About Us

The Wanderers Community Sports Club, as it is known today, was formed by the amalgamation of the Rovers and Pirates. 

Brightwater Pirates

The Brightwater Pirates had terrific support during its first few years which enabled the club to operate a very successful insurance scheme for injured players. Often over 500 spectators would fill the grounds next to the hotel to watch the match. The major afvantage in having a ground next to a hotel was that players could have a bath after the game (a luxury for many in the early days of sport who often had to travel for several hours after games still in their playing clothes) and also aftermatch functions had a ready supply of liquor! The club also had use of a ground on Lord Rutherford Rd alongside the present Rutherford memorial. Brightwater Pirates drew players from Golden Downs, Wairoa Gorge, Mount Heslington and Waimea West. 

Rovers Football Club

The Rovers Football Club came from Wakefield and had been in existence since the 1900's. Players came from Belgrove, Foxhill, Spring Grove and Wakefield. On March 23 1907 the club paid half a guinea to the Nelson Rugby Union and this allowed them to become part of the union. The club colour was officially recorded as green. The official ground for the Rovers was the Wakefield Domain. Sometimes games would simply be played in farmers paddocks and cows would have to moved prior to games! Unlike their Nelson counterparts, country clubs had to pay for all their own things and this was tough on members, especially when buildings needed upgrading. At the Domain, the Rovers used the lodge rooms as their clubhouse but there were no showers or baths. Like many of the rural teams, Rovers had large numbers of the same family in  a team. At one stage an entire team but for one "outsider" was made up of the Baigent family!! Rovers still managed to compete well and had several teams. 

Cricket

Cricket was strong around Brightwater, Wakefield and surrounding areas in terms of player strength and numbers in the 1800's. There were clubs in Belgrove, Pigeon Valley, Wakefield, Spring Grove and Brightwater and from these many would be selected for the Nelson representative team. In these early years it is also interesting to note that the Spring Grove club were known as the Wanderers. 

It is unclear what happened with these clubs over time. However, in 1948 a meeting was called to get cricket going again. The Brightwater Domain was used as their home ground. 

During this period, cricket was not under our 'umbrella' of sports. 

The War

World War II seriously depleted the number of players at both Pirates and Rovers to the stage that they were no longer competitive against the city teams. This happened right around the country and mergers between clubs were common. In the interest of rugby in the area it was decided to amalgamate the two clubs to form one strong club. Pirates were particularly keen for this to happen and contributed £48 to the new club, as opposed to Rovers' £18. 

The Emerging of the Wanderers

The first meeting of the new club was on February 27 1951 and after unanimously passing a motion by Mr. Don Max, the club came into being. Mr. Bernie Reade was elected President. It was he who had put forward the name Wanderers, a name that had long been around in the Brightwater area, but was more to do with cricket than rugby. The name of the club was deliberated over for a long time and was nearly named Athletic, but in the end the name Wanderers was chosen. 

Club colours was also strongly deliberated as a completely neutral colour had to be chosen, yet at the same time the colour could not already be in use in Nelson. Eventually, the combination chosen was a gold jersey with white collar, black shorts, and royal blue socks with gold tops. Interestingly enough, royal blue and gold were the colours of the Wakefield Girls Basketball Club (existed in the 1930's) which went by the name Haerenoa - Maori for Rovers! 

Following the amalgamation, the Pirates were still using the grounds next to the hotel and so the Wakefield Domain became the official home ground of the Wanderers. In 1952, Wanderers were using both Brightwater and Wakefield Domains for rugby. M. A. Wood was elected Patron, the job being more traditional than anything else. But still, every club had a patron as a "father" figure who's job it was to sort out any problems within the club. A constitutition was drafted and letters sent to the Brightwater and Wakefield Domain Board asking for use of the grounds. A senior, junior, third, fourth and fifth grade team were entered in competitions, far more than the Pirates or Rovers could have hoped for on their own. Subscriptions were set at 10 shillings for seniors with an extra two shillings and six pence being added on for insurance. 

Rugby continued to grow in popularity at Wanderers over the next decade. By 1960 there were teams going right down to eighth grade. 

In 1967 a vital deal was struck with Council in which Wanderers gained a 33-year lease over the Domain grounds. This then allowed the club to start building on the grounds without having to go through all the red tape. It was after gaining the lease that the existing Brightwater clubrooms were built. 

In 1968 the LSD Shield, still played for between Wanderers and Rangers (now playing as part of the 'Valley Stags'), was donated by Mr. K. Inwood. 

Rugby

Over the late 1960's and early 1970's interest in rugby dwindled in the Wakefield area and most of the rugby was taking place in Brightwater. In 1973, the Brightwater Domain became recognised as the home ground of Wanderers. 

Squash

In 1976 the club built a squash court as demand was huge at the time. The club was also focussed on providing growing opportunities for the locals. At the time Mr Karsten said "where some clubs tend to place emphasis on expanding facilities for the social side of their activities, we thought that this approach would be of more benefit to the club in the long term as well as providing an extra facility for Brightwaters growing population."

Netball

Wanderers Netball was formed under the clubs umbrella in 1979. At the time, Netball was played in Brightwater. Their courts were shared with the tennis club to best use this available court space. Netball had success for several years, winning the senior competition in 1981, 1985, 1986 and 1987 and fielding seven teams. 

Cricket

In the late 1970's, the Wakefield Cricket Club folded due to lack of membership. All remaining players moved to the Brightwater Cricket Club. A special general meeting was held on 14 October 1982 by the Brightwater Cricket Club. It was at this meeting that R. Ford moved and D. Shuttleworth seconded that the Brightwater Cricket Club amalgamate with the Rugby Club and be called 'Wanderers'. The motion was passed unanimously. In the mid 1980's Wanderers Cricket formalised junior cricket in the Waimea district. 

In 1985, the club installed new lights. At the time these were the best in Nelson. This allowed the club to host night rugby matches which proved extremely popular. 

Tennis

Tennis also officially amalgamated with the Wanderers Rugby Club in 1985 so that tennis players could access the clubrooms and associated facilities. At this time there were the three courts but they were in a poor state. Following the amalgamation, the club was able to raise funds to resurface the courts in 1989. 

Wanderers now well known as a multi sports club

Amalgamating so many codes under one umbrella was well ahead of its time. Sports 'hubs' and 'sportsville' models were to become popular in the 2000's where Mr. Karstens thinking around building a club around the communities needs is promoted by national bodies as the gold standard.

This was a period of rapid growth for the club as it reaped the benefit of its unique approach to becoming a multi-sports club and increasing the scale of its wide and diverse membership base. 

The atom

Our club emblem, the atom, was decided upon in 1992 to honour Brightwater's Nobel Prize Winner, Ernest Rutherford. Rutherford arguably achieved more than any other New Zealander during his life but his accomplishments are difficult to understand. He is widely known for splitting the atom but this simplification does not do him justice. The club is proud to wear the atom in his honour. 

A huge volunteer effort

In ground irrigation was installed in 1994 by volunteers! This is an asset which continues to be extremely useful in maintaining our grounds. 

Changing clubrooms

Large renovations took place to our clubrooms. A gym was built next to the squash court and a clubroom extension was added which included a new entrance way to club, bar and office in 1996. 

New facilities

In 2001, Lord Rutherford Park became an overflow ground due to the increased demand on the Brightwater Domain. In that same year, the bowling club wound up its affairs, donating the clubroom building to the Tasman District Council to remain as a part of the Domain. 

Moving toward professionalism

Society changed and the club had to adapt. Less volunteers were able to contribute their time because they simply did not have the time. Council regulations became so restrictive that liability concerns were a barrier to volunteering labour. Even the day-to-day regulations around health and safety laws and building checks became time consuming.  

The answer was to employ someone to carry out these tasks. Initially Diane Drogemuller, a longstanding volunteer, took on these duties and was reimbursed for her time. She recalls "the job has changed from being purely hands on to mostly sitting behind a computer."

Gym building lease taken over

Wanderers took over the lease to the old bowling clubrooms in 2014 and converted it into a gym for our sporting members. Gradually, this became a community gym open to all to purchase memberships. 

The Tasman District Council took over ground maintenance

Up until 2015, Wanderers was fully responsible for maintaining our own grounds. This required significant investment of time and funds. The Tasman District Council are now responsible for this. 

Change to governance structure & constitution

To reflect our club's 'community' focus and to respect the many other sports we had under the Wanderers umbrella, historically and at the time, we decided to change our name to the Wanderers Community Sports Club. 

At the same time, our constitution was changed to implement some of the changes recommended by Sport NZ and funders at the time. This involved some considerable changes like moving away from a committee to a Board and rules to select a board. 

Changing courts to basketball

In 2023 the club decided to replace one of the netball courts with a basketball court. Nelson Netball centralised the sport to Stoke and over time we lost all our teams. The netball courts were no longer in use for matches or by the community. As basketball was popular, the hoops were installed.