The men’s Probus Club started in Broadway in 1978 when a Rotarian in the Evesham Rotary Club, David Senior, wrote to over sixty retired men in Broadway to see if they were interested in attending a preliminary meeting. He collected together 24 interested and retired/near-retired men who lived in the Broadway area and were prepared to be involved in the formation of a local Probus Club.
At the first AGM held on 28th June 1978, Jack Hanglin was elected President, Stanley Amos Secretary with Harold Reeves-Hall as Treasurer. Dr Vincent Corbett was elected Vice President.
Picture shows Mr Jack Hanglin (left) founder chairman of the Broadway Probus Club, with the current chairman, Dr Vincent Corbett, holding the club’s first chain of office which Mr Hanglin presented to the club. [The Evesham Journal of 14th Feb 1980]
The constitution was discussed and it was decided to base it on the recently formed Evesham Probus Club. The first committee members were Bill Heeley, Kenneth Johnson, Noel Seton-Morris and Rex Booth. The first subscription was only £1 per annum (+ coffee & room charge) and after a number of increases, by 2001 it was £20 per annum, when meeting charges were discontinued.
Originally membership numbers were fixed at 50 causing a waiting list that at one time totalled 15. Currently the maximum membership is set at 65.
The history of Probus clubs in general can be found on wikipedia.