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MONTHLY REPORTS TO INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF TORCH CLUBS (IATC) by the Secretary of THE TORCH CLUB OF ASHEVILLE-BLUE RIDGE, NORTH CAROLINA INTRODUCTORY NOTE At the home of Dr Albert Fink
in Hanover, Pennsylvania in late September, 2003 Patrick
Killough saw a copy of a 2001 TORCH magazine. Dr Fink had recently
joined a TORCH club in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and gave the magazine
to Patrick. Patrick took the magazine home to Black Mountain, NC the
next day, studied it and asked IATC for permission to start a club in
or near Asheville, NC. After a series of organizational meetings, the
required twenty members were gathered together, a name was chosen and
the group began to meet provisionally in anticipation of the charter which it
was granted in October 2004, with formal charter presentation in April
2005.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^IATC requires club secretaries to send it monthly reports in a fixed format on club doings. Here are those for our club's first four meetings: September, October, November and December 2004. We meet every First Thursday September through May at 5:30 p.m. As of December 16, 2005 we are in our fourth meeting place. Patrick Killough Vice President Torch Club of Asheville-Blue Ridge, North Carolina 12/16/2005 MONTHLY CLUB
REPORT
ASHEVILLE-BLUE RIDGE TORCH CLUB DATE OF MEETING, Thursday September 2, 2004 (our FIRST) 1. MEETING ATTENDANCE : 18 MEMBERS 80% of Total Pledged Membership (22); 6 GUESTS 2. MEMBERSHIP CHANGES: NA. 3. LOCAL ADDRESS CHANGE OF MEMBER: NA (Club was not yet chartered) 4. OTHER CHANGES (Club Officers, Meeting time/Place, Other): This was the first of two meetings at Deerfield Episcopal Retirement Community in Asheville. We were charged only $10/member for our room and an excellent buffet dinner. We were not permitted a sound system, however. And acoustics were imperfect. See http://www.deerfieldwnc.org Our club had of yet no official standing with IATC, though we had been greatly assisted by Dr Henry Howe of our sponsoring club in Greenville, SC and by Dr David Smith, IATC New Club Coordinator in New Hampshire. Mary and Patrick Killough had also attended the annual IATC convention in Wilkes-Barre in June 2004. I think it is fair to say that we became a "provisional Torch club" September 2, 2004. It was the first time "all" or most of our intending members had come together under one roof. In two previous "organizational" meetings we had elected officers and one director and agreed on our by-laws text. Club President Willard ("Bill") Fishburne could not attend because of a daughter's surgery in Pennsylvania. Therefore Vice President Prof. George Yates was in the chair. The concept of brief "icebreaker" sketches by four members of proposed future papers had come from Bill Fishburne. Individuals who had volunteered to speak were given five minutes apiece with a further five minutes apiece for Q&A. From the beginning President Fishburne had rigorously insisted that no speaker could take more than 30 minutes for a presentation (before follow-on 30 minutes discussion). That precept remains honored and is a hallmark of the Asheville-Black Mountain Torch Club as I write in May 2005. PROGRAM REPORT =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= This meeting Four Speakers: Shirley Cohen, William Currie, Joseph Geiger, MD, Nicholas Goncharoff, PhD IATC Members? No. (No one in our club had ever belonged to Torch before) Professions: Acting, Mathematics, Medicine, History Titles of Remarks: --The Elements of Good Acting --Our World Is Charged With Mathematics --How Old Is the Universe? --The New Russia of President Putin Subjects: --Acting builds on skills all of us have: mime, gestures, empathy. --Primitive Ethiopian calculating methods foreshadowed binary numbers. --Cosmos may be more than 6,000 years old. But consider the proofs. --Putin is the man of the hour, what Russians want and need. Will the paper be submitted by the Club Board or Committee for consideration for publication in The Torch? NO. These were mere sketches of intended future more formal presentations. FYI: Secretary: T. Patrick Killough Date: 05/07/2005 Other items of interest for the Regional Director: At the September 2, 2004 meeting, the members present, after discussion, agreed that the CLUB's annual local dues would be $20 initially, with meal costs being a separate, individual expense. 05/07/05 TPK Blk Mt, NC 28711 ===-=-=-- MONTHLY CLUB REPORT OCTOBER 2 0 0 4 ASHEVILLE-BLUE RIDGE TORCH CLUB The biggest news of the month was that the IATC Board on October 3, 2004 voted to charter our Torch Club. Hence our meeting four days later was our first official meeting as members of IATC. DATE OF MEETING, Thursday October 7, 2005 1. MEETING ATTTENDANCE : 10 MEMBERS 45% of Total Membership 4 GUESTS 2. MEMBERSHIP CHANGES: NONE 3. LOCAL ADDRESS CHANGE OF MEMBER: NONE 4. OTHER CHANGES (Club Officers, Meeting time/Place, Other): SEE BELOW. PROGRAM REPORT In the absence of the President (wrist surgery) and Vice President (business), Secretary Patrick Killough presided. Speaker: James Lees IATC Member Profession: Electrical Engineer Title of Address: WHY THE SOUTH SECEDED Subject: The Southern rationale was that secession was its right. No war was intended. There was a contract among sovereign states and each judged its own actions. Slaveholding was an economic dead end. But the claim of state sovereignty was no joke. Will the talk be submitted to IATC for publication? No. The talk was from notes. Since then other opportunities have been presented for Jim to talk and his talks also led into a coming (Oct-Nov 2005) adult education 12 hour course for Montreat College. Secretary T. Patrick Killough Date May 07, 2005 Other items of interest for the Regional Director: . The day after our meeting, the executive director of Deerfield Retirement Community (site of our first two meetings) phoned our secretary. At a regular monthly meeting of Deerfield residents on October 8, unanimous sentiment was that the Torch Club must stop using Deerfield. Why? (1) The administration had invited Torch there without clearing this with residents (NOTE: ownership of Highland Farms was recently transferred from the Episcopal Bishop of Western North Carolina to the residents, who have been at pains to demonstrate to staff who the new bosses really are). (2) Torch club took up too many parking places. (3)Torch club members using the buffet line made residents wait too long. Management, which had actively solicited our presence, was very apologetic. We had been advised a week earlier to try to get at least one resident as a club member (we had already tried several) and had had our first resident as visitor the evening before, October 7.) COMMENT: Torch was, in my opinion, a tool in an ongoing struggle by Deerfield residents to bring previously independent management to heel. The argument about parking and the buffet line are downright silly. After our board of directors scrambled and quickly visited nine locations, we selected Coral Bay Sea Food Restaurant near central Asheville as our meeting place for November and as long afterward as we might. See http://www.smliv.com/dining.htm Coral Bay Seafood 164 Tunnel Road, Asheville, NC 28805. 828-225-3474. http://www.coralbayseafood.com -=-=-=-=-=-=--=-- MONTHLY CLUB REPORT ASHEVILLE-BLUE RIDGE TORCH CLUB DATE OF MEETING, Thursday November 4, 2004 1. MEETING ATTTENDANCE : 15 MEMBERS 65% of Total Membership (23) 10 GUESTS 2. MEMBERSHIP CHANGES: NONE 3. LOCAL ADDRESS CHANGE OF MEMBER: NONE 4. OTHER CHANGES (Club Officers, Meeting time/Place, Other): NONE PROGRAM REPORT Speaker: Richard A. Kruse, IATC Member Profession: ACADEMIC HISTORIAN Title of Address: THE DA VINCI CODE: AN HISTORIAN'S EXAMINATION OF THE EVIDENCE Subject: Dan Brown's 2003 best selling novel THE DA VINCI CODE is a good yarn but with many gross factual errors, not just about the origins of Christianity, Jesus's relation with Mary Magdalene, the Priory of Sion but also about Leonardo Da Vinci and his paintings of Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. Will the paper be submitted by the Club Board or Committee for consideration for publication in The Torch: NO. The speaker had recently given essentially the same talk before a group of professors at the University of Texas at Austin. FYI: the excellent talk has already led to other invitations in other local fora for Professor Kruse to pursue his theses about THE DA VINCI CODE. Secretary: T. Patrick Killough Date: 05/06/2005 Other items of interest for the Regional Director: So far the club has lost no charter members, although one member of a married couple is pondering whether "one is enough." Now that we are meeting regularly, our primary technique for recruiting new members is to invite guests who, we think, will enjoy joining Torch and are qualified. TPK 05/06/05 ===-=-=-- MONTHLY CLUB REPORT ASHEVILLE-BLUE RIDGE TORCH CLUB DATE OF MEETING, Thursday December 2, 2004 1. MEETING ATTTENDANCE : 16 MEMBERS 73% of Total Membership (22); 6 GUESTS 2. MEMBERSHIP CHANGES: NONE 3. LOCAL ADDRESS CHANGE OF MEMBER: NONE 4. OTHER CHANGES (Club Officers, Meeting time/Place, Other): NONE PROGRAM REPORT Speaker: Nicholas Goncharoff, IATC Member Profession: ACADEMIC HISTORIAN, International YMCA Executive (retired) Title of Address: PUTIN'S FIRST TERM AS RUSSIA'S PRESIDENT. Subject: President Putin of Russia, personal friend of our speaker, inherited a mess from his predecessor Boris Yeltsin, who gave away vast chunks of Russian state productive assets. Russia's masses are egalitarian, extremely jealous of anyone who is notably richer than they are. Thus Putin's campaign to corral the "oligarchs" is wildly popular. President Putin now promises and is in the early stage of enacting a cradle to grave welfare state. Will the paper be submitted by the Club Board or Committee for consideration for publication in The Torch? NO. THE TALK WAS FROM NOTES. FYI: the excellent talk has already led to other invitations in other local fora for Dr Goncharoff to pursue his theses about Putin's Russia. Secretary: T. Patrick Killough Date: 05/07/2005 Other items of interest for the Regional Director: Dr Goncharoff is well known around Asheville as a Pentagon consultant and avid Russophile. Three Russian speaking women visited our club to hear him (one of whom is now--May 2005-- thinking of becoming a member). Two of he three had all visited Russia recently, bearing many gifts of medicine and clothing for friends and relatives. They found Nicholas's presentation giving more credit to Putin and to the living standards of today's Russia than either deserves. A lively discussion provoked a good time by all. TPK 05/0705 ===-=-=-- Send to: Mr James Strickland, Executive Secretary, International Association of Torch Clubs, Inc., Strickland & Jones, P.C., 749 Boush Street, Norfolk, VA 23510 - 1517, Phone: 757.622.3927, 1-888-622-4101, Fax: 757.623.9740, E-mail: iatc@infionline.net And to: Region 4 Director, Edward B. Latimer, 6617 Macon Road, Columbia, SC 29209-2053, Phone: 803.776.4765, Fax:804.783.0849, E-mail: Dick1040A@aol.com file: torch_A-BR_mo_12-02-04 ++++++++++++++++++++++ This report on the first four meetings, 2004, of the Asheville-Blue Ridge Torch Club was reviewed and put on-line 12/16/2005. TP Killough -OOO- |