on the property which was used as farmland for growing vegetables. It was at that location that the club had some of its most notable achievements in cricket and soccer and indoor games like billiards, snooker, table tennis, pool and darts.

Mr. Mello is a former vice president of the club and for almost 30 years played cricket for the club.

"They were some good times, we would work half a day on Thursdays and play cricket in the afternoon,'' he recalled. "I remember towing a fella up to Somerset on my (pedal) bike to play a cricket game and then he would tow me back, sitting on the crossbar.'' The demise of the cricket team in 1997 and the loss of its soccer team decades before meant that the club didn't attract huge crowds. Even rugby over the last few years has seen its crowds decline considerably, leaving the annual Rugby Classic as the main money earner for the club.

"There was a lot of discussion for a number of years as to whether we should allow soccer to return to National Sports Club,'' said Mr. MacPherson.

"At that time there were problems that soccer venues were having with drugs on their premises and there was a strong lobby against soccer.

"Of course rugby was already well entrenched there as well as hockey. "There were two different camps as to whether should we invite other organisations to use Nationals as a home ground for soccer or continue with rugby and hockey.'' The loss of Nationals' cricket team four years ago contributed to a further decline in interest amongst members.

"There were people who tried very hard to keep the cricket teams together, but they were unsuccessful. Once that happened there was a decline in the activity level of the members,'' said the president.

"When you don't have people patronising your club, you don't have funds coming in and it becomes more and more difficult to operate and you start cutting back wherever you can.'' Mr. MacPherson admits the older members are moving away from club life and the younger members, with so many recreational choices, don't have the same level of interest and commitment.

"In years gone by clubs were the focal point but what you're having now is if you have a family with two or three kids the father would take one son to participate in go-karting and then rush another son to do something in the triathlon and another son is playing soccer somewhere,'' he stated.

"The activities are many and varied and things are spread out all over the place. It's very hard to be a club with very diverse activities. The only ones who seem to survive are the ones who concentrate on one activity, one sport.'' Six acres of prime land in Devonshire now has new owners after $3.5 million recently changed hands. New owners Montessori Academy will convert the facility into a school, leaving rugby and hockey to wonder if they will have a home in the long term.

"There were several reports sent to the members on the fact that the club was not going to continue as it was,'' said the president.

"We held on from 1998 through 1999 and the writing was already on the wall in '99. In the early part of 2000 we had pretty much done everything we considered we could to make the club more attractive. We did renovations upstairs and downstairs and got our finances back in order.

"Then, at an AGM in April 2000, the membership ordered that a committee of management look into the possibility of selling the club. The people who put a lot of time and effort into the club didn't want to see it go, we wanted to lease it to another organisation.'' Other clubs around the Island are also facing similar problems with declining numbers as people move away from club life.

"No club will survive on this Island unless you have dedicated management teams and dedicated organisers,'' warns Mr. MacPherson.

"You can have a golf tournament and it will not be supported unless people are willing to get on the phone and call people up. You just need to have people who have the time and people just don't have the time.'' Happier times: Alfred Mello cuts the ribbons which officially signalled the opening of the upstairs lounge area of National Sports Club in 1981. Mr Mello is one of the oldest surviving members of the club.

`Use it or lose it': Former Nationals president Donald MacPherson believes members' inactivity was partly to blame for the club's demise.