Big Bang Celebration

Rotary Club of Billericay Mayflower members celebrated their Chartering as a new Rotary Club, on February 10, 1990, with a “Big Bang” dinner held at Crondon Park on the last Thursday at the end of August.  

Enjoyable Evening

Carol and President PatrickI, along with IPP Roger and Sarah, attended this Mayflower event on behalf of our club.

The evening was a tribute to the formation of the Rotary Club of Billericay Mayflower, which we had instigated as its mother club.  Eleven founder members were present to enjoy the evening. All were made very welcome by President Alistair Moulds and all the Mayflower members.

The programme started with a very amusing address from Sid Slater who was Vice President at the formation of Mayflower, and who reminded us of the build-up to its official Chartering, and particularly about the tragic loss of the prospective first President, Peter Moore, who unfortunately died shortly before the chartering.  In a tribute to Peter, he was still recorded as the "Founder President” of the club.

A New Club

Patrick had found details in our club archive of the Mayflower Club's formation and read out the statement made in that year (1989/90), and followed this with a short speech about the formation of their club, as he was on the committee with Peter Murray, Harry Boughen and Ivan Gibson which decided that a new evening Rotary Club gave the public more opportunity to join Rotary in Billericay. 

Patrick was followed by an address from Past District Governor Brian Hill-Cottingham, who was the District Extension Officer at that time, and he complimented the club on the way it had developed from its early days over 30 years ago.

What a Video

After this everybody was shown an edited video of the inaugural Black Tie dinner held at the Meads Crystal Ballroom in Brentwood.  This showed all the Founder Members being introduced by Peter Murray.  They were all mercilessly teased by Peter with very funny comments about their Rotary “work classification”.
If you want to see the video of the event and also if you want to listen to Peter’s comments, then this video is on YouTube and can be found at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xFlpODRm60
It is notable for showing much younger versions of some current members of Mayflower and, sadly, some who have passed away, receive their membership pin. 

It was a very enjoyable evening, one which was very successful and replete with much fun and laughter.