As I write this, Spring is officially around the corner, yet flurries persist! As the old ball player said, “It’s not over until it’s over!”
On Tuesday, March 27, our Annual General Meeting will be held in the Historical Room, Main Floor, Newcastle Community Hall at 7 p.m. All members are most welcome to attend and enjoy cookies and cider! There is usually a “show and tell” at the end of the meeting where individual members present artifacts or papers and explain the significance behind them. Since it is our AGM, members present will be asked to approve a slate of Directors to serve on the Board for the period March 28, 2018 to March 27, 2019. As of this writing, all nine currently serving Directors have indicated a desire to serve for the forthcoming Society year. One Directorship remains open, so I would encourage any member to step forward and stand for election as a Director.
Let me know in advance if you wish to be considered by the membership for a Directorship on the Board. We expect Directors to take part in the pleasant work of the Board and to make a commitment of their time to attend Board meetings and other events in which your Society participates. Please contact us if you would like to stand for election as a Director. As a matter of parliamentary procedure, I will call for nominations from the floor at the meeting, as well.
Our plan this year is to once again have two feature speakers, one in early April and the other in early October. A notice to members will advise you of the speakers, their topic and time/dates. This information will be covered in our Newsletters.
As you know from previous Newsletters, we were disappointed in the negative response we received from the Federal agency responsible, two years running, to our application for a grant. That money was intended to finance a relatively modest but important project to convert our records (photos, documents, historically significant letters, etc.) to an appropriate data base so that, in future, members and the public at large would be able to access this information electronically. With our “never say die” attitude, the Board will explore other avenues of winning a grant, including engaging representative politicians to support future applications. The amount we applied for at approximately $15,000, so it any members and/or their companies would like to provide support, it would be greatly appreciated and appropriately recognized.
You may have noticed in our last Newsletter, we adopted a new logo style for the Society. It appears on this Newsletter, as well. Credit for this fine piece work falls to Paddy Duncan, a Director. Paddy typifies the kind of contribution Directors make to the on-going growth and well-being of your Society.
So far this, we have participated in the Sports and Leisure Show at the Rickard Center. We plan to participate in a number of forthcoming events during the year, including the plan mentioned in the last Newsletter of group or organized individual visits to the Historical Room for a brief introduction to your Society and what’s ahead. These visits would include a tour of key parts of the historic (1923) Community Hall itself. Building management has confirmed to our secretary, Myno Van Dyke, their willingness to permit such tours.
I do enjoy talking to you through our Newsletter!
Regards
Bob Malone