1990 History – Early Ford V8 Club #109

Vancouver Island Regional Group Report to V8 Times Magazine 1990
It would appear that our last group report was made in the fall of 1987. It’s not appropriate to recount all our activities in the interim; suffice to say our group is strong and healthy and our membership has probably doubled.

This is due primarily to the inspired leadership of Dick Hansen who has served as president those three years. Dick is content to sit on his laurels and has been succeeded, by proper process (my, haven’t we matured?), by Andy Anderson. No one can remember how long Rick Streeton has been treasurer but he has passed on his quill to Al Hulko. Bob Cox continues as secretary and we look forward to his continued excellent and innovative work on our newsletter.

This year our 10th Annual Fords & Friends Picnic was located more central to our northern members. It was held in Duncan at the B.C. Forest Museum. It was a good choice as we had plenty of room for displaying registrants’ cars and the museum was an added attraction. The steam train ride was particularly popular. It was agreed that we attracted visitors to the museum and vice-versa. It’s great to see the increase in numbers of restored cars of all makes which is evidenced by the steady growth in the number participating in this event. There was an over abundance of door prizes but we award only two trophies—People’s Choice and Long Distance. Sid Morehouse was awarded the People’s Choice for his ’47 Buick Convertible which had the top installed the day before. An accidental tourist from Calgary, Wally Schultz driving a ’55 Chevrolet, was awarded the Long Distance trophy.

A new approach to club tours was initiated this year. Ten pairs of members were inducted as tour organizers for a tour in each month except July, the picnic month, and December. This arrangement took the responsibility away from a tour committee and allowed for a wider range of ideas. We had some very good tours and some really good tours, so that arrangement is likely to continue.

Al Clark is not content to sit on his laurels and is promoting our sponsorship of a tenth anniversary Western National Meet in 1996. Hopefully you will hear from us before then.

—Sincerely,
Ken Mawle, Regional Group 109