Pines Yacht Club Celebrates 100th Anniversary

Tim Horgan, Fleet Captain, and Eileen Horgan, 100th Anniversary Committee chairperson, cheer as the 100th year anniversary flag is raised over the Point of Pines Yacht Club Sunday.

Tim Horgan, Fleet Captain, and Eileen Horgan, 100th Anniversary Committee chairperson, cheer as the 100th year anniversary flag is raised over the Point of Pines Yacht Club Sunday.

As hotels, salt baths and plush resorts in the Point of Pines gave way to new homes for new Revere residents some 100 years ago, those new residents needed a place to meet and congregate.

After all, the Pines in 1914 was rather far removed from the rest of Revere, and vast marshes stood between the City’s main thoroughfares and the new far-flung neighborhood at the furthest tip of the City lines.

That meeting place was the Point of Pines Yacht Club (PPYC), where residents of the tight-knit little neighborhood on the sea gathered for dances, social occasions, and eventually – fishing and boating.

This past weekend, after more than a year of planning and fund-raising, the PPYC celebrated its 100th Anniversary, with the club being formed on Aug. 28, 1914.

Eileen Horgan chaired the 100th Anniversary Committee and said it was special to her because her ancestors were original members of the Club. In fact, as she gazed over a photograph taken during the Club’s formation in the early 1910s, she pointed out her great grandmother sitting stoically in a chair on the side.

“My great uncle was mentioned in the early 1900s as one of the original founding members,” Horgan said. “My grandmother and grandfather became members later in the 1920s. The funny thing is that everyone always asks me if they had a boat and none of them did. That’s because back then the Club was more of a social club. People would come together here for cabaret shows, social events and fundraisers. That’s what it was primarily all about in the beginning. Really, in 1914, they only had one pier and the boats were all on moorings.”

It wasn’t until the 1950s, she said, the Club really began to take on a boating and fishing focus.

Horgan – who said she is getting ready to move back to the Pines where she grew up – said the Club has spent the last year holding wine tastings, calling for old memorabilia, and raising money to put the celebration over the top.

Horgan said she found most of her research about the history of the Club in the old Revere Journal archives, and also courtesy of a man from Michigan, Paul Malone, who is the grandson of the Club’s first Commodore.

In the end, all the work paid off with a stellar time for all – holding a black tie gala at the Club on Saturday, a Family Day on Sunday, and a colossal Brunch on Monday morning.

On Sunday, Commodore Ray McCue joined Mayor Dan Rizzo and others to hoist the 100th Anniversary flag and to issue an official proclamation.

“One hundred years later, the Point of Pines Yacht Club continues to serve a fun, loving, vibrant boating community,” said Mayor Dan Rizzo, who proclaimed August 31, 2014 as the Point of Pines Yacht Club Day in Revere.

“I really thought everything went off perfectly and this was a really nice time,” said Daniel Rogers, a trustee of the PPYC.

Both Rogers and Horgan said the event and the year of planning has brought the Club members closer. They said they hope to capitalize on that.

“We have a lot of momentum now and we want to keep it going,” said Horgan. “We’re talking about having a formal next year to keep it going.”

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