February 2007 President's Corner

Steve Frederick '72, USNAAA Atlanta Chapter President

ATTENTION WORLD !

The Dark Ages Party has been scheduled. Mark April 28,2007 on your calendar and plan to join us for a memorable evening. As I write this column we do not yet have a venue (although we’re very close,) nor a menu nor event schedule. However, we do have a guest speaker. Paul Johnson (yes, that Paul Johnson) will be joining us for the evening, hopefully along with his wife. We were fortunate enough to get Navy’s head football coach to join us for the evening in the April, and consequently decided to have the Dark Ages Party a little later than usual to accommodate his schedule. Invitations should be mailed out to our Chapter members in mid - March, so be looking for yours and RSVP as soon as you get it. Which brings me to another subject.

By now, you will have received your membership solicitation letter in the mail (unless you have already joined for 2007). Hopefully, you have responded already, but if not, do it now. Of significance here is that our Dark Ages Party is always a “members only” event. Only Chapter members in good standing will be invited to spend the evening with Coach Paul Johnson. If you are interested in getting the inside story on Navy Football, become a member of the local Chapter immediately by either sending in the membership form that accompanied the solicitation letter, or going online and connecting to the appropriate link. Then, when you get the invitation, RSVP ASAP. There will be a finite number of seats and we expect attendance at this event to exceed that of any recent event. If we do not have enough seats, it will be first come first served - so respond as soon as you can.

Please note that the venue for our monthly luncheons has changed. As many of you know, the lease for the facility that Jock’s and Jill’s occupied on Peachtree Road ran out at the end of 2006. Consequently, our January luncheon was held at Frankie’s at the Prado on Roswell Road. Craig Martin, who had been the manager at Jock’s and Jill’s, is now the manager at Frankie’s. He takes great care of us and the food at Frankie’s was just as good as we had grown accustomed to at Jock’s and Jill’s. Since we were in the process of getting accustomed to our new venue, we went without a speaker at the January meeting, but the attendance was good none the less. Joining their fellow alumni at Frankie’s were Bill Rentz ’55, John Stark ’51, Perry Stephens ’51, Walt Coakley ’54, Johns Jaudon ’55, Reggie Vachon ’58, Clint Johnson ’60, Carl McCallum ’60, Ed Hux ’61, Paul Hurst ’62, Bill Holmes ’64, Joe Frazar ’65, Jim Slemenda ’66, Paul Borer ’70, Dick Click ’70, Mitch Rowland ’71, Steve Frederick ’72, Michael Lores ’74, Ples Bruce ’77, Terry Hamilton ’77, Gary Hoy ’84, Mario Maddox ’85,Greg Morrow ’85, John Prendergast ’90.

Our February luncheon will be Bob Barr, former congressman and now political observer. We will again meet at Frankie’s at the Prado on Roswell Road. Please go to our website for directions and more information. Bob Barr should prove to be a great speaker and we expect a larger crowd than usual, so plan to arrive early. I hope to see you there.

I would like to mention again that we are in the process of putting together the Chapter officer slate for the 2007-2008 term. All Board members serve as volunteers and provide as much time as they are able and comfortable with. Please consider serving on the board of directors. The effort is more fun than work, and the board members are all great people with a background similar to yours. We respect the fact that you may have a family and/or a job, and will not infringe on the time you need for both of them. If you are interested in finding out what the experience is like, please talk to one of the board members. Then consider joining us and making a difference for your fellow alumni.

Keep up with the developments within the Chapter at our website, and join us at any one or all of our events. Our Chapter is only good as the members we serve. I hope to see you soon at one of our events.

BEAT ARMY!

Steve Frederick ’72
Chapter President