Tunbridge Community Club celebrates 50 years

The Tunbridge Community Club will hold its 50-year anniversary celebration on Saturday, May 2, with a family day based around reliving memories and making many more.

It may not be the most glamorous building in the historic village, halfway between Hobart and Launceston, but the former garage has long been a hub for the tiny population and a broad sweep of farmers throughout the midlands.

In 1976 the original town pub, further up the main street, was unceremoniously closed by the publican one night when he reportedly called last drinks and kicked everyone out, never to open again.

The shock and disappointment from locals was channelled into a makeover of the old servo and it’s been run by a volunteer committee ever since.

Club president and owner of Annandale dairy farm Richard Gardner said it offers a place for locals to meet face-to-face, and twice a year he invites all the surrounding farms to come together at the Club for what’s simply called Farmers’ Day, for a meal.

His sheep manager Bree How is Club secretary, the volunteer barperson on Thursday nights and has been pivotal in the Club’s turnaround when it was facing bankruptcy 18 months ago.

With a hard-working young committee, a switch from a paid barman to volunteers and a focus on more community events the books have been turned around.

“I’ve been working here in Tunbridge for about eight years and pretty much got conned into doing the committee within the first six months,” she laughed.

Another Annandale employee, Scott Worldon, has also been a solid contributor, following in the footsteps of his grandfather who was one of the founding members.

At the Club, which is open Wednesday to Friday from 5pm and the first Saturday of every month, the conversations can be muted or loud, depending on the weather, the time, the wool  or fuel prices or the amount of beer consumed.

When someone needs help, there’s a fundraiser. When there’s a problem, it gets sorted.

Even an ongoing debate about removing a wall to give more room around the bar was put to rest when local Greg Power showed up on a weekend with a sledgehammer and simply took the wall out.

In more recent times the locals lobbied local and state government hard for nearly five years to get the heritage-listed Blackman River Bridge at the northern end of town repaired and opened after it was severely vandalised.

The annual beer tasting has long been the Club’s biggest event of the year and there are regular games of dart and eightball, music every second month, and probably a few more wakes than anyone likes to admit.

“There seems to be a good relationship between the farmers and the locals, all ages and all walks of life,” Richard said.

“The introduction of irrigation into the district has had a snowball effect on making farms more productive, employing more people, and we’re starting to see some young families come back.”

Richard said everyone is welcome to celebrate the Club’s long and colourful history with a day designed to include all ages.

The schedule for May 2 is: 2pm Club opens, 3pm afternoon tea and president welcome, 5pm food vans open, 8pm live music with Jon and Col, 2am Club closes.

Free camping is available.