ACCORDING to locals, the local bowling club never stopped serving beer from its tin shed out the back when the Meckering earthquake shook the town in 1968.
Rod Carter, who is a lifelong member of the Meckering Sporting Club, was 13 years old when the earthquake happened and was in a shearing shed at the time.
"I was having my normal break around 11am when I heard a thundering noise and felt the earth move around under my feet," Mr Carter said.
"I didn't realise what was happening at that moment, but my family lost our house, like a lot of other people in town, and in the six months following Meckering lost about half of its population."
Fortunately Meckering's sporting fields weren't affected by the major event - only its buildings, with the local sporting clubs having to make do with makeshift buildings in the months following.
With no local facilities left in town after the natural disaster, a meeting took place in April 1969 to form a committee to create the new Meckering Sporting Club.
As part of the Lord Mayor's Relief Fund for the Meckering Earthquake, a contract for $54,000 was signed with Cooper and Oxley to help build the new sporting facility.
In September 1969, the committee, which planned to amalgamate the town's bowls, tennis and golf clubs, approached the Cunderdin Shire for a $20,000 loan over 20 years to bridge the deficit to build the club.
At the official opening of the club in May 1970, Perth lord mayor Sir Thomas Wardle, who also owned a successful supermarket chain at the time, gave a personal donation of $5000 to support the building of the clubhouse.
This resulted in Mr Wardle being awarded the club's first life membership.
"Mr Wardle opened the club, and as he did it, he handed the bowling club president at the time, who was actually my father, Baden Carter, a personal cheque for $5000," Mr Carter said.
"It was a hugely generous gift, as I think the building itself ended up costing about $60,000, so he was a very well respected man in our town."
Since then, all of Meckering's sporting facilities, including tennis, bowls, golf and hockey, have been combined and centred around the club, with the one building catering for all of them.
Jeff Snooke, who has been on and off the club's committee for the past 30 years and president of the club since October 2017, has witnessed it evolve over that time.
"Following the earthquake, the golf course was relocated to where the club is now, and we originally had six grassed tennis courts and now we have four synthetic grass courts," Mr Snooke said.
"The bowling club green was changed over to synthetic grass, and everything that has been added since the Meckering earthquake has been added within the same precinct.
"The sporting club building itself has been extended and revamped and modernised as 50 years has gone on."
With the club having 150 members, Mr Snooke said if the community lost its sporting facilities after the earthquake, it would be very fragmented as a town and a district.
"It's no different to any other town in the country, without sporting facilities and sport in general, the community spirit wouldn't be as good," Mr Snooke said.
This community spirit can be seen in the Meckering Sporting Club still retaining a few of its original members who live in the district.
One such example is Mr Carter, who has lived in Meckering for 66 years and has a grain and sheep farm to the town's north.
He first became a member of the junior tennis and bowls clubs before the Meckering Sporting Club was incorporated in 1970.
Since 1978, Mr Carter has been on and off the organisation's committee and at one stage was club president.
As a lifelong member, he said he had seen many changes to the fabric of the sporting club, such as witnessing women become full members instead of just being associate members who weren't allowed to vote.
That change occurred in the mid 1980s when it became a common law for women to become full members of any club," Mr Carter said.
"It definitely made sense, as the women did most of the work around the club anyway.
"These days, half of the association's committee are women, and it definitely gives the club a nicer family feel."
For about 20 years, the Meckering Sporting Club has also been supported by a community crop, which local farmers donate their time and machinery to harvest.
"Ten years ago it was a voluntary program, but in recent times it's been a bit harder to get farmers to participate, so we now nominate farmers to do it," Mr Carter said.
With the club paying for the seed and fertiliser, all profits from the crop go back to the club.
When the initiative first started, the club would lease a paddock off a local farmer to subsidise income, but now the club has a long-term lease on 130 hectares near town.
"I think the first bit of land the club leased was from the Richardson family and that went on for about four to five years, and then it was the Armstrong family and so on," Mr Carter said.
"If we didn't have that initiative, the club might have run into a bit of financial trouble."
With most of Meckering's communitys functions held at the club, including anything from wakes for funerals to anniversaries, he said it acted as a social meeting place for the town's population.
"It's the only watering hole or pub in Meckering, so that makes it pretty special," Mr Carter said.
Mr Snooke agreed the club was the heart of the town.
"We have a very cohesive committee and community, so everyone pulls in the same direction, and if something needs to be done for the betterment of the community, everyone jumps in and does it," Mr Snooke said.
"That can be seen with our busy bees, when our members come in and help clean up various parts of the club and its grounds, so they can continue to be enjoyed by everyone."
The Meckering Sporting Club unfortunately had to postpone celebrations for its 50th Anniversary, originally planned for this month, due to regulations around the COVID-19 pandemic.
"We will celebrate the milestone at a later date, and will be inviting everyone that has had anything to do with the club over the past 50 years - so a lot of ex-residents of the district will be back and formal invites will go to past presidents and life members," Mr Snooke said.
"It will be a day of celebration centred at the club with a few official speeches and a chance for people to get together, reminisce and enjoy a bit of camaraderie."
