The demolition of the Mike’s Club building at the corner of Regent Street West and West Canal a few months ago took place with nary a word from the media here. Because Mike’s Club had been so iconic, beginning with its establishment by the late Miguel Zayden around 1962, its demolition was truly historic in the annals of Belize City’s roots population.

I grew up right across the street from the Mike’s Club building, directly west of Bolton Bridge and next to the Haulover Creek, in front of the canal. Before 1961’s Hurricane Hattie, the building was three stories high, wooden. Hattie ripped off the top floor. So, Mike’s Club opened on the surviving second floor. My understanding is that the property was owned by the late Carlos Sikaffy.

The bigger story may be the death of the club system in the old capital. When I was growing up in the 1960’s, Colonial Band Association (CBA) and Newtown Club had been established from before my time and were still going strong. These were membership clubs, which were licensed to sell alcoholic beverages, whisky generally being the beverage of choice.

What you younger readers have to understand is that Belize City was the center of everything back then (Belmopan was not opened until 1970), and all the government departments, which had Creole majorities in their offices under the British, did business in the city from 8:00 to 12:00 and 1:00 to 4:00 weekdays, and 8:00 to 12:30 (half-day) on Saturdays. CBA and Newtown provided post-work recreation for the civil servants. (CBA was in the heart of Belize City’s Southside, at the corner of Prince Street and East Canal. Newtown Club was on the western side of the Barracks green, which was sold to the Ramada Hotel group around 1985 or so.)

At these clubs, men played cards, shot carom billiards, drank some, and sometimes held dances. (Unity Club was unique in that it did not have a billiards table, only table tennis, and I did not see alcohol being sold. Unity focused on their cricket and baseball teams, and they oversaw the running of Edwards Park, which became Rogers Stadium after Hattie in 196l.) 

The business community, which was more Mestizo than Creole, was organized in Pickwick Club, which used to be on the southern side of what is now the law office of the Musa & Balderamos law firm on North Front Street. Pickwick had a “lawn” tennis court, as did Newtown. (Not so with CBA, which was surrounded by the street, the canal, and wooden homes.)

I don’t know much about Cambridge Club, which was on Church Street next to the historic bike shop near Church Street’s corner with Albert Street. The one time I went up to Cambridge Club, the late Doyle Prince appeared to be the proprietor, and bartender. The famous, flamboyant Oliver “Racku” Craig, a butcher, appeared to be a member there. The club seemed to be working class, as opposed to civil service. I don’t remember if they had a carom billiards table.

Belize Club, across from the Barracks green, had a membership which was expatriate and basically Caucasian. Belize Club would participate in local cricket competitions, but otherwise remained aloof from community activities.

At Newtown Club, which I visited during my vacation from Dartmouth in 1967, there was a carom billiards table, but it was not the center of attention in the club. The center of attention was the cards table in a spacious inside room near the bar, where the attorney/economist/politician, Dean Lindo, held court in the presence of people like Joe Longsworth and the attorney Ernest “Stud” Staine.

I point this out because it seemed to me that Mike’s Club, in a smaller building than Newtown, was dominated by the carom billiards table, and Mike’s billiards players were the best in Belize. There were rooms where older, respectable men gambled in poker games and one or two other card games. On the verandah of Mike’s, next to the Haulover Creek, we played dominoes, often for money.

It seemed to me that the membership/clientele of Mike’s Club was dominated by waterfront workers, fishermen, carpenters, cabinet makers, and other Belizeans we would consider working class. I became a regular of Mike’s Club during the early 1970s, primarily because it was so conveniently near to my family home at the corner of Regent Street West and West Canal. Although I was from the academic class, I was pretty much accepted by the Mike’s Club crowd, although the club was more PUP than UDP, and there were periods when I was fighting against the PUP and I felt some hostility from a couple Mike’s people.

There was an incident that happened at Mike’s one time which scares me even today. A member I believed to be UDP (I was in a pro-PUP phase at the time) sat next to me and began playing with a .22 automatic pistol. I tried to explain to him that such a firearm is very dangerous, because sometimes when you take out the clip, a slug remains lodged up in the barrel. I had had an experience just two or three weeks before when a friend thought a .22 was safe because he had removed the clip. The gun went off suddenly and hit the wall a foot from my head. I knew the shooter to be my friend. But the person sitting next to me and playing with the .22 had been drinking, and I believed him to be politically hostile. No matter what I said, he ignored me, and I think, looking back, that I should have been more physical.

Overall, however, I had many good times at Mike’s Club, and the proprietor’s common-law, the late Deltrude Uter, became my comadre and very good friend.

It was understood that gambling was permitted at Mike’s Club, even though, strictly speaking, gambling was illegal in Belize. One night, the paramilitary’s Charlie Good and his crew raided the club and took some very respectable Mike’s citizens to the police station. That situation was quickly cleared up, and Charlie was taken off the streets. When he returned to the streets a week or two later and marched into Rick’s Bar (across Bolton Bridge from Mike’s), he was dramatic. That’s a story I will tell you another time.