News and Updates December 15th

We hope this finds you all well.

Things continue to improve at the club and we look forward to seeing you over the holidays.

Upcoming

We will be having some informal holiday parties that we hope you can attend.

~ An informal Pastime Christmas Party will be held this Friday 12/19 4-8pm. 

~ Friday 12/26 Out of Towner's Happy Hour: Bring your out of town friends and family to the club from 4-8.  This will be a great opportunity for you to show your friends and family the club and invite them to join our membership. Remember that out of towners only pay $75/year for membership!

We will draw our $25 raffle on 12/26.  

There are still tickets available so please stop in and buy a ticket if you haven't already.

~ Join us for all the SU Games! Come Tailgate Inside before!

Holiday Hours

Christmas Eve       7am - 6pm

Christmas Day       Closed

New Years Eve      7am- 10pm

New Years Day      7am - 8pm

~ January 20th 6:00pm ~ Pastime Membership Meeting and Board Installation.

News

We are currently selling raffle tickets for 2 Duke/SU tickets (2/14/15) for $10.

Available at the bar.

We've added Pizza to our menu. 14" pizza for $8. Have one with friends at the bar or grab one to bring home for dinner.

We have some New Members to Welcome:

John Tracy

David Colangelo

Chris Scanlon

Kevin Nickels

Lingsen Zhang

Tim Cooney

Welcome to the Club! Let us know how we can improve your experience.

~ We have been adding and improving our exterior lighting with help from National Grid and Smart Watt Energy. New LED lights are helping add safety and security around our property at night.

~ If you are or know any contractors who would like to make a proposal on renovating our shower/steam room please encourage them to do so. This renovation does not need to be done using tile, any and all bathroom materials and designs will be considered.

We will continue to take bids as we prepare a budget and expect to complete this over the summer.

Needs and Wants

We are looking for Syracuse/SU/Pastime/High School/Parochial League pictures, signs, memorabilia, etc.. to help us decorate the bar and other areas of the club.  If you have anything collecting dust at home, please bring it to the club and we will find a place to display it proudly.  Items can be given to a bartender, placed in the outer office, or you can contact us here and we will arrange the exchange.

There are a few areas of the club that are in need of new furniture.  We are looking for comfortable chairs (leather type material for easy cleaning) for our entranceway.  If you have access to waiting room style comfortable chairs at a good price, please let us know.

As always ~ THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT.

Happy Holidays!

All is well at the Pastime Athletic Club

"The only sound more pronounced than the rolling bowling balls, clanging weights or cheers at the bar this weekend was the sound of children laughing and playing hoops in the gym."

That's what the Club is all about.  Thats what we are working hard to preserve and protect.

We hope you are all well and that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Things continue to improve at the Club and our membership continues to grow.

We would like to welcome our Newest Members to the Club:

Dan Venditti

Dan Young

Jim Burns

Stephen Haust

Ted Tompkins

Tyler Knickerbocker

Nat Dunn

Mike Nocevski

Bob Vertucci

Eric Marcinkowski

Chris Mango

Charles Mango

Patrick Togni

Tyler Eustace

Steve Nickels

Steve Antuna

Thank you all for joining. We appreciate your interest and support. Remember that this is your Club and we hope you will take advantage of our space by using it for activities that make you and your family stronger.  Contact us here anytime with questions or concerns.

News

~ Improvements have been made to out Fitness Center.Come take a look. We have improved our exercise space significantly.

~ We are working to improve our upstairs kitchen which is being emptied to create additional exercise space for activities such as cross fit, boxing and group    classes.

~ Renovations to the upstairs GSIOC bar are almost complete. We will be posting a notice soon to call for a meeting of the GSIOC Club, which is a very old Club within the Club that has not met is quite a while.

~ We are taking focus on our exterior lighting and property surveillance to ensure the comfort and safety of our members in and out of the Club.  Please remember

Upcoming Events

Join us on December 6th at 7:00 pm for another Paint, Sip and Be Merry Event when we paint "Harvest Moon". Register at http://www.paintdrinkandbemerrysyracuse.com/

History Bridge ~ New Era For Pastimes!

The Syracuse Herald ~ May 1901

The Pastimer ~ October 2014

The Pastimer ~ October 2014

"If ever the saga of American athletics is written, a space will have to be allotted for the role played by the Pastime Athletic Club of Syracuse."  

                                                                    ~ The History of The Pastime Athletic Cub

Athlete's must stay focused and overcome challenges to give themselves a chance to succeed.  

Athlete's don't give up.

The Pastime Athletic Club was started by Athletes in 1892.  It's a place for athletes to train, compete and socialize together...a place where we can prepare for the challenges ahead...a place where we find support in defeat and shared celebration in victory.  We won't win every match but we will never give up, we will always strive for excellence and in doing so, become Champions.

A year ago we were facing some of the Club's most challenging times. An aging facility and an ever changing urban landscape forced us to dig deep and fight for a comeback. We are proud to say that we are winning that fight!  Instead of focusing on an uncertain future, we are now focusing on our members, your families and on making sure that the Club remains a place where you will find comfort and support for years to come.

We are excited to announce that preparations will begin soon for the celebration of our 125th Anniversary in 2017. We will have 2 years to prepare for this milestone which will include capital improvements and celebrations to mark the occasion.

Stay tuned for more info on how you can help.

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Charity!

Throughout this year we've been making contributions to charities, community programs, neighborhood groups and more. We will continue this focus and increase our efforts to be a leader in our community.

We recently completed our Charity Basketball League.  The Championship Team chose to have the league donation go to the McMahon Ryan Child Advocacy Center and to the Bishop Ludden Football Program. The team was made up of Scott, Tyler and Troy Eustace, Matt Harrington and Rafiq Ashkar.

We look forward to hosting more Charity Sports Leagues in which the winning team chooses a charity to receive the proceeds from the league.

This summer the Club provided entry to the LeMoyne College Soccer Camp to a young athlete in the Washington Square Park soccer program.

We also supported multiple charity golf tournaments and provided meeting space for neighborhood groups and other non-profits.

Please let us know if you identify any ways that we can contribute our resources and talents to the community.

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1st Year Members!!!

Our most highly touted recruits. It is our hope that we can provide you with a positive experience so that we can keep you as a member. Please let us know how we can ensure that success. If you feel that you did not find as much value in your membership as you hoped and are considering dropping your membership, please contact us so we can discuss ways to improve that relationship.

1st year Members do not owe any additional dues until their promotional year is up.

Our dues are mailed out once a year which is why our 1st year members received a bill for the pro rated amount of the year.  We understand that this is not a best practice, as you are still in a promotion period. You will receive a Membership Card for 2015 in the mail this week and your dues for the remainder of 2015 are not due until your promotion period has ended.  We apologize for this confusion and appreciate your membership.

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Dues

Membership Cards are in the mail and we will be changing our Card Access to the new Red Cards on Friday 10/17. PLEASE pay your dues for 2015 or set up a quarterly payment plan which is easy and convenient.  You can call the club to pay by credit card if needed.

Your dues and our efforts to increase membership will help ensure our success.

Thank You for your support!

If you or anyone you know is considering dropping their membership for any reason, please have them contact us first to discuss alternatives.

Please continue to recruit new members.

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New Members

We have a lot of new and returning members to Welcome including:

Dan Cullivan

Kevin Donovan

Brian Demonte

Dan Miskelly

Bob Juneau

Richard Baker

John Tysco

Hal Slate

Anthony Kirts

Bob Rust

Charlie Duffy

Mike Hanley

Danny Sizing

Walter Mielnicki

Ciro Frontale

Luke Becker

Jared Graber

Steve DiRoma

Jimmy Abbatiello

John Addante

Ed Wilsch

Marty Voss

Anthony Maurillo

Alex Budzielek

Ben Davis

Amer Yagan

Jeff Parnell

Keven McLellan

Jim Wallace

Welcome to the Club!

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Needs/Wants 

Things you may have at home or at work picking up dust.  

Items can be left with the bartender or in the club office.

- We are in need of a freezer for the kitchen.  A household size stand up or chest freezer would be 

  sufficient. If any member has one that is not in use, let us know and we can arrange to pick it up. 

- Flags! We are looking for flags to hang in the gymnasium. USA, Syracuse, New York State, SU,            

  Canada...

- A stand up water cooler for our lobby.

- A Keurig Coffee Maker.

- Volunteer to help plan an Old-Timers Dinner.

- Volunteer to help plan a Pastime Holiday Party.

Please continue to recruit your friends and family to become Members and remember that we now offer a $100 social membership and a $75 out of town membership.

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Upcoming Events

Saturday October 18th: SU v Wake Forest Tailgate Party: Kickoff at Noon.

Monday Basketball League will begin on November 10th and run for 22 weeks!

Captains will meet on November 3rd to prepare the teams. 

Friday Night Bowling Party: Every Friday night starting at 7pm. Open Bowling with drink specials!

Starts Friday 11/7.

Open Gym: Mondays and Fridays 6-8pm.

Sunday and Monday NFL Football: Every week.

The BIG Pastime Raffle tickets are still being sold for $25 at the bar! Drawing date will be announced soon.

Remember the Club when you are planning your next party.  We have everything you need to mark any special occassion.

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Thank You For Your Support!

Pastime Update

We hope this finds you all well.

It's a beautiful day at the Club, so stop down.

We have a few important reminders that we would like to make you aware of.

Tonight at 5:00 there is a planning meeting for our Club Play, "Requiem For A Heavyweight". If you are interested in participating, please try to attend this meeting.

If you can't make it, just send us an email and let us know your interested.

We are still selling tickets to our September 27th Mystery Dinner Theatre. 

(Flyer Below).

In order to host this dinner we must have 50 guests signed up.  We still need about 20 more and we need to know before this Saturday. Contact the club by phone or email if you wold like to attend.

Our Youth Basketball Skills and Drills for boys and girls 7-10 will start this Saturday at 9:00am.  The flyer and signup are attached here.

We will start having Basketball Open Gym starting this Monday at 6:00pm and Fridays at 10:00 am.

There are signups at the club for the Monday Night Basketball League or you can notify us by email and we will add you to the list.

Things are going well in the kitchen so far.  Come down for a Pastime Burger and keep an eye out for the Pastime Salad coming soon.

Stay tuned for more updates and events. Remember to come down to the Club to watch Football on Saturday, Sunday and/or Monday Night.

Old Pastime Updates like this one can be seen at http://pastimeathleticclub.blogspot.com

See you at the Club Soon!

Pastimer Update

We hope all are well.

Fall is approaching at the Club and it will be an exciting one!

Our kitchen is officially open and our Pub Menu is attached.  We will launch a new menu in a couple weeks that will offer more items.  Right now, menu items can be ordered at the bar.

We are also working on a drink menu and a party menu that will be shared with you soon as well.

Our parking lot has been receiving some TLC, as well as the bowling lanes which are being refinished.

There are sign ups at the club for our Monday night Basketball League.

We are excited to announce our Friday night open bowling party starting in October.

Bowling from 4-11. $3 Members $5 Guests

We will have a Tailgate Party for today's SU game starting at noon with food and drink specials. Come down and join us.

We will have a meeting for our Playhouse event "Requiem for a Heavyweight", this Thursday at 5pm.  If you would like to help with this production in anyway please plan on attending this meeting. We will need Players, as well as people to help with the production. We are still looking for a Director if anyone would like to take on this role.

Our annual raffle is still underway as we have more tickets to be sold. Stop into the bar and grab a $25 raffle ticket for a chance to win the big money. A drawing date for the raffle will be announced soon.

The floor lockers in the fitness room will be removed soon, take some if you want.

We will replace them with more fitness space and some new equipment.

Steam/shower room is still in planning process.

We will stay in touch with more information soon.

Have a great weekend and we will see you at the Club!

Pastimer Update

Pastime Athletic Club Members,

Tomorrow (Thursday July 24) at 6:00pm we will host our 2nd District Councilman Chad Ryan and Mayor Stephanie Miner. All are welcome.

Councilman Ryan, along with some neighbors, has arranged for this public meeting in order to bring our neighbors and the Mayor together to discuss her invitation to host deported children in the neighborhood.

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2014/07/syracuse_mayor_stephanie_miner_will_meet_with_public_about_immigrant_kids_awaiti.html

We are proud to host this event for our neighborhood and our Councilman so that we can discuss this important national topic.

We apologize for the inconvenience that this will cause our members, however we feel that this is a good opportunity for us to show the community that we are here to help.

No matter what your opinion of the topic or our guests, this is a great opportunity for our Club.

We are taking this opportunity very seriously and are working hard to get prepared for it.

We will be having a volunteer event tomorrow from 9-11am to tackle a few things that we'd like done at the club before this event.

If you are free tomorrow morning and are able to stop down, Please do!

We need to clean up weeds in front of the club where the Mayor will enter, move some chairs around and we need to finish up a little painting and cleaning.

The meeting will be held in the Century Room. The Councilman, Mayor and staff will have the Presidents Room for preparation.

The gym will be closed from 6-7 for this event.

The police department and fire marshall will be present to help as needed.

If you have any concerns please contact me.

Thanks for all your help!

Ted Ackerman

Board of Directors

491-4474

pastimeathleticclub@gmail.com

The Pastimer Summer 2014

"The Pastimer" ~ Summer 2014

Summer Greetings from The Pastime Athletic Club!

We hope this finds you all well and enjoying the nice weather.

We have some great new members who we need to welcome to the Club, as well as some returning members. 

Let's make them all feel welcome and comfortable.

New and Returning Members

Eric Klein

Charles Meile

Deloris Gittino

Tom Lawrence

Sue Leskoske

Mike Corbett

Brian Conboy

Mike Vaughan

Kevin Wolfe

Dan DiMarco

Mike Kelly

John Tysco

Tony Diaz

Perry Kanfer

Nathan Porceng

Catherine Wagner

Patrick Sheftic

Peter Rauch

Cosmo Trichilo

Jimmy Walker

Tony Corcoran

Susan Maurillo Prostor

Please continue to recruit and encourage new memberships. 

The Board of Directors is committed to doing whatever it takes to give everyone something of value in exchange for their dues. 

We have a lot of exciting news and updates.

- Thanks again to Jeff Morgan for overseeing important structural and mechanical work being done to our facility. His expertise helped us start addressing important building concerns and has now helped us get over the hump...we've come a long way in 6 months. 

- Our crumbling north wall has been taken down, rebuilt and reinforced. Repairs to the roof are underway. Once the roof work is completed we will move inside to repair damage to the north walls in both the first and second floor bar areas.

- Important water system repairs have been made (We were heating way more water than needed and our new system will be much more efficient).

- Thank you to John Brown who has been painting inside the club.

- We are planning on shutting down the SHOWER AND STEAM ROOMS for 2 weeks in July to completely gut and re-tile these spaces. As soon as we have dates set we will get the word out. We will be looking for help with demolition, donations of materials and/or cash donations to help cover the costs associated.

- We are also working on getting the parking lots repaired and repaved.

Upcoming Events!

The Jimmy Macs 3 v 3 BBall league. 

Tuesday June 10th - Tuesday July 29th

Games are at 6, 6:30,7, and 7:30. 

Come down to watch some good North side basketball.

This league is full.

World Cup Soccer!

USA plays 3 matches in the group round and we will be watching them all at the club. Come down and cheer on our team.

Monday June 17 7:00     USA v Ghana

Sunday June 22 6:00      USA v Portugal

Thursday June 26 1:00   USA v Germany

Summer Clean Up.

June 21 and 22 from 10:00-12:00

Meet at the club to clean up, trim and tidy the outside.

We may also need help with a few inside projects.

Pastime Charity Summer Bball League

Monday July 7th - Monday August 18th 6:00 - 9:00

4 v 4 Ball. $10 for Members. $40 for Guests.

Proceeds donated to the charity of choice of the Championship Team.

Sign up at the club or email us here.

Poker Tournament

August 2nd 5:00pm

More info will follow

Golf Tournament

August 22nd 10:00 am shotgun start at Foxfire.

$75 per person Captain and Crew Format.

Sign up at the Bar. Must be paid by August 1st.

More info will follow including requests for sponsorships.

Club Raffle $25 for a chance at Thousands!

Drawing August 30th 3:00

Only 400 sold so hurry.

Sign up at Bar only.

Other events we are working on...Dates to be announced soon.

Biscotti's cake making party.

Mystery Theatre Dinner.

Thank you to Maureen Dore who is working on getting these events, as well as others organized. 

Thank you also to Maureen for helping the Pastime AC get involved in many of the neighborhood and community events around us. We are committed to being an active supporter of our neighborhood and Maureen has been acting as our liaison to the neighborhood groups, Police Department and the community as a whole.

If there are other events you would like to see at the club please email us.

Coffee is free at the Club.

Please feel comfortable stopping for a cup of joe or grab a cup to go after your workout. We've started bringing in newspapers and other periodicals for people to read.

Don't forget that we have WIFI and you can come down to the club to do some work or have a business meeting/gathering.

Call today to host your party, meeting, fundraiser or gathering.

Andy and his team are ready to make your event a memorable one.

Please thank Andy Corcoran for all the hard work he continues to do as our General Manager.  He steps up everyday and works his tail off to improve the Club experience for everyone.

Please continue to support our staff who work very hard to provide a quality service to all our members. Because Andy is not able to be at the Club Full-Time, they are much more than bartenders. The Board views them more as Assistant Managers and they are given the authority to enforce the rules of the Club.

Needs and Wants

From time to time we will reach out to all of you with our needs and wants list. These may be things that you come across in your business or profession or even things that you have at home that you no longer need.

2015 Dues

Our 2015 bills will go out at the beginning of July as usual and are due on September 1st. We hope you will be able to pay promptly so that we can can continue to improve our Club. 

Restaurant

Andy and his team will be submitting a proposal to the Board for consideration this month for a pub style menu and hours that will be simple but effective.

If any other member would like to submit a proposal to the Board with a menu, budget, hours etc...it would be welcome and considered.

Remember to visit our website and our Facebook page and encourage your friends to do so as well! Also keep an eye out for our new "Pastimer Blog" coming soon.

www.pastimeathleticclub.org

https://www.facebook.com/pastimeac

Thank you all for your support!

See you at The Club.

~ The Pastime Athletic Club Board of Directors

Pastimer April 2014

April 2014

Pastimers,

Things around the Pastimes are looking better everyday.

The cold weather was tough on our building and our steam boiler heating system which has since been replaced by a forced air heat and air conditioning system. This new heating/cooling system, installed by Ron Nicotra, will use far less energy and will keep our facility comfortable and environmentally friendly year round. 

Thank you very much to Ron and his team!

The roof and ceiling above the men's bathroom have been fixed. We've also improved the lighting in the bar itself.

We will continue to work toward improving our facility and making it more comfortable, secure and efficient.

We'd like to thank you all for your support and patience through the cold weather and the inconvenience of the construction and repairs.

We have to thank long time member, Jeff Morgan and his team of contractors, for all their resourcefulness, generosity and TIME in this effort.

We've installed a new 60" LCD SMART TV over the bar. 

This TV was purchased for the club by Craig Marcinkowski with help from Brian Nicholas MD and Bill Kilmartin. If you'd like to contribute to this purchase, there is an envelope behind the bar.  Thank you all who have contributed.

Our youth Basketball program was a big success once again.  We have to thank Len Rauch and Mike Yaizzo for all their hard work. The program promotes excellence for these young kids and for our club. Once again the league has also provided a financial boost to the club.

Another successful bowling season is winding down and it would not have happened without the service of Art Cornelius Jr...Art kept the lanes open through the polar vortex and made sure that everyone enjoyed themselves. Please spread the word that we are open for bowling and willing to discuss/host new/old leagues, tournaments and parties...year round.

Our Monday Men's Basketball League is winding down with playoffs this week.

Tuesdays this summer we will host the Jimmy Mac's 3 on 3 basketball league.  This league was once the pride of Jimmy Mac's Bar on Pond Street which has closed. This will be a way for us to help carry on a Northside tradition while promoting our Club and what we have to offer.

A committee has been formed to look into ways of improving our fitness room and great strides have been made. We are close to upgrading much of our cardio equipment and will be adding exercise space by eliminating the lockers that are currently on the lower floor. We've begun a complete locker inventory and will remove locks from inactive members so that everyone can find a locker that they are comfortable with prior to eliminating any.  We will place notes on the lockers that we intend to eliminate so that everyone has enough notice.

We've added new classes that have been very beneficial for those who have attended...

You should feel comfortable coming to try out a class and bring a friend or 2 along.

Monday        Yoga 6:00

Wednesday  Tai Chi 6:00

                     Zumba 6:00

Thursday      Zumba 5:00

Sign up for classes beforehand at http://www.pastimeathleticclub.org/classes.html

While we continue to consider options for our kitchen operation we have been approached by caterers who are prepared and ready to provide food for parties at the Club anytime.  These include, The Bull and Bear Roadhouse, Peppino's, Louie's, and Gentile's.

Don't hesitate to call to reserve space and we can get you set up with one of these fine caterers.  You should also feel free to bring in your own food and use the Club kitchen as needed.

If anyone has thoughts or ideas for the future of our restaurant operation, please email them to this address.  We will approach this carefully and are committed to re-opening our kitchen ASAP.

Our friend and bartender, Kate Murray, will be leaving the Club to  accept a position at Prime Steakhouse in Hanover Square. She will stop in to visit from time to time.  You'll be seeing Rick Russo behind the bar more this Spring. 

Rick is very friendly and professional and will serve us all well.  

Please introduce yourself to Rick and welcome him to the team.

Our membership is growing on a regular basis. New members will be listed at the end of each month.

The Board has approved a new "Student Membership" for full-time students of $120 plus tax per year.

Please continue to promote the Club among your friends and colleagues and encourage them to consider a membership.

We will stay in touch by email from time to time.  Email us here anytime with questions, concerns and ideas!

See you at the Club,

Pastime Athletic Club

Board of Directors

Pastime History Bridge 2005: FUTURE TIME BRIGHT, PASTIME OFFICERS SAY

We found this article and many others that we will share here in the Post Standard Archives. Anthony Corcoran did an incredible job as Manager of the Club and now his brother Andrew is going to pick up where Anthony left off and we are going to move forward with those plans to build a brighter future...

FUTURE TIME BRIGHT, PASTIME OFFICERS SAY

Post-Standard, The (Syracuse, NY) - Thursday, January 27, 2005

Readability: 6-9 grade level (Lexile: 1050L)
Author: DICK CASE NEIGHBORHOODS

Pastime Athletic Club lives.

The private sports and social club in the 1300 block of North Salina Street is 113 years old this year and doing just fine, thanks. Last summer, there was talk around town that one of America's oldest athletic clubs might fold. "We're not closing," Anthony Corcoran says as firmly as a man can.

Anthony is the club 's new general manager, hired last July when a crisis threatened. Since then, Pastime 's gained 130 new members, paid off a debt of $30,000 and taken on new

energy, according to lawyer Ralph Dodge, the new president, and Gabe Buschle, a past president who's club historian.

"We had to reverse the trend and we did. You can see a difference here," explains Gabe, a retired dentist from Central Square. "Things weren't up to par and we were losing people."

Pastime has a limit of 2,200 members in its bylaws. For years, the quota was solid, with a list of several hundred men wanting to join. The rolls dipped to a low of 700. There are now 1,100, and "we're getting five or six applications a week," Anthony says.

Ralph and Gabe are part of a new board of directors sworn in this month. Nine of the officials are new to the board, out of 12.

Ralph and Gabe say the former board's worries about the future of the club showed up in a letter to members last summer, asking them to chip in or face the possibility of closing. Although the letter raised $14,000, these veteran members say they regret sending it.

"It was erroneous," according to Anthony Corcoran. "It was based on wrong information in an internal accounting."

Ralph and Gabe feel the club suffered from that, and for not having a paid manager for two years after the last retired in 2002. Pastime had hired a full-time overseer since 1953. The quality of food and service in the club 's restaurant declined, among other problems.

"I think members weren't happy with the quality of the product," Ralph continued. "And people have less time than they used to and they've moved out to the suburbs.

"This isn't a North Side neighborhood club anymore. I think we became complacent. We felt good about the status quo. Now we're more efficient."

Ralph (38 years on the rolls) and Gabe (52) are both second generation in the club . So is Anthony Corcoran, who played in youth sports programs when he was a kid. He came to Pastime from a job as house manager at Syracuse Stage.

"I feel at home," the manager says. "I think I was led here."

One of the first things he did was to repair the broken electric sign on the club 's Salina Street front. "That's symbolic," he says.

Anthony looks after a staff of 24 workers in what he says is a "full-time job, and then some." When a food server calls in sick, "I wait on table." Besides improving the club 's finances, he's seen to physical improvements around the building, and he listens to members' suggestions.

The club 's a busy place.

It has an eight-lane bowling alley, a fitness room and lockers; a golf driving range, gym, bar and lounge and rooms where members may run events ranging from club meetings to birthday parties to wakes.

"We have a lot of wakes," according to Gabe Buschle.

There are baseball and basketball teams and tournaments; youth sports that members' kids and neighborhood boys are invited to join; special events such as holiday parties and dances; a pitch league of members and regular poker games.

Syracuse Power Squadron meets at the club . So do Crouse-Hinds and city police PBA retirees. A club of local German Americans has a room in the basement.

The modern Pastime goes back to a group described as 30 "athletically-inclined young men" from the neighborhood who met at Reith's tailor shop in the 900 block of North Salina and created themselves a club in the summer of 1892. Back then, their interests were baseball (indoor and outdoor), rowing, track, cycling, basketball and bowling.

Those charter members - including Ed Dorner, the first president, who held the job 51 years - rented space on the North Side until officers bought the present building, which had been Sacred Heart Academy.

The vacant school then was owned by nearby St. John the Baptist Church and dates to 1856.

In 1959, the club added an annex to the north side of the landmark for new bowling alleys.

Over the years, Pastime has gathered in other local clubs, including G.S.I.O.C. and Ermenie. G.S.I.O.C. is memorialized in a room, even though exactly what those initials mean is lost. The first two stood for Gebhart Sauter's tavern, the group's first meeting place.

The venerable building next to Turtle Street is in good shape, according to Gabe Buschle and Ralph Dodge, but it needs lots of TLC and prayers that the old furnace makes it through another winter.

Gabe and Ralph pointed out that because of the club 's many loyal veterans who cherish the place, Pastime benefits from volunteer help, including donations of plumbing and electrical work. They tell me the nifty chairs we're sitting on in the lounge came from a $7,000 donation by member Richard Benjamin and his wife, Sophie.

They say Sophie really appreciated the gesture by the all-male club four years ago to invite members' wives and widows to join them in every part of the club "except the locker rooms," according to Gabe.

"We broke the chains," says Gabe, who was president at the time.

Sons of members get membership preference. "I joined as soon as I was eligible, at 18," Ralph explains.

He says today's club is diverse in its members, who range from 18 to 90, with a bulge in the middle between ages 45 and 50. The majority don't live on the North Side. A businessman from New York City who spends several days in Syracuse each month recently joined.

"We have professional men but this is still basically a blue-collar group," Ralph says. Way back, Pastime drew heavily on the old Catholic school "parochial league" for members.

He thinks the club still is a cordial meeting place to keep those old school ties bright: "We're a good bunch of guys. There's always someone here you know."

Dick Case writes about neighborhoods and neighbors every Thursday. Reach him at 470-2254, or by e-mail, citynews@syracuse.com.

About the Pastime Club

Location: 1314 N. Salina St., Syracuse

Hours: Open every day, 7:30 a.m. to 1 a.m. Lunch, Fridays; dinner Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.

Dues: $200, special one-year offer for new members: $99

Information: 471-7929