President Joy Pool has been a member for 17 years and is keen to reverse a declining membership, which is presently less than one-third of the day the club was formed.
Probus is a worldwide organisation operating in 23 countries.
It originated in the United Kingdom, with the development of two community-based social clubs in the 1960s.
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The first Probus Club in the South Pacific was formed in New Zealand, in 1974
Two years later Australia's first branch was formed in Hunters Hill, NSW.
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Clubs across the world were discovering that the amount of people looking to join was making clubs too large to operate as intimate social groups.
Many towns and cities started to form two or three Probus groups, each with its own leadership and way of operating.
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This is true of Benalla, which also has the Rose City Probus Club and Lakeside Probus Club.
“We currently have 45 members,” Ms Pool said.
“When we started we had 122 at our first meeting, so we'd love some new members.
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“We are a social club, we don’t do fundraising and things like that.
“We have outings. We went to Euroa to see the museum and war memorial and we were going to see Swanpool's SCRAP art, but sadly that was cancelled.”
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Ms Pool said one of the club's objectives is to support local business.
“We take it in turns going to different places in town for lunches and thing like that,” she said.
“We will often have speakers and entertainment at our meetings.
“The other day we had Dennis Tucker, he is a country and western singer and he was excellent.”
Ms Pool said often people will come along to a meeting as a guest of a member, which gives them a chance to see what the club is all about before signing up.
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“Recently I took three guests out to morning tea and they had a good time.
“We hope they decide to become members, and if they do they will then be inducted.”
The group meets at Benalla Bowls Club on the fourth Monday of each month at 10 am.
If you would like to come along and see what Benalla Ladies Probus is all about you can call Joy Pool on 0405 304 556.
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