Over the last thirty years our chapter get-togethers have been held in many exotic places. Swimming pools in the dead of winter, parks on military bases, VFW clubs, Oktoberfests in the north Georgia mountains, Confederate Civil War Prisoner of War Camps, but never...I mean never, have we held a meeting in a church. Never that is until our latest gathering at the Best Western (Smokehouse Inn) in Monteagle, Tennessee, the site of our Summer 2012 meeting . Our Hospitality room (all eyes glance fleetingly towards the Heavens, anticipating that brilliant flash of lightning and clangorous clap of thunder to strike us down) was in the church. Our members sat on the pews that would be occupied by the locals come Sunday morning All eyes towards the Heavens!.
But then maybe holding a meeting in a church isn’t really a bad thing. Our Spring meeting in Madisonville, Kentucky didn't foster enough excitement to provide sufficient members to hold a quorum. The Church Thing must have had some effect on the membership because we had twenty-seven members signed up for the 2-day event. That was more than enough to have a quorum.
As usual, the members started filling up the rooms on Friday, 20 July. A few of the more affluent members decided to partake the luxuries (jacuzzis, sitting rooms, screened decks...you get the picture) of the multi-bedroom cabins scattered across the landscape. The rest of us tossed our kit-bags in our generic rooms and moved cautiously into the Hospitality room — the Church.
For some reason (maybe the Big Jumpmaster in the sky was staring down on us) the Hospitality room emptied somewhere around 2200 hours (10 pm for you Legs). Not only is this a first for a church, but also a first for such an early hour break-up of our Friday night gathering in the Hospitality room.
And since it was such an “...early to bed...early to rise...” thing, most of us were up at 0500 hours with nothing to do but wait for the restaurant to open at 0700 hours. The “...ear Over the last thirty years our chapter get-togethers have been held in many exotic places. Swimming pools in the dead of winter, parks on military bases, VFW clubs, Oktoberfests in the north Georgia mountains, Confederate Civil War Prisoner of War Camps, but never...I mean never, have we held a meeting in a church. Never that is until our latest gathering at the Best Western (Smokehouse Inn) in Monteagle, Tennessee, the site of our Summer 2012 meeting . Our Hospitality room (all ly to bed...early to rise...” thing didn't apply to those affluent members who sat on their screened-decks and partied well into the wee hours of the morning. They didn't show up at the restaurant until almost noon.
The Hospitality room was still standing which meant we could hold our meeting (an actual business meeting this time). Promptly at 1300 hours (1 pm for you Legs), Sid Morgan, our President, slammed the gavel on the table and the 148th (give or take a few) quarterly meeting of Chapter XXXIII was underway.
There was a lot of business to attend to and the meeting lasted longer than usual. Items were discussed, motions were made, motions were approved. One important item that was discussed was the upcoming Chapter elections. A teller committee is being formed (no one has been assigned the positions yet) to gather names for the chapter officers. The terms of the current officers will expire in October 2013 and a new slate of candidates need to be vested. Each member should consider placing their names in the running for one of the four offices. Then came the second most important items on the agenda...the location and dates of our next meeting.
Art McRae volunteered to host the October meeting in Knoxville, Tennessee. It will be at the same hotel (Best Western PLUS), on 12-14 October. Don't worry UT fans. There are no football games scheduled for that weekend. You can check the Bulletin Board on the chapter website for the particulars and Judy will publish an Alert Order in the near future.
Sid Morgan will host the January, 2013 meeting in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. It will also be at the same hotel we held our last Winter Meeting, but this time we'll have a real Hospitality room in one of the conference rooms. I believe this meeting will be held on the last week-end of January, but I'm not sure. You can also get the dates on our Chapter website.
As usual I've added a few photos taken at our meeting in Monteagle.
See you in Knoxville, Tennessee the week-end of 12 October 2012.
Copyright © 1994 Chapter XXXIII SFA. All rights Reserved.
Chapter XXXIII, SFA, The Larry Alan Thorne Special Forces Memorial Chapter
Summer Meeting was created 26 July 2012