Although the amalgamation of the proud Waipawa United and Waipukurau High School Old Boys' rugby clubs might still rankle some to this day, club president Tony Mackie said it was important to mark the milestone.
"It's quite difficult as a new club to build history - and we certainly lost a lot of history with the merger of the two clubs. But this is a good step towards building up that history and putting a marker in the ground for the next 25 years and onwards."
Mackie was looking forward to many of the club's characters, past and present, reconnecting over the weekend to share some good stories and "tell a few lies" about their on and off-field exploits.
"Results are important, but friendships are more important. That's the reason why you play rugby and get involved with a club."
Both clubs struggled with player numbers in the 1990s, and Mackie said the decision to amalgamate was to ensure at least one CHB club could continue to field a premier and reserve grade team in Hawke's Bay's top club rugby competition.
"The other important factor was to stop players from heading to Napier and Hastings in the belief they had to go there to play premier rugby. And we've done that very well," said Mackie, pointing to players like All Black Brodie Retallick, though he conceded the merged entity had been powerless to combat the problem of dwindling player numbers - an issue for the code nationally.
Ross Angus, who first played seniors for Waipawa United in 1959 as schoolboy, was on the original amalgamation committee and became patron of CHB Rugby and Sports in 2006, after the death of Jim McCormick.
Angus said although not everyone was fully behind the amalgamated club, it had succeeded in its most important aim of maintaining a CHB presence in the Nash Cup and Maddison Trophy competitions, as well as providing a pathway for local players to go on to higher honours.
"We hoped that amalgamation would attract all the better players [to Central] but each community has been a little bit parochial and maintained their own teams, but in saying that, on our club honours' board there's probably more than 20 players over the 25 years who have gone on to play for the [Hawke's Bay] Magpies."
David "Snow" Petersen was the last chairman of Waipukurau High School Old Boys. He said he and Waipawa United counterpart Bernie Story were initially faced with stiff opposition but eventually 75 per cent of members of both clubs voted for the amalgamation.
"There was a lot of club pride and that meant they were reluctant to give up their identity. But neither club was in a position to provide a premier team because there weren't enough players, so that's why we drove it. But it was still a big call," he remembered.
Life member and immediate past Central president Peter Fleming explained the club's original playing strip of the black, yellow, green and red harlequin jersey with white collar and blue shorts reflected the different colours of the district's various clubs: Waipukurau HSOB (black and white), Waipawa United (yellow and black), Takapau (red and black), Porangahau (green and black), Otane (green and black) and the defunct Waipukurau club (blue and white).
After the harlequin jerseys, there were several variations of the strip before the club's current colours of royal blue and red - representing the red of the CHB sub-union and the blue of the club's feeder secondary school, CHB College - were adopted in the mid-2000s.
The club has made 22 of the harlequin jerseys, which are being auctioned on the club's Facebook page. The auction will be suspended on Friday night and then resume at the after-match celebrations at the clubrooms on Saturday.
For details and to RSVP for the Friday night meet and greet, from 7pm-11pm, and the supporters' barbecue on Saturday afternoon, people must email chbrugbyandsportsclub@gmail.com by Monday, May 28.
