History of Longridge Golf Club & Preston Cycling Club

Part 5 - The Next Phase

The extension of the golf course did a great deal more than flatter the club’s ego; it permitted a rapid expansion of the membership. When work began in 1970, there were 270 playing members; a couple of years later, that figure had almost doubled. And suddenly, a club that had lived from hand to mouth over so many years and had needed to beg and borrow in order to develop found itself in a relatively prosperous and thriving condition. The next phase of development was about to begin.

Again under the guiding hand of Norman Page, the treasurer pored over the accounts to devise a scheme whereby the extension and modernisation of the clubhouse could be financed to the tune of £25,000. With the help of a brewery loan of £5000 and loans from members, he found a way, and on January 4, 1974, Herbert Forrest’s building workers again moved in.

Five months later, the work was finished, and Dr. Andy Kelly, a trustee of the club and a former captain and president, was able to open the new clubhouse. It now boasted a pleasantly modernised bar with lounge and dance floor attached, as well as a superbly fitted kitchen downstairs, while upstairs, there was a new ladies’ lounge and locker room, a large men’s snooker room, and a bar to serve both men’s and women’s retreats.

It had turned out to be a much larger job than had first been appreciated, for the contractors uncovered so much of the Barn’s original roof timbering that was in such a poor state that the whole area had to be re-roofed. Perhaps, like its predecessor, it will give warmth and protection for another 400 years.

(And so the story is almost complete). Thus from a ramshackle barn and 29 acres acquired by those far-sighted members of Preston Cycling Club for £550 in 1917, there has grown a luxurious clubhouse and an 18 hole golf course that stands on 86 acres of land owned by the members themselves. In 1974, it had an estimated book value of over £170,000.

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4