The finished clubhouse

The early years

Building the new pavilion

Cheam Bowling Club is a section of Cheam Sports Club, a private club where bowls, cricket, football, hockey, karate, korfball, squash and tennis are played.

Cheam Men's Bowling Club was founded in 1931 and Cheam Ladies Bowling Club in 1964.

On 24th September 1931 there was an informal meeting in the canteen of Cheam Sports Club. Some twenty-seven men gathered together and mooted the idea of playing bowls at Cheam. Of this number, six were elected to be committee members. It would seem that most of the group were at least honorary members of Cheam Sports Club. Maybe they were just social members, or perhaps formerly had enjoyed cricket or tennis. Jas Bartlett was the prime mover in our founding and the first chairman. On the 3rd of October the first committee meeting was held. It was announced the rental had been agreed with Cheam Sports Club at £1.1.0 a year. This was on our present site, which was a rough plot of land also containing an allotment. The subscriptions were then set at 10/- a year and we were officially to be named “The Cheam Bowling Club”.  In April a meeting was called, where it was set for the official opening of the green on 29th May 1932. A Mr Harry Bolton would be invited to cast the first jack.

At a meeting on 22nd April 1964 the men agreed to the forming of a ladies section of the bowling club, limited to 24 members. Their activities were subject to the jurisdiction of the men’s section and an annual subscription of 3 guineas per member was to be paid.

From these small beginnings the Club grew from strength to strength and in 1994 the members decided to build a new joint pavilion to replace the two huts that had served as separate men's and ladies' pavilions but were now too small.

The complete pavilion was built by the members in their free time, from the foundations to tiling the roof.

Both the men’s and ladies’ sections play league and friendly games, which include mixed matches. We enter many outside county and national competitions and some of our members have played in the county team and in the England team. Mixed roll up afternoons are always well attended and very enjoyable. There also separate roll up afternoons.

We have a lot of fun days and social events and have had bowls tours to Spain, Portugal and Cyprus.