The idea of a club for retired professional and businessmen was first raised by a member of Welwyn Garden City Rotary Club in 1965 and spread quickly throughout the United Kingdom and worldwide. Each Probus Club is autonomous. The history of Probus Clubs in general can be found on Wikipedia.
The title ‘Probus’ is an abbreviation of the words PROfessional and BUSiness but membership is not restricted to these two groups. It also embraces former executives of government and other organisations, in fact any man or woman who has had some measure of responsibility in any field of endeavour.
The first mention of a possible Men’s Club in Bognor Regis was in a Bognor Regis Rotary Club newsletter of 11th January 1982, and on 19th May 1982 a meeting of interested parties saw the formal creation of the Bognor Regis Club for men. Of those instrumental in calling the first exploratory meetings and the formation of the Club was David Chiverton, at that time a Community Service member of Bognor Regis Rotary Club. David became the first Bognor Regis Probus Club Secretary, with Rowland Stratton as its first Chairman.
The original venue for meetings was the Clarehaven Hotel, Bognor Regis, until its close in September 1985, when the Club moved to the Royal Norfolk Hotel for the next 24 years until the closure of the Royal Norfolk Hotel in 2009, when the Club moved, in March 2010, to its present venue at the Inglenook Hotel. Shortly after the Club’s creation a formal Constitution and Rules of Management were drawn up, and later in 1982 ladies were invited to join us for a luncheon during the spring/summer and a dinner at Christmas. Outings began to be arranged on a regular basis, the first being to Goodwood House and Broadlands in 1985. These outings and residential stays at hotels have become a regular feature of the Club’s activities, as will be seen from the list of activities of the Travel Club in the current year. By 1997 these extended to a number of trips to the Continent, one of which included a wreath-laying ceremony in 2004 in the British Military Cemetery in Bayeux, France, marking the 60th anniversary of D Day, attended by 9 of the 22 then current members of the Club who had served in the Second World War. In similar vein the Club, on 4th August 2014, on the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War and the 70th anniversary of D Day, dedicated a tree at the National Memorial Arboretum to “the memory of those who paid the ultimate sacrifice that we might enjoy freedom and fellowship”; and the Chairman of the Club participates in the annual wreath laying ceremony on Remembrance Sunday at the Town Hall memorial service in Bognor Regis.
Over the years the Club has enjoyed speakers at its lunches, who have covered more than 300 topics, some of the talks being given by members of the Club, drawing on their wide experience of the professions, commerce and industry, travel, and local and international affairs. Although not a ‘service’ Club formed to raise money for charities, the members have always been aware of the needs of others, and so each year the Chairman selects a charity for the Club to support financially, resulting in many thousands of pounds being donated to charities, both local and national, over the years.
Arising out of our membership of Probus and the activities which we share, there is a sense of belonging, of self-generating goodwill and fellowship which leads to the cordiality and compatibility so evident within the Bognor Regis Probus Club.