Over my dead body will that bit of
silver leave Swansea”. I hear. Well, of course, the decision must come
from the Area 15 members . That’s both their right and privilege. The
members down there knew Will better than I. And I apologise for having
upset the Swansea applecart. Of this I had no intention of so doing.
Honest I hadn’t.
But I reserve my
right to write, with honesty, as I see a situation. That in turn, is both
my right and. privilege.
SUBS
MUST BE FIXED.
From my interpretation of
the Rule likely to be adopted at the A .G .M. regarding the, subscription
for membership of the C.R.C. it would seem that, providing the Central
Fund gets it’s whack of £1.50 per member, each Area can decide
its own Subscription Rate. IS that not so? Frankly this just won’t do.
And why? Very simple. The future of the Club, surely, must rely on
increased membership. Again, is’ that not so? But without a FIXED
membership fee how, tell me how, is the newly-appointed Publicity Officer
to conduct an advertising campagne? What use is a membership application
form, which fails to state what the cost is to join?
Quite
obviously there has to be a fixed amount for membership of the C.R.C. be
it the present £3.50 or raised by as little as 50p to £4., which has
been put tome from several quarters and which, I must say, seems fuI1y
justified and not excessive.
Areas
which have additional
facilities, meeting rooms etc which have to be paid for, would then make
their own arrangements to meet the additional costs.
Swansee
and Middlesburgh are cases in point where meeting rooms, projectors and
affiliation fees have to be found. There can obviously be no objections t
these Areas asking their members for the extra where-with-all to pay for
these facilities which can do nothing but further the enjoyment of their
hobby.
BUT
.THE BASIC MEMBERSHIP FEE FOR THE C .R . C MUST BE A FIXED FEE.
THEY KEEP GOING...
Gradually I have been browsing ‘through a few letters Area Newsletters
from the, reasonably,, past.
One of the first was from Eric Clark,
Area 17 Leader - an area which has but three members, including Eric
himself - but amazingly Eric still manages to produce an interesting and
chatty newsletter despite a series of Set-backs early this year when he
suffered several heart attacks - not to mention a cardiac arrest. I
haven’t heard from Eric for a while but hope sincerely that he is
progressing well and that the dark-room improvements he was tackling when
his health interfered have now been completed and he is sufficiently
recovered to once again enjoy some processing sessions.
Another Leader, Beg
Long of Area 19, whose letter to me in September last year indicated that
he too, had been having health problems and was in fact, at that time
awaiting a heart by-pass operation. By now I hope that traumatic
experience is behind him and, further, that the operation was a cornplete
success. Like Eric he, too, managed to turn out a readable Newsletter - in
spite the difficulties occasioned by below-par, health.
It’s people like
these, and there are others I know, who, through sheer dedication, have
kept the Club alive. I salute them all.
Also from the past
October last year, in fact - I find something more than a little
disturbing. George Sparkes of Area 22 mentions a chat he had with the
Manager of Rayco Ltd , who indicated he would be happy to pack one of our
leaflets with any orders they dispatched.
I myself received a
box of chemicals from Rayco Ltd. (chemicals which Oliver doesn’t stock!)
but there wasn’t a C.R.C. leaflet enclosed. This is something which our
new publicity officer might well follow up. And I wonder, did Rayco Ltd.
Ever receive the leaflets?