Waltham's French Club Faces Uncertainty, Hope Amid Pandemic

WALTHAM, MA — For some 75 years families have attended annual French Club picnics, spaghetti dinners and breakfast with Santa. The pandemic put the future of the social club behind those community events in question, but thanks to community members and a local gas station, things may just be turning around.

The French Club, a social club that once was a way for Canadian French immigrants from the Maritime provinces, once the largest immigrant group in the city, to come find out about jobs and make connections in the 40s, 50s and 60s. In recent decades, the club has not only opened to women, but to all groups. The heavy french accents have subsided, but they still find a way to serve poutine and French Canadian Soup. Last year in honor of 75 years in town, the house band played atop a float and rolled through the city when it had the parade.

The French Club hosts events to help it run, but it also donates the function hall and parking lot to various local organizations, including GWARC, Creative Head Start, Waltham Youth Baseball & Hockey, Special Olympics. And they also host a $500 college scholarship.

Amid the coronavirus pandemic in March, however, all activities came to a halt at the social club.

With no income, the club — which exists off of $50 annual dues from some 250 members, renting its function hall, selling alcohol at its events — started to see bills from electricity, gas, insurance and the security alarm system mount up.

Six months later, the club started looking at its options. Would they have to close for good or sell the building?

Then City Councilor Randy LeBlanc’s 79-year-old father, also a member, had an idea of starting a fundraiser online, Randy LeBlanc said. Since September, the group has raised more than $4,240 toward a goal to help pay for the club’s expenses for a year, which they estimate to be around $20,000.

“Eight months in and I can’t imagine they’re not going to need the one year’s income,” the younger LeBlanc said.

The owner of Waltham’s Main Street Gulf Express gas station at 821 Main St, George Michael, saw the fundraiser and asked if he could help.

Although he’s not a member of the club, he’s hosted a handful of fundraisers out of his gas station before. He is donating $1 for every gas fill up from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25.

"It's really great," said Doreen LeBlanc (no relation to Randy) who has also been a member for years, her mother was among the first women to join the club when it opened to ladies. Then in 2016, the club got historic status from the city, she said, in view of the contribution of the French Canadian immigrants to Waltham.

"It used to be men, and then you had to be French Canadian, and now it's open to absolutely everyone," she said. "We want it to be more of a community center, still preserving some of the French traditions," Doreen LeBlanc said. " And we want to encourage more members when we're back open."

Randy LeBlanc, now 50, has been a member of the club since he turned 21.

“It was a rite of passage,” he said. “I played on the French Club Hockey team in the tournament for like five years in a row until the team I was on won the cup.”

That hockey tradition has since been passed along to the Shoppers Cup, and the club has corn-hole leagues and horse shoes, but the sense of community that the club fosters, he said, is one he wants his children to have exposure to, just like he was.

“Growing up, it used to be that they’d have the French Club picnic every year, I just thought it was normal, you’d go to see a hundred French Canadian families that you played hockey with or knew from church. It was just normal. It makes a city seem like a small community,” he said. “I want my kids to get exposure to that.”

Recently a DJ came to the parking lot at the club and folks brought their own chairs, and spaced out wearing masks as they listened to the music, both LeBlancs say that's the kind of community they hope to see for the years to come.

Jenna Fisher is a news reporter for Patch. Got a tip? She can be reached at Jenna.Fisher@patch.com or by calling 617-942-0474. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram (@ReporterJenna). Have a something you'd like posted on the Patch? Here's how .