They say we can’t go home again. But sometimes, we get pretty close to it.

You cannot go back by thinking about the past. The past isn’t about what we remember. We yearn to re-live the past because it always looks better in the rear-view mirror.

If you haven’t heard of the Sportsman Inn, it was a hotel not far away in the mountains in Quebec, and it was the kind of place where everyone went on Saturday night. About half a century ago. There was dancing and live country music.

At the Saturday, February 28 Sportsman Inn Reunion which took place at the Vankleek Hill fairgrounds, the feeling of that place was alive again. It seemed fitting to hold the event in Vankleek Hill as many of Vankleek Hill’s young people were Sportsman regulars back in the day.

Ottawa Valley country musicians got their start there or played there to showcase their newest music while they were on the rise.

From Ronnie Prophet to Dougie Trineer, to Bobby Lalonde to Bruce Golden to Neville Wells to the Family Brown– these performers were and are familiar names who were onstage at the Sportsman.

That night, with the music of Bobby Lalonde, Bruce Golden and Dusty King Jr. in the air, everyone seemed to reach through the years and be their younger selves again. The owners of the Sportsman Inn– John and Mary Fay Prophet and their family members, many of whom supported the enterprise–as well as their children Greg and Beth Ann–were there. Former staff members, including a former bouncer, attended the event. It was an easygoing good time–a community coming together.

To add to the spirit of the evening, the event was a fundraiser for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) Canada, raising $11,000 for the cause. The idea for an evening of much-loved country dance music started in Vankleek Hill residents’ Faye and Scott Allen’s kitchen.

”My wife Faye and I came home from a wedding one night and got to talking about the good music that we used to have every weekend at the Sportsman Inn. We were missing it. I contacted Bruce Golden about the idea of a Sportsman Inn Reunion and making it a fundraiser, and it took off from there,” said Scott, who is a longtime member of the Vankleek Hill Agricultural Society.

Years ago, before they were married, Faye recalled Scott coming home every weekend from Kemptville College so that they could head to the Sportsman on Saturday night.

It’s not enough to say that it was a simpler time back then. There was something more.
Those Saturday nights were about connecting with your community and with people that you knew. It was a kind of marking of time, for those too young to know it was passing.

There was a feeling that you had left your other life behind. But you brought all your friends with you for a good time. There were first dates and last dates, and weekly dates that turned into marriage and lifetimes together.

The Sportsman Inn Reunion contained a bit of taking stock. Remembering how good we had it back then. And remembering the feeling that there was no doubt that the world would yield its secrets to each of us. In good time.

Now half a century later, we showed up perhaps a little worse for wear. We were older. Life has happened to us.

As people arrived, their faces were expectant. Their eyes held the cares that they had seen during the past 50 years. But the good dancers were still good dancers. The teasers still teased, nicknames were used. Maybe the wilder ones were a little bit less wild.

Everyone was there for a good time. And to pay tribute to the Prophet family that was at the heart of so much fun, so much good music and so many good memories.

For a few hours, the packed hall was aglow at the fairgrounds, floating in the winter darkness. It was a beacon of goodwill and laughter and music and dancing and memories.

We held back time–for a little while.

Photos: Louise Sproule