The Singapore Recreation Club (

Abbreviation An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...

: SRC; ) is one of Singapore's oldest social clubs with a strong sporting tradition, located on

Connaught Drive Connaught Drive (Chinese: 康乐通道) is a one-way road linking Stamford Road to Fullerton Road on the northern side of the Singapore River within the Downtown Core in Singapore. Esplanade Park is on the left side of the road, and The Padang is ...

at the north end of the Padang in the heart of Singapore's

Civic District The Civic District is a district located near the Singapore River in the Central Area of Singapore. It contains historical buildings and museums such as The Arts House (the former Parliament House), National Gallery Singapore (consisting of th ...

History

The Singapore Recreation Club was founded on 23 June 1883 by a group of thirty

eurasian Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipela ...

men and was officially established on 1 July 1883. At that time, the club was housed in a building on

Waterloo Street Waterloo Street (Chinese: 滑铁卢街/四马路) is a two-way street in downtown Singapore stretching from Rochor Road to Bras Basah Road. It passes through the planning areas of Rochor and Museum Planning Area. Formerly a one-way street, th ...

. In 1884, a club pavilion was erected on the site of the Padang. Two years later, the club adopted navy blue and red as its corporate colours: navy blue for sportsmanship and red for the brotherhood of man in sports. By 1904, with increasing membership, the construction of a clubhouse commenced with the foundation stone laid by club president Edwin Tessensohn. The clubhouse was formally opened on 2 September 1905, the governor of Singapore,

Sir John Anderson John Anderson, 1st Viscount Waverley, (8 July 1882 – 4 January 1958) was a Scottish civil servant and politician who is best known for his service in the War Cabinet during the Second World War, for which he was nicknamed the "Home Front P ...

. The addition of two wings was completed in 1931 and declared open by the club president Dr Noel Clarke. At the Annual General Meeting in 1948, member P F de Souza proposed that the club should be open to non-Eurasians, and this proposal, though not immediately accepted, gained more support over the years. In 1955, ordinary membership was opened to people of all communities. A year later, in 1956, women were admitted as members for the first time. At a meeting on 11 February 1963, club president Sir George Oehlers proposed to open full membership to people of all communities in Singapore. This was agreed by a majority of members. As such the vision that SRC "will be an inter-racial club in Singapore" was fulfilled. A new, $65 million clubhouses was opened on 28 June 1997, by Dr Tony Tan, then deputy prime minister of Singapore and minister of defence. The new clubhouse was the idea of former president Jack Wellington. In 1993, the committee led a drive to raise the money to build the clubhouse. The funds were raised through the decision to make membership transferable. The club stands at the north end of the Padang as part of the historical

, which is also part of the

Singapore Grand Prix The Singapore Grand Prix; ta, சிங்கப்பூர் கிராண்ட் பிரிக்ஸ் is a motor racing event which forms part of the Formula One World Championship. The event takes place on the Marina Bay Street Cir ...

route.

Objectives of the Club

The objectives of the Club remain: to promote all forms of sports, recreation and social activities through an active calendar of events, as well as to participate in activities of national sports association and the Singapore National Olympic Council. The commitment to sporting excellence is enshrined in the Club's Constitution and prevails to the present day.

Membership and activities

SRC today has over 5,500 principal members. Sports played by SRC include

billiards Cue sports are a wide variety of games of skill played with a cue, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered table bounded by elastic bumpers known as . There are three major subdivisions o ...

and

snooker Snooker (pronounced , ) is a cue sport played on a rectangular table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six pockets, one at each corner and one in the middle of each long side. First played by British Army officers stationed in Ind ...

bowling Bowling is a target sport and recreational activity in which a player rolls a ball toward pins (in pin bowling) or another target (in target bowling). The term ''bowling'' usually refers to pin bowling (most commonly ten-pin bowling), thoug ...

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

, field hockey,

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping w ...

, soccer, softball and tennis. Social activities and games include balut, bridge, chess,

dancesport Dancesport is competitive ballroom dancing, as contrasted to social or exhibition dancing. In the case of Para dancesport, at least one of the dancers is in a wheelchair. Dancesport events are sanctioned and regulated by dancesport organization ...

line dancing A line dance is a choreographed dance in which a group of people dance along to a repeating sequence of steps while arranged in one or more lines or rows. These lines usually face all in the same direction, or less commonly face each other.Knight, ...

and

Toastmasters Toastmasters International (TI) is a US-headquartered nonprofit educational organization that operates clubs worldwide for the purpose of promoting communication, public speaking, and leadership. History The organization grew out of a single c ...

External links

Official Singapore Recreation Club WebsiteOfficial Singapore Recreation Club Facebook page
{{Coord, 1, 17, 31.74, N, 103, 51, 13.644, E, display=title Clubs and societies in Singapore Downtown Core (Singapore) Multi-sport clubs in Singapore Sports clubs established in 1883 Football clubs in Singapore