Annual Report (October 1993)

This post is part of a series of editorials written by Bert Walsh during his tenure as president and past president of the Shasta Historical Society. Readers are advised that his humor is often irreverent and rarely politically correct. 

Click here for the table of contents for the entire collection of his editorials.

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Well, it's time for the annual report to the membership on the Society's activities and the state of things in general. I guess you can refer to last November's newsletter because we're still doing the same things. Of course, now we have Wayne to take care of the logical, orderly and neat stuff. This gives everyone else more time to deal with illogical, messy things like the newsletter, finances, cataloging the collection and occasionally answering the mail.

Now it's come to our attention that my role model, Bill, has been busy reinventing government and that started a train of thought--what about reinventing history. It is quite evident that most of our ancestors lived hard, worked hard, and died young. The record shows that they weren't always very nice to Native Americans, the foreign born or even each other. With historic traditions like that, is it any wonder that our evening news is so depressing? We, like the old guys who used to come to Historical Society meetings, should give history a more laid-back slant. It might turn out to be a positive influence on our present lifestyle.

In that spirit I will cite a little-known historical item: Many years ago, Jack Beale¹ and I had the honor of serving with Major Reading during the Boer War in McNamara's Band. We were repeatedly cited for conspicuous gallantry toward the opposite sex.

Any scholarly criticism or rebuttal to this oral history gem should be addressed to the Society, "attention Jack Beale." Any researcher who would like to share a similar Reinvented History Vignette is invited to submit it to the Society for publication, "attention Fiction Editor."

Now, about reinventing bureaucracy, your Society is right on the cutting edge. If something has occurred before, we route it to the individual who handled it last time. This system isn't perfect--after several years in someone's file folder, paper will get brittle and turn to dust. All strange and unusual communications are routed to the president who will either (a) leave it in his file folder on an even-numbered day or post it on the bulletin board on odd-numbered days; (b) refer it to the Directors, which is kind of fun; or (c) answer the communication in an honest, forthright manner, disclaiming all knowledge of the problem and referring the originator to the appropriate charitable agency or medical specialty.

Really truly, if you think the Society should do something, just show up and start doing it. Pretty soon you will have your own file.

--BTW.

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¹Jack Beale was on the Shasta Historical Society Board at the time this was written. The reference to the Boer war was a ditty Bert used to use to see just how well-educated his audience was.