St. Vital Seniors Club was started in 1983. Its members met in a room specifically designed for them at the BRAC (Beaumont Recreational Activity Centre, now the Ken Nichol Regional Recreation Centre). The first executive was Marcel LeBlanc, president; Alex Berube vice-president; Jeannine Rodrigue, treasurer; and Helene Berube, secretary. Many activities, including floor curling and a monthly Sunday brunch, were started there.

By the end of 1985, the club, under the leadership of Dollard Gobeil, began to plan for a new senior citizens’ centre. Within a few months, development of Le Rendez-Vous was approved and fundraising was in full swing. These were some of the special contributions:

• Recreation, Parks & Wildlife Foundation matched $22,000 private donations

• Town of Beaumont Council donated $35,000

• Macleods – three $300 donations

• Fundraising blitz and ongoing member donations

• Jeanette and Maurice Gariepy gave $25,000 from their lottery windfall

• New Horizons federal grant of $10,978

Construction began in May, 1986. In July, it was reported that “Mother Nature was throwing a bit of a rainy ‘monkey wrench’ into the construction schedule,” but the many volunteers kept plugging away. Behind the scenes, the women cooked and baked, providing meals for the crew. The building organizer was Aime Auger; carpenters included Dan Berube and many others.

At 85, Ernest Gobeil volunteered every working day and cut the “thousands of cedar shakes covering the top portion of the walls” to satisfy the downtown redevelopment codes for a ‘Normandy-style’ look.

A special feature of the building is the heated floor; at the time Beaumont was “only the second community in the province to install such a heating system in its seniors’ centre.” Interior finishing and painting was completed by others, including Maurice Labrosse, Edward and Dianne L’Heureux, Helene Magnan and Marcel LeBlanc. Because the centre was built “almost entirely with volunteer labour,” the overall cost was held to approximately $180,000.

Move-in was mid-January, 1987; the driveway, sidewalks and landscaping followed that summer.

Together they made their Dream our Reality!