When he picked up the Bridgeport Standard on Wednesday, Feb. 7, 1906, Frank Elliot might have scanned the news columns looking for his name. He wouldn't have found it.

Instead, on page 1 he might have read about Ed Walsh, the coal delivery guy whose horse bolted down Fairfield Avenue the day before and tossed both the coal and old Ed into the street. The area was in a bit of a cold snap, temperature in the mid-teens, which maybe explained the plethora of coal and wood ads throughout the 12 pages of the penny newspaper.

A grocery clerk who lived as a boarder, Frank was most likely a frugal man. So his eye might also have been drawn to the page 1 ad for the D.M. Read Co., which had a special that day on white oak dining room chairs. They were marked down from $1.75 to $1.25 apiece. Likewise, Bridgeport Public Markets, with two convenient locations in the city, offered sirloin steak at 2 lbs for 25 cents.

Teddy Roosevelt was president, by the way, and it was the year both the San Francisco earthquake and the Russian Revolution got under way.

What Elliott might have looked for in the newspaper was some small notice of the charter he'd received the day before, conferring official status on the little club he and some working-class pals had started the year before, just to have a little piece of shoreline.

On Feb. 6, 1906 the little club, the Pequonnock Yacht Club and its distinctive red, white and blue burgee, became official.

The view from the upper deck of the

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yacht club today is far different from what it was in 1906. A power plant, shipyard, coal chutes and assorted other gritty operations indent the horizon in the 180-degree view.

Frank E. Elliott was the club's first commodore, serving in '05, the year before they got their charter, '06, '07 and '09.

The commodore now is Stuart Rainger, of Fairfield. He's 85 years old and a World War II veteran — it says so on the blue baseball cap he wears — and in his accent lingers the influence of the childhood he spent in Surrey, England. His first stint as commodore was from 1968 through 1970. He served again in 1977, in 1979, in 1999-2000, again in 2002, and as of just a few weeks ago, he's back in the head seat.

"Every time there's a problem, they make me commodore," Rainger said with a little laugh the other day, sitting in a sun-drenched room on the second floor of the club.

The problem this time is the much talked about Steel Point redevelopment project. On the now barren little peninsula that is to be Steel Point, all the land is accounted for — except for the building, yard and docks of Pequonnock, which is at 66 California Street, at the very tip of the land.

Pequonnock is a workingman's club. For its 240 members, dues are $300 a year. The 180 members with boats pay an additional $18.50 per foot for a slip. Should Midtown Equities, the people who say they are going to develop Steel Point, move ahead, there will be a marina in which slips will cost $100 a foot.

"This is a sweat-equity club," says Rick Gates, a Shelton resident and chairman of the club's legal committee. By that he means each member is required to contribute a minimum of 10 hours a year working at the club, or pay another $200. "Regular guys can't afford $100 a foot," Gates said.

"When I joined in 1961," Rainger said, "dues were $9 a year, payable at 75 cents a month." He laughed again.

Like other such working stiffs' yacht clubs along the prized Connecticut coastline, the pressure is on from wealthy and powerful interests.

Out in the club's yard sit boats that have been hauled in for the winter, their bulky forms sheathed in shrink-wrap. Think Tony Soprano snoozing in white Spandex.

On a flagpole, the American flag and the Pequonnock pennant are pulled rigid in a cold wind. With a nod to the wrapped boats in the yard, Rainger says, "My line is 'There are no palm trees in Bridgeport.'" He doesn't believe the year-round marina conceived by the developers makes financial sense in the New England clime.

"We don't want to stop Steel Point," Rainger says, leaning forward. "We just want to be part of it."

Downstairs, around the bar, the pool table, the tables in the corners, the talk is of carpetbaggers. When you've been in one spot for 101 years, I guess you're entitled to use the word. Michael J. Daly is managing editor of the Connecticut Post. You can reach him at 203-330-6394 or via e-mail at mdaly@ctpost.com