North Queensland Club serves as a meeting place for local business people since 1885
Tradition runs deep at the North Queensland Club dating back to 1885 serving businesspeople across North Queensland as a premier location.
Townsville
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Tradition runs deep at the North Queensland Club, which has operated in the city since 1885.
It is a meeting place for businesspeople across North Queensland where they discuss important issues of the day and plan the future of businesses and the community.
The club was originally known as the Gordon Club and occupied Stanton House on Flinders St. The clubhouse was established at its current site on Denham St in 1888.
President Leon Pommer joined the club in the early 1980s when he was starting on his career as a lawyer after moving from Brisbane.
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“When I started in the 80s I was relatively young and the mainstay of the club were older so it introduced you to that older group and I suppose now our crew has become the older brigade,” he said.
“I was a partner in a local (law) firm and every partner was a member and if we had legal drinks I would come up.
I also used to play snooker at lunchtime and have a sandwich.”
The club holds meetings, weddings, birthday celebrations, Christmas parties and Melbourne Cup soirees and can accommodate just over 100 people.
The clubhouse has a fully stocked bar, two snooker tables and provides modest lunches from 11.30-2pm and afternoon drinks from 4.30-6.30pm Monday to Friday.
Mr Pommer said the club was proud to provide a professional space for people to enjoy.
“Our primary function is as a meeting place for businesspeople. They can come here and have lunch and talk privately and you don’t have poker machines in your ear or music blaring at you,” he said.
“What we generally do is try to have a business lunch once a month where we might ask the mayor to come along or the editor of the Bulletin and talk about their position and what they see is happening in Townsville,” he said.
Initially membership was only open to literary and professional gentlemen but in 1996 the doors were opened to women.
The club currently has 140 town members and 30 country members.
Mr Pommer said he would have visited the club three times each week over the past three decades.
“I have lived in Townsville for 40 years and it is a good feeling to be part of an ongoing institution,” he said.
“We need a continuity of age however and we are so happy to have younger people in to carry on the tradition.”
NORTH QUEENSLAND CLUB
Number: (07) 4771 2250
Email: manager@northqueenslandclub.com.au
Address: 146 Denham St, Townsville
Website: www.northqueenslandclub.com.au
Facebook: North Queensland Club
When: Open Monday - Friday
Originally published as North Queensland Club serves as a meeting place for local business people since 1885