This month, the Redlands Lawn Bowling Club eclipsed the 103rd anniversary of its founding. The green where the sport first took place and root in Redlands yet exists, along with the historic structures built by the club, such that Redlands remains a venue for the pastime, which is a relative rarity in Southern California.
The bowling club, located on the grounds of Sylvan Park at 411 North University Street, was founded in 1923 by real estate developer Melvin L. Hooper with the assistance of Dr. Frank H. Folkins. That was two years after aficionados of the sport began playing the game on the same spot in Sylvan Park.
The Redlands Daily Facts ran an article on November 1, 1921 remarking that lawn bowling had been taking place at Sylvan Park over the two or three previous Saturdays, and crediting Melivin Hooper as instrumental in initiating the competitions.
Hooper, originally from Canada, fancied himself as a crack player.
The activity proved popular enough that competitions became regular events at Sylvan Park, which was proximate to the stone zanja, an aqueduct constructed by Spanish settlers more than a century previously.
There was already a lawn bowling club in Pasadena at the time. Led by Hooper, a group of Redlands residents formed what was the second long bowling club in Southern California, officially chartering the chapter on January 24, 1923.
Popular in Italy and other countries in Europe, the origin of lawn bowling is traced to ancient Egypt around 5,000 B.C. A relatively familiar form of the game existed in Rome, with the modern sport and its formal rules having been developed and refined in Britain, with the oldest surviving green in Southampton, England, dating to 1299.
The primary goal in lawn bowling is to roll a ball closer to a designated “jack,” which protrudes from the ground a standard distance between 69 feet and 75 feet from the rolling mat than one’s opponents. The game is played over a set number of “ends,” i.e. frames or rounds. The objective is to be the first player to reach a score of 21 in a singles game or 25 shots in a doubles game.
The formation of the Redlands Law Bowling Club led to a longstanding partnership with the city and allowed improvements to be made to the playing grounds at the expense of the club’s members.
Within two years after the club’s founding, games became a significant social feature of the community. International teams, one from England, Canada and Australia in particular, were sojourning to Redlands to compete there. The Redlands Daily Facts edition of May 29, 1925 reported that lawn bowlers from Riverside were competing against players from Redlands. The influx of competition from outside the city prompted the club to undertake the erection of its first clubhouse in June 1925.
The June 10, 1925 edition of the Redlands Daily Facts credits the grounds upon which lawn bowling competitions are taking place at Sylvan Park with being “the finest lawn bowling greens in Southern California.”
In August 1925 the Lawn Bowling Club erected, at a cost of $500, flood lights to allow lawn bowling to take place at night.
In October 1926, the city council, then referred to as the city trustees, provided more land at the park to expand the law bowling facilities. This occurred as Hooper was gearing up to construct the Regal Court apartment complex on Michigan Street in 2027, and with the means available to him, he saw to it that the club built its second clubhouse, one done in a distinctive Mission Revival-style, including a stucco exterior and parapet roofline, which has been maintained and remains in place today.
The club’s team competed in Southern California Citrus Lawn Bowling League against other teams from Sun City, Riverside, Hemet and Pomona, having taken the won the league’s annual trophy which originated in 1961 and remains with the winning team for a year on some occasions.
The City of Redlands granted the clubhouse historic and scenic designation on September 3, 2015 and those grounds were given a state historic resource designation the same year.
–Mark Gutglueck