Monday's Musings - Turning the Pages

I credit the following quoted material to the amalgamated club’s first President, Jimmy Grier.

“In the late 1980s, both Castaways RFC and Oak Bay Wanderers were struggling to have enough players to keep fielding teams, and both clubs were having trouble financially keeping their heads above water.

Representatives of both clubs met in 1989 and see if amalgamation was desirable and feasible. Involved at this time on the Wanderers team were Dennis Carson, President of Oak Bay Wanderers, Doug Gray and Hugh Creighton. On the Castaways side were Jim Grier, President of Castaways, Bill Palmer and Graham Hunter. We had help from such illustrious figures as Frank Carson, Nigel Banks and Paul Baylis, as well as much input, both negative and positive, from numerous prominent members of both clubs.

Following endless meetings which alternated between Oak Bay’s and Castaway’s clubhouses, we agreed to amalgamate under the name Oak Bay Castaways.

To give some history to the time frame of events involving the clubs, firstly Oak Bay Wanderers had been around for a hundred years or so and bought a clubhouse at the corner of Redfern Street and Oak Bay Avenue in1972.  In 1976 the founders handed it over to another group of ‘trustees’ for the members of the Wanderers, who eventually turned the club over to the members in 1982.

Castaways started playing cricket in 1965 and rugby about a year later 1966.  Field Hockey and soccer sections were added later. After occupying various clubhouses on Parry Street, 750 Discovery Street, 1630 Quadra Street, David Clarke’s basement on Prospect Place, the club finally purchased 714 Discovery Street aka The Temple, in 1977 for the princely sum of $175,000 from two German businessmen.

In 1990 the newly amalgamated club known as Oak Bay Castaways started playing rugby under that banner. All good so far, but then a decision needed to be made regarding a clubhouse.  Both locations, Discovery Street and Oak Bay Avenue were considered.  Location, neighbors, noise from social events, renovations needed to house a joint club, resale value of either of the buildings and proximity to home fields were all factors to be considered.  After many more heated discussions we announced our decision to sell the Oak Bay building and keep Discovery Street. There was much ill feeling among the Wanderers alumni at the time.  Oak Bay Clubhouse was sold in 1993. The Castaways Sports Club changed its name to Discovery Sports Club in 1992 and is the owner of the building which currently houses CW Rugby and Castaways soccer.

Now we are thirty-five years down the amalgamation road and most players and many supporters do not remember the origins of the club unless they have family members who were involved in the past.  Most supporters embraced the amalgamation which led to the rise of the hugely successful Castaway Wanderers RFC that won the BC Championship three times from 1999-2002. The Temple, though distant from Windsor Park, has seen some epic functions and good times. It became a designated Heritage Building and has a current assessed value of $1.28 million, so it was a good investment.

No longer can a club survive on beer sales, the number of registered players has grown, with some 70% being ineligible to enter the club due to legal age restrictions, the building integrity is showing its age, most members come from Oak Bay families and location is too distant to be of any practical use.  All these factors have led to the current formation of the Oak & Palm Society and the Coming Home project."

Respectfully submitted,

Jim Grier. (Last President of Castaways RFC, First President of Discovery Sports Club, First President of CWRFC, briefly named OBC).


Our penultimate “page” is related to the announcement of long-serving, senior men’s coach and former Director of Rugby, Kenny Goodland who has offered his resignation upon completion of the season.  Ken has been with CW for 25 years.  He was appointed assistant coach to Scott Manning with our men’s teams in 2018 and took over the Director of Rugby position in 2021, along with that of head coach of the senior men.  Ken has given yeoman’s service, and he will be sorely missed but he will be actively involved in the transition and will be available in other capacities.  Once again Ken, we say thank you, and we know where your heart lies.  The final page will be the club’s search for a new head coach!

MORE FACES OF KENNY GOODLAND

 

 





 

Special mention today of our President, Kerri Cook. Kerri served as Liaison Officer with the NZ Black Ferns at the HSBC Sevens for the third occasion, this past weekend.  The Kiwis won the title, defeating Australia in the final.  The Vancouver Sevens was another success.  Kudos to TSN for comprehensive coverage.  Canada’s women went 0 – 3 on day #1 but bounced back to defeat Japan and Fiji for a fifth-place finish, unfortunately injuries to Norsten and Logan were incurred as the show moves to New York next weekend.  The men, playing in an ‘exhibition’ Challenge series with Japan and Chile, went 3 – 1.  Their effort against Japan on day#2 was a good showing with CW associated, from Ontario, Jack Shaw scoring a hattrick, and captain Kratz leading his boys and providing a highlight, ‘out-the-back’ pass for a try.  The men will now move to Uruguay and Brazil as they pursue promotion to Tier 1.