NOTES BY JACK.

Otago Witness, Issue 1913, 9 October 1890, Page 26

NOTES BY JACK.

A movemant is afoot to form a bowling club at Gore. Between 40 and 50 residents have expressed their willingness to join a club if started, aud a list is being prepared by Mr George Law. In a description of the new bowling green at Napier, the Hawke's Bay Telegraph gives a few particulars of the history of bowling in that town :— " Years ago here in Napier, a green was to be found at the Hawke's Bay Olub, but some six or seven years ago it was taken up, and the ground is now devoted to tennis. About five years ago the directors of the Recreation Ground Company laid down a green on their property, and a few individuals, with strangely shaped balls, whose bias puzzled the players muchly, took to the pastime. Probably the greenest thing of the lot were the players. Few of them had ever played before, while the green was heavy, and what should have been an amusement bacame something more than exercise — a toil. The playing green was narrow, but what it laokod in width it more than made up in length, for it was far and away the longest bowling green on the face of the earth. A few feet at each end were got rid of by making a ditch, though some of the players saw in this the rain of the green. From that small beginning, tender the most disadvantageous of circumstances, the Napier Bowling Club, in October 1887, was formed. Dr Hitchings as president, and Mr T. W. Balfour as vice-president, with an energetic committee, set towcrk, and the dub' prospered. The year following saw a neat pavilion erected, but the green remained much the same as before. Visitors from other clubs occasionally put in an appearance, and how bowlers could get anything near the jack on such a corrugated surface was to them a mystery. They laughed at the peculiar ridges, which- even the members said were only understood by one of their number, and he, unfortunately, could only play even moderately well on one of the four rinks. But notwithstanding all the drawbacks from which they suffered, there were four young civil servants, Messrs- Ashton, Luxford, Stubbs, and Yates, who regularly threw down the gauntlet to the club, and the challenge used only to be taken up because of the lion-heartedness of a bowler who now fills the position of president of the club, Bowling is generally supposed to be confined to old fossils, but in Napier this does not apply, for the juniors have always beaten the seniors, and from the ranks of the bowlers a very good cricketing team could be selected, Napier claims to have the oldest reliable bowler in the colony, who could play any man not more than 10 years his junior, and at the same time can 1 select probably the most junior rink to be found, A 7ft fence encloses the new green, while the playing green, 120 ft x 110 ft, will enable eight rinks to be played. The ditch all round is turfed, while the banks on three sides are devoted to choice flowers. It is intended to form an additional green, allowing of 11 rinks being played. This improvement has entailed an expenditure of between £800' and £900, and there has been no appeal for assistance to outsiders. As a consequence of the formation of the new green some 30 new members have been elected, and before the year is out it is confidently anticipated tbat the club will be tha strongest in the North Island, with the exception of the Wellington ono."