Newbies laid foundation for squash in Feilding

Peter Lamppy is a sports commentator and former sports editor based in Manawatū.

OPINION: When the Feilding Squash Club was born in 1967, it came about in a most unusual way.

The founders, headed by Cheltenham farmer Howard Williamson, hadn’t hit a squash ball in anger and knew nothing of the niceties of the game.

This story tip was sent my way by one of the originals, former All Black Stuart Freebairn, after he read the story of recently deceased New Zealand champion Charlie Waugh.

Williamson still lives on his farm, mows his expansive lawn on a ride-on mower and at 95 has extraordinary recall of how they inveigled donors to part with cash to build the clubhouse.

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His brother was the late David Williamson who most claim would have been a 1949 All Black but for an accident on his motorbike.

The Williamson homestead boasts a swathe of original art, painted by Howard’s wife and acclaimed equestrian artist, Jackie.

The squash link came when Howard pulled into a service station in Feilding where the son of the owner, Bob Stevenson, said he was off to Palmerston North to play squash.

When Williamson asked him why he didn’t play in Feilding, it was because there weren’t any courts.

The Williamsons had many community contacts through farming, art, rugby and the Jaycees.

After a meeting at Freebairn’s house in South St, they decided to form a club and a public meeting was convened at Groombridge’s Tea Rooms and Milk Bar, where a committee was formed. Williamson, having never graced a squash court, found himself chairman.

When a Palmerston North architect came on board alongside a vet, lawyer, accountant and stock agents, they discovered they had to raise 11,000 pounds, a huge sum in the 1960s.

They visited clubs at North Shore, Te Awamutu, Hastings and Cambridge, on which they based their club of two squash courts.

They approached the Feilding Tennis Club about a joint venture but they didn’t want to know because the squash people were perceived to be bringing a debt.

A site was found in Denbigh St but the neighbours didn’t want them either.

Besides all putting their hands in their pockets, Williamson said they would raffle anything they could get hold of.

They would visit potential donors and found much goodwill, the same when he chaired the committee, which later built the Feilding Old Boys’ clubrooms at Johnston Park.

They did find an ally in Feilding Borough Council mayor Bruce Short and he found them the existing site at Victoria Park, paying a peppercorn rental.

The new squashies set about their ”special adventures”. They painted buildings, cut hedges, staked Jim Morrison’s dahlias and employed shrewd slogans such as “Keep Feilding Fit” to enlist recruits.

They visited Ōhakea air force base, which had two wooden courts, and were told by the base commander they were welcome to play there, but not women, who went to Palmerston North.

As a foreign game to most, national champion Nancy New and George Perigo, who played at national level, taught locals the game.

They sold debentures at 5% interest to be repaid annually by lot, but few asked to be repaid.

The section was levelled and cleared of trees and the clubhouse built by Doug Marshall in quick time, none of the consents of today to bog everything down.

RangitĪkei member of parliament Norm Shelton opened it, the first squash club in his electorate.

Williamson then learnt to play squash, served his two-year term and stepped aside.

After a few years the committee made bad decisions and got into financial difficulties, even getting into a legal confrontation with the council.

Williamson chaired a meeting, returned as president for a year and with sympathetic mayor Herbert Dew got the lawsuits out of the way and stepped down when everything was sorted.

People were invited to play back then, a lot from private schools.

Celebrated Pakistani Hashim Khan played an exhibition match at Feilding and Susan Devoy was a guest speaker.

Freebairn’s wife Colleen, a top tennis player, became club champion and represented Central Districts.

Today there are four courts for 125 members, two more built in the 1970s during the heyday of squash and court 3 is a modern glassback with spectator terracing.

The clubhouse has a valuation of $2.4 million and with maintenance costing up to $27,000 a year, there have been tough times.

To offset costs it is shared with the Feilding Social Riders motorbike club.

President Rodger McLeod has played there for three decades and he and his wife are life members.

Three open tournaments are held each year, the most recent three weeks ago attracted 82 players.

The club colours are yellow and black. Feilding has long had a conspicuous heavy steel racquet on its road frontage and after being stolen in 1999 it was found in a drain out of town. It was firmly reinstalled.