PROfessional and BUSiness = Probus
If you’re retired and looking to widen your circle of friends, Aylsham Probus could be your answer. Probus is an international organisation, which had its beginnings in the mid 1960s when retired members of Rotary Club in Welwyn Garden City started to meet together in the form of a luncheon club. The Rotary District took up the idea, looking to sponsor such clubs elsewhere and as a result three businessmen, all approaching retirement and realising a need for fellowship got together to form what eventually became Probus.
The name Probus comes from the first three letters of PROfessional and BUSiness, having the additional advantage that it is the root of the Latin for ‘probity’.
Such was the success of this innovative organisation that just ten years later there were branches in New Zealand and Australia with Canada following in the 1980s. Today’s Probus can boast representation in the USA, Belgium, South Africa and India, alongside other groups in Africa and Asia.
Each Probus branch is autonomous, deciding for itself what activities are available for members. In Aylsham, meetings take place every first and third Tuesday morning in the Aylsham Lodge Hotel on Norwich Road. A typical gathering will start with an opportunity to chat over a cup of tea or coffee and this will be followed by a speaker. Recent subjects have ranged from Air Sea Rescue to Prison Mentoring, Morris Dancing to Queen Victoria and travel, together with autobiographical talks from members. The morning can be rounded off with a visit to the hotel’s well-stocked bar!
Like the majority of Probus Clubs, Aylsham, which was established in the mid-1980s, is aimed principally at retired men but two or three times a year events, usually including lunch, are organised to include wives, partners and friends.
Probus is entirely non-profit making so membership is kept down to a very reasonable £35 a year to cover the cost of venue hire and speakers’ fees. For more information or to arrange a visit to the Club, give Secretary Eric Bone a call on 01263 731172 or email [email protected]
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