75th Anniversary at Cattle Point – January 2024

Happy 75th Birthday to the Gippsland Lake Yacht Club on its current site.

January 2024 marks the 75th anniversary of the official opening of the Gippsland Lakes Yacht Club club-house on its current site. The original and smaller GLYC club-house was once a little further west towards Newlands arm.

Way back on Monday 31 January 1949, in front of a large crowd, the GLYC officially opened its new clubhouse on the foreshore at Fleischers Point, over looking McMillan Strait and Lake Victoria.

Bairnsdale Shire President Cr. A.J.Gilsenan officiated at the ceremony. Speeches were made and people were thanked.

Ralph Thomson, former and first commodore of the GLYC (founded in the 1930s), with a long family connection to lakes yachting, spoke of earlier days and pointed to the flag pole which was once the mast of the “Boomerang” , a boat owned by the late Miss Ruth Hamilton. Ruth Hamilton was a prominent Paynesville resident and co-founder of the Bairnsdale CWA in the 1910s and passed away in 1942, a few years before her mast graced the new club-house.

GLYC Vice Commodore John Lloyd had great expectations for the club, remarking that conditions on the lakes were as good as any in Victoria and in the future Paynesville would receive yachtsmen in their hundreds.

Cr Gilsenan thought community resistance to a club-house on the foreshore was driven by fears it would be an eye-sore. But the fine building was nothing of the kind, rather it was an asset, consolidating Paynesville as the centre of lakes yachting.

It’s important to note that the GLYC spent some years planning the move, and as early as 1946 had decided that the building would be good looking and functional with storage space below the building, ensuring the building would be available for social activities.

Photographs of 1950s Paynesville GLYC regattas tend to support those claims made in 1949 – Paynesville – the boating capital of Gippsland if not Victoria. 🙂

Read more about the big day in 1949 here : https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/269438354? )

BTW, the GLYC was formed in early 1937 when boat owners from Bairnsdale, Metung and Paynesville got together on Tuesday 19 January 1937 to consider a proposal to form a boat club.

The club was in temporary premises for a short while until the opening of a club house at Sunset Cove. This club-house was moved along the foreshore and formed part of the new club-house at Felischers Point. Read more here: https://sailglyc.com/history/

Apologies for any errors or omissions..

Here’s a listing of the source of the original pics:

pic1 source: The jetty, car ferry and Yacht Club at Paynesville http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/4273847

pic2 source: Gippsland Lakes Yacht Club, Paynesville, Vic http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/60579

pic3 source: Aerial View of Paynesville http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/372181

pic4 source: VIEW AT PAYNESVILLE, VIC. http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/58073

pic5 source: Yachts, Paynesville, Vic. http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/63453

pic6 source: REGATTA DAY PAYNESVILLE, VIC. http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/57992

pic7 source: The Jetty, Paynesville, Vic. http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/63115

pic8 source: Yacht Club At Paynesville, Vic. http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/66004

pic9 source: Paynesville, [Vic.] http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/58780

please note these pics and info are available via the State Library of Victoria www.slv.vic.gov.au and the National Library of Australia via Trove at www.trove.nla.gov.au