The "Oyster Pond Yacht Club - Past Memories" Story

It was an ordinary day. Just got an email from Kathy from Northeast, Maryland. Kathy runs Kathy's Corner Shop in the city. Her store is full of art and crafts from artists and craftsmen who live in Maryland as well as the states that border it. I found her store a few years ago and now sell my altered Polaroid prints as well as some stained glass panels in her store. Kathy is about the same age as my wife Carol and me and we enjoy our visits to her store when we drop off photos. Her husband died years ago, but she still has stories to tell about their trips to the Caribbean when he was a salesman and had to made stops in different exotic locations. We often share stories about our time in St. Martin as well as the US Virgin Islands. She told me she had a post card from Sint Maarten, the Dutch side of St. Martin, and when she found it, would email it to me. Just opened it! Pretty neat post card. Must be at least 50 years old!! OK, how can I figure out how old the card is and some history about the Oyster Pond Yacht Club, Hotel and Marina that is pictured on the card? Oyster Pond is located on the east side of the island, directly south of the border between the French and Dutch sides of the island and north of Dawn Beach. Well, my first choice was "Google" it. Surprisingly I found very little telling me about the building pictured on the card. What's next, I thought. Ah, the perfect place to find out about the card would be the two travel forums that I frequent. Pulled up "TravelTalkOnline" (TTOL) and "SXM Travel Forum" and typed in a message or thread about my find. Even included the same picture thatKathy had sent to me. Within the hour I started to get responses. Norm, who lives in St. Louis and frequents both the boards, told me he knew the perfect person who lives on Sint Maartenand would forward the card to her. By the end of the day his source, Barb, had emailed Norm and he forwarded her message. Barb said it is probably from the 60s. She believes that the Oyster Pond Yacht Club opened in the early to mid-60s. The Oyster Pond Yacht Club was the original hotel on the peninsula which was built by a wealthy gentleman from Chicago who also developed the hillside above the peninsula. The Yacht Club consisted of the 20 room hotel with a private restaurant and tennis courts. In the post card photo there is a boat going through the entrance of the pond which was owned by the manager of the club, Jean-Carolo Rossini. The rear of the post card shows that it was printed by International Graphics from Florida so I "Googled" that and had no luck finding a company that still exists with that name. I did have another response from a TTOL member by the name of sxmmartini who sent me the photo that was taken in 1995 after hurricane Luis devastated the island. After the hurricane, the resort was rebuilt and re-opened as the Oyster Bay Beach Resort. The tale of that resort will follow tomorrow. It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.