Our History
This article is the transcript of Les Warburton's speech to the dinner held to mark the Club's 30th Anniversary in 1995. Les Warburton was the Club's first President. He has since been made an Honorary Member of the Club.
It gives a person a lot of satisfaction & pleasure to know that a club which he was partly instrumental in forming is still functioning strongly after 30 years. Although the original & early minutes of meetings are lost, I can still remember the formation of the club.
I don’t remember how I met Col & Eileen Davidson, but i do know it had something do with coins, and it was from this meeting that the Orange & District Coin & Stamp Club came into being.
At the time there were more people interested in getting a collection of Australian coins together “than you could poke a stick at”, as it was less half a year away from the Decimal change-over” of 14 February 1966.
We thought that it would be interesting to know just how many were interested, so we decided to place an advertisement in the local paper with the view of forming a Coin Club.
As the result of the advertisement we received many calls from interested people. We found that among the callers were also stamp collectors who inquired if we intended to include philately as part of the clubs interests, and, as you can see, this eventuated.
The inaugural meeting was held at Allcorn’s Star Ballroom (New Patmos) on 29 July 1965. As I remember, 23 people attended. They were as follows:-
Philip Barrow, Robert Bartlett, Veronica Cameron, Ray Cantrill, Perce & Mrs Curall, Colin & Eileen Davidson, Geoff Floyd, Ray Flynn, Lal Hansen, Frank Hazzard, Geoff Hennessey, Des Morrissey, Ray Norman, Tom Robards, Mrs Rowe, Keith & Lionel Stewart, Lee Serisier, Barry Tate, Les & Dot Warburton. If I have forgotten anyone, I apologise.
We held two or three meetings at this venue before moving to the old Town Band Hall in William Street. We stayed there for quite some time before moving to Gryliss’ Cafe next to the Strand Theatre in Summer Street.
The Foundation Office bearers were:-
President:- Les Warburton,
Secretary:- Geoff Hennessey,
Treasurer:- Veronica Cameron.
At the inaugural meeting a name for the club was settled on. I remember well that Col. Davidson moved that the club’s name be the Coin & Stamp Club (not the Stamp & Coin Club). This was carried.
I can remember that at one early stage we boasted a membership of 94.
Such was the enthusiasm that we held our meeting fortnightly & held auctions which drew people from Sydney, Dubbo, Narromine, Bathurst and other district towns.
At one of these auctions I recall bidding $300.00 for a 1930 penny, but, as the reserve was $350.00, I missed out. Three hundred dollars then would be the equivalent of about $2 000.00 now. This coin currently sells for in excess of $6 000.00.
Well after the decimal coinage change-over of February 1966, interest dropped off quite dramatically. It was mainly due to the efforts of Phil. Nicholas, as Secretary, that we survived a quiet period. After a while, Col. Davidson took over as President, and guided the Club to it’s present stage.
