Lions Club group photo in the 1970s.
SUCKER GARDEN--The St. Maarten Lions Club will celebrate its fiftieth anniversary on Saturday, and has reflected on its history of service and activism on the island.
The club was a brainchild of government auditor Donny Bakhuis, who visited the island as part of his work with the Antillean central government in Curaçao. It was founded on December 12, 1970, under the umbrella of the Bonaire Lions Club. The club had 22 charter members, with Ben Vlaun serving as its first President.
The club was the first service club on the island, and it held its weekly meeting at the popular Le Grand St. Martin Hotel on the French side. Later, club member Sigfried Dressner, who was one of the operating officers of Pott Rum Distillers in Pointe Blanche, offered his company’s conference room as the club’s weekly meeting place.
The club initially had a hard time fitting into the regional structure of Lions Club International. From 1970 to 1975, the club formed part of District E-1, which was made up of clubs in Venezuela, Curaçao, Aruba and Bonaire. With all these territories speaking Latin-based languages, Spanish was the lingua franca of regional meetings, which were usually held in Venezuela.
The club’s members decided then to move to an English-speaking district, and transferred to District 60 under President Lou Peters in 1976. The club has been a part of District 60 ever since.
Like other service clubs of the era, Lions was at the time a men’s club. Women could not become official members, instead forming a local Lioness Club in 1973.
The Lioness Club complemented the work of the Lions, and was instrumental in the early eye-screening programmes. The Lioness Club bought simple eye-screening machines and Lionesses such as Sonia Vlaun, Irma Hazel and Amalia James would visit primary schools to test the pupils’ eyes.
Lionesses were also known for their “West Indian” monthly food sale held at Sundial School. They also brought the “Ebony Fashion Show” from New York City, New York, to St. Maarten, which featured international models who performed before a sold-out crowd at the now-Sonesta Maho Beach Resort, Casino and Spa.
Lions Club International opened admission to women in 1987 following the United States (US) Supreme Court ruling that it was illegal for service clubs to bar women from membership. The St. Maarten Lions Club then began to take on women, with Lisandra Havertong becoming the first female club president in 2000.
Sight programmes featured prominently in the club’s early days. When general practitioner and eye specialist Dr. Ersdaile Jacobs joined the club, he started a monthly free public eye-testing programme, which took place under a tent in Cyrus Wathey Square opposite the then-Windward Islands Bank (WIB). This was held in combination with the club’s “Breakfast Morning”, which helped raise funds for other Lions Club community projects.
The move from simple eye tests to more modern testing was done under the initiative of Rudy Hoeve, who helped the club secure the funds to purchase better testing equipment. This allowed Dr. Jacobs to handle many more persons during the monthly screenings.
In 2001, the club invited Canadian Vision Care to St. Maarten and their team of ophthalmologists and optometrists tested more than 2,000 primary school pupils and gave glasses to those who required them. This was also extended to many of the island’s seniors.
A similar event was held in 2018, when President Davey Woods invited humanitarian organisation Volunteer Optometric Services to Humanity (VOSH) International to the country. The volunteers tested more than 2,800 primary school pupils for free, and handed out glasses.
Lions who loved deep sea fishing – such as Celeste Beauperthuy, Ronchie van Grieken, Cyril Hazel and Ben Vlaun – organised fundraising fishing tournaments.
Local fishermen and boat owners would depart as early as 4:00am to return in the early afternoon with their prize catches. Sometimes as many as 40 vessels would take part and the club would have a barbeque while the boats were at sea and sell food and drink to the crowd who were waiting for the fishing vessels to return so they could buy freshly caught fish at reasonable prices.
The club raised some US $13,000 from one fishing tournament in 1985. This money was used to buy a dialysis machine for St. Rose Hospital on Front Street, which allowed for St. Maarten patients to no longer be required to travel abroad for dialysis treatment.
Other projects included a home painting and repair project for the elderly and vulnerable, which was spearheaded by Cyril Hazel, who worked for the Department of Public Works. The club was also instrumental in the realisation of the St. Peters basketball court in the early 1980s.
Some of the club’s projects have become annual staples, such as the “Lion Wally Havertong Christmas Bingo Spectacular”.
In 1973, Wally Havertong, who had been a bingo caller in Aruba before migrating to St. Maarten, was invited to call games at the club’s fundraising Bingo at Mullet Bay Beach Hotel. Lion Wally was the bingo caller for more than 40 years after that, which prompted the club to name it in his honour. The event has grown to be the major fundraising event for the club, with some 2,300 persons trying their luck during the annual event.
Lion Wally also initiated the club’s annual health fair, which has been named in honour of Rudy Hoeve.
The club also named its annual senior citizens party in honour of Nelson van der Linde, who initiated the project in 1997 when he was president.
St. Maarten Alpha Leo Club is the oldest Leo Club in the Dutch Caribbean, according to the Lions Club. It was chartered on April 16, 1983, with an initial membership of 16 boys and girls.
In 1983, the Lions Club organised its first multiple district convention at Mullet Bay Beach Hotel, which gathered around 940 delegates from across District 60. The recently installed Leos were dressed in specially designed uniforms and were the convention’s flagbearers.
The club has been successful at the regional level as well, and can boast of producing the most District Governors of any club in District 60. The first St. Maarten Lions Club member to hold that post was Maxime Larmonie, who served in 2000-2001. He was followed by Wally Havertong in 2006-2007 and Claudius “Toontje” Buncamper in 2012-2013, while Claudio Buncamper is set to become District Governor next year.
The current Lions Den in Sucker Garden was completed in 2001. Besides being a meeting place for the club, it also serves as the location for the After-School Activity (ASA) of No Kidding with our Kids Foundation.
Lions Club International is the largest non-profit service organisation in the world, with more than 1.4 million members of more than 48,000 clubs.
“After 50 years of humanitarian service to the community of St. Maarten, we are thankful for who has guided us in our call to serve. … As we continue to celebrate this milestone, we are encouraged to continue serving the community of St. Maarten for many more years to come,” said the St. Maarten Lions Club in a statement on Thursday.
