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Chairman's Corner
By the time you read this, the entire upstairs of the Museum should be carpeted. There has been a lot of activity by the Museum staff to get all of the files and teachers' kits material out of the way to allow the carpet installation to proceed. The Collection Committee has moved the storage cabinets into the Gallery temporarily to accommodate the work. It is nice to see some progress.
Genie Howell and I had lunch with Doug Sawyer, the new Director, in March to introduce ourselves and discuss the Foundation's place in the future of the
Museum. He is not a mineral collector (let's work on that) but he is dedicated to moving the museum forward and developing new exhibits. I am
enthusiastic about working with Doug and his staff to continue to build up the museum.
Our latest Symposium was a resounding success. The talks were very good, although I experienced a first. I was halfway through my talk and discovered two slides that were out of sequence. Not a life threatening
situation (although I remember my heart was somewhere in my throat for what seemed like an eternity) but one every speaker goes through at least once. The food was good and the mineral sales were very good. The silent auction format worked well. At least there seemed to be a lot of activity during each of the breaks. My thanks to everyone who spoke and helped to make the day a pleasant one for all of the attendees.
The best part of the day for me was presenting the Foundation's first annual award for dedicated service. This was an idea of Genie Howell's that finally came to fruition with the selection of Marc Watson as the first recipient. The award was made by Graham Sutton out of Nevada sandstone and engraved with the title and Marc's name. Since Marc has always collected
quartz, Genie suggested we place a couple of quartz crystals on the award, as well. I took on this responsibility and placed a nice Diamond Point
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crystal and one from Crystal Hill at Quartzsite on the base. One final note. If I am ever fortunate enough to be given this award, remember that I am a gold collector so a couple of 1 ounce nuggets would really look good!
Over the past few years, the Foundation has provided funds to the Museum for various projects and equipment including a video camera for a micromount
exhibit, equipment for the lapidary shop, and the Rock Dinner collection. Then, there are the many fine specimens on display throughout the museum and
the gallery. What the Museum really needs at this time is bodies. They are looking for people to work as guides during the day for school groups, on the collection and whatever.
We have tried to enlist Foundation members to play host in the Gallery on Saturdays with minimal success. Ben Benham has done the duty several times. I realize it is difficult for a lot of us to get down there and spend the time, me included. Doing this on the honor system has not worked. At the next Board meeting, I am going to start a Volunteer Committee. The duty of
this committee will be to contact Sue Celestian for the needs of the museum, to solicit volunteers from the Foundation membership and schedule them. I would ask each Foundation member to make a commitment of at least 2 hours per month.
We are not the only organization that will be providing help. But, we should be the first group the Museum can count on to "belly up to the bar" and get people down there. And, maybe we should be taking the responsibility to help coordinate all of the groups who use the Museum's facilities. I will leave that to the committee. Yes, we all pay our taxes and provide support for the Museum that way but it is not enough. It is my understanding that one of the ways an institution demonstrates its worth to the community is by the number of volunteer hours given to that institution.
(Continued on page 5)
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