100 Years

Moorleigh

The Building of the Leon Haskin Tennis Club - Turning a Dream into Reality (Part I)

16 April 2024
Author: Philip Sheezel
Contributors: Ian Davis , Russell Jaffe

 

It is fair to say it was Leon Haskin who first dared to dream of building a tennis centre to replace the tennis centre that was first been built  by the South Judean Tennis Club in the 1930’s at 97 Alma Road Caulfield.

 

On the night that I was first elected President of Maccabi Victoria in August 2000, Leon stood up to congratulate me on my appointment and then launched into a passionate speech detailing his disappointment on how the tennis club had, since the loss of Alma Road in 1992, been like the “wandering Jews” looking for a home. He stated that it would be a tragedy to allow an 80 year old Jewish club to remain homeless and to possibly die. I recall that he then cried and said we must do something to save the club.

 

I then made a promise to him to meet him and see what could be done. The next Monday morning, I met with Leon and Clive Friedman in Clive’s office in Caulfield and we started the process of finding a home for the club. Over the following years, with the help of members of the committee of Maccabi Victoria including Joe Aarons OAM, Russell Jaffe and Danny Lustig as well as long time supporters of Maccabi  Alan Synman OAM and Ian Davis OAM, we began the task of trying to find a home for not only the tennis club, but also for other Maccabi clubs including the Ajax FC, the Maccabi Basketball club, the Maccabi squash club, and for a health and wellness centre.

 

Some of the sites that we considered included:

  • Princes Park
  • St Kilda FC
  • The Bentleigh Reserve
  • Elsternwick Park
  • The Alma Club
  • Bentleigh College
  • Glen Eira College
  • Caulfield Racecourse
  • Bialik College.

 

I specifically recall the day in late 2001 when Ian Davis, Russell Jaffe, Joe Aarons and I met the then CEO of the City of Glen Eira (Andrew Newton) in his Council’s offices at the Caulfield Town Hall and was shown a map on his wall. Andrew pointed to an area known as the Moorleigh Reserve in Bignell Rd, Bentleigh East and he expressed the view that this would present us with the best site on which to build a Maccabi Centre.