The Chairman welcomed everybody to the 25th Annual
General Meeting of the Society and informed the
Meeting that the AGM would follow the Agenda set out
in the March 2000 edition of the Berkshire Family
Historian.
1 Apologies for Absence. The
following apologies were received: Lady Palmer, Eddie
Spackman, and John Gurnett.
2 Minutes of the 1999 Annual General
Meeting. The Chairman reminded the Meeting
that the Minutes of the last AGM had been published
in the September 1999 issue of the Berkshire Family
Historian. The Chairman asked the Meeting that the
Minutes be accepted as read. This was proposed by
June Dickason and seconded by Ken Marsden.
3 Matters arising. There were no
matters arising.
4 Chairman's Report for 1999-2000.
It is my very great pleasure this evening to present
my third report to you as Chairman of the Society.
The Society has this year hit the headlines with our
journal Berkshire Family Historian when we won the
coveted Elizabeth Simpson Award, presented by the
Federation of Family History Societies. The
presentation was made at the AGM of the Federation in
Bath in April. Our Editor John Gurnett was there to
receive this magnificent trophy and the acclaim of
all those present.
This brings me to one of the great assets of the
Society-our Research Centre. 1 said in my report to
you last year that we were about to pack up the
library and put it into store. Thankfully, the
Research Centre is now open for business. The
premises were converted from an empty shell into the
new Centre by the efforts of volunteers. Principally
by Ed Pearce and his band of helpers who put up the
shelving; bv Chad Hanna and Gillian Stevens who put
the entire library back on the shelves in good order;
and by Sally Pellow who reconstructed the Bookstall.
She was, I think, very pleased to have the Bookstall
out of her garage. Thank you all for your efforts. 1
must make a special mention of Bill Boyall. Through
his good offices, a firm called Blind Date Blinds
kindly made vertical and roller blinds for the entire
centre completely free of charge. Bill Boyall then
fixed them all. Thank you both for your splendid
contribution to the centre.
I have mentioned the Library In many ways, a
Library is only as good as the books that can be
found on the shelves. For that, we have to thank the
late Lesley Hanna. Lesley died in February after a
short illness. Lesley had been the Society's
Librarian for seven years; before that she had been
one of the Membership Secretaries from 1987 to 1992
so that she had contributed a great deal to the
Society.
Once again, we need to thank our Membership
Secretaries Margaret Pyle and Dawn Garlick who so
patiently guide a growing number of applicants
through the process of becoming members. Dawn Garlick
has been one of our Membership Secretaries for some
seven years now. She decided that seven years is
quite long enough and has retired. Thank you Dawn for
vour efforts on behalf of the Society. 1 am pleased
to say that Liz Longhurst has agreed to replace her
and we wish her well.
The public face of the Society is greatly enhanced
by our publications. Our Publications Manager is
Jocie MeBride and under her direction, several
publications on microfiche have been published by the
Society this year. We continued our series of
Monumental Inscriptions. The first releases were made
in what will hopefully become a complete set of
indexes and transcripts of Berkshire Parish Registers.
We have released a set of fiche recording the
locations of War Memorials in Berkshire together with
indexes of the people commemorated on them. We have
also released the first instalment - for Thatcham -
of the complete indexes and full transcripts of the
1851 Census of Berkshire.
In a few moments, Ron Dobreé will be giving his
last report to the Society as Treasurer. At this AGM
Ron has to stand down as Treasurer since he has
served as a member of the Executive Committee for
five years and that is the maximum allowed under the
Society's constitution. Ron's wise counsel on all
financial matters will be greatly missed. Thank you,
Ron for all your work for the Society.
I have mentioned a number of people who have
contributed to the running of the Society. There are
others in addition to those 1 have mentioned directly:
for example, the Branch Committees; the Library
Assistants who staff the Research Centre; the members
who work on projects; and, of course the members of
the Executive Committee. I estimate that, in one way
or another, the Society has between l00 and 120
members working for it. Since the members resident in
Berkshire are only around 850, this means that about
1 in 8 of you contribute to the Society's affairs. I
think it is a splendid achievement that we should
have such a large body of helpers.
In conclusion, 1 would like to express my personal
thanks, not only to the Executive Committee, but also
to all those members who continue to help behind the
scenes. Without the contributions made by each and
every one of you the Society would not be the success
that it is.
5 Treasurer's Report for 1999-2000. This
is the final report of my five year tenure as
Treasurer of the Society, and the first in which 1
have had to strike a rather gloomy note. Our income
was severely affected by the closure of our Research
Centre from July last year until April this year.
This resulted in the elimination of the income from
temporary members, and the fiche printer and caused a
large reduction in bookstall sales. At the same time
the rent was replaced by a storage charge, which,
while necessary to preserve the Society's assets, did
not earn any income directly or indirectly.
We have been fortunate to find premises which are
just large enough for our current library and for
research facilities of a standard that allows proper
research to be under-taken, They may also provide a
future opportunity of extension. However they are
twice the cost of the previous rooms at Prospect
School, and also required a large amount of
expenditure on security and fitting out.
Nevertheless, we do appear more fortunate than the
Berkshire Record Office who remain homeless, while
Newbury Council fight it out with the builders. Your
Executive Committee took the decision that this
additional cost had to fall on the Research Centre
users, rather than the general membership, and
introduced a fee for access to the Research Centre.
At the same time it was recognised that the users
should expect more for their money, and a lot of
effort has gone into extending the information base
available to researchers and improving their working
conditions.
For the general membership, improvements in
presentation of the magazine and in producing new
members packs have improved the value for money of
the membership fee. While they also won the Elizabeth
Simpson Prize, they did not come without an increase
of expenditure, some of which should not recur next
year. In looking at these figures, one also realises
the savings that were achieved in prior years by
Robert Houseman in bribing his young family to stuff
the envelopes, and by carefully regulating the weight
of the magazine. 1 feel that this year the bookstall
sales have not reflected properly the efforts that go
into dealing with the enquiries. Apart from the
effects of the closure, there have been relatively
few branch sales, and our attendance at other society
open days has suffered. This year has been the worst
for many years, despite many new publications of
registers and MI records, and the Society has missed
the subsidy provided by these sales.
Your Executive Committee felt that it was still
premature to make any judgement on the contribution
to be expected from the new Research Centre or from
the bookstall in its new home. However, 1 must warn
that unless there is a contribution from both these
areas of activity, the increases in other costs of
the Society services to all members will require a
subscription increase for the year 2001-2002 - the
first increase for at least 6 years. Finally before
stepping down may I once again thank all those who
have contributed time and effort towards running the
finances of the Society. They have been many but I
must thank in particular the two Membership
Secretaries, Ed Pearce, who maintains the Research
Centre records and Sally Pellow and her helpers who
maintain the bookstall records. The Accounts were
approved by Sid Quartermain and seconded by Chad
Hanna.
6 Election of President and Vice-President.
The Chairman informed the Meeting that the
Executive Committee had invited Lady Palmer, our
current President, and Dr. Peter Durrant, our current
Vice-President, to continue in those posts for the
2000-2001 year, and they were duly elected.
7 Election of Officers for 2000-2001.
The Chairman informed the Meeting that the following
nominations were received by the Secretary by the
closing date in the last issue of the Berkshire
Family Historian:
Society Chairman - Ivan Dickason
Society Secretary - John Gurnett
There were no nominations for the post of Society
Treasurer.
As no other nominations were received they were
duly elected to serve as Officers of the Society for
2000-9001.
8 Branch Committee Appointed Ex-officio
Members. The Chairman informed the Meeting
that the Branch Committees have nominated the
following Members to serve as their Representatives
on the Executive Committee for 2000-2001.
Bracknell - Pauline Wales
Newbury - Wendy Maskall
Reading - Liz Longhurst
Vale of White Horse - Ken Marsden
Windsor - Barbara Swiatek
9 Appointment of Executive Committee
Members for 2000-2001. As no other
nominations had been received the existing Committee
members were re-elected.
10 Appointment of Auditor. The
present Auditor, David Muzzlewhite, does not wish to
remain as Society Auditor. No nominations were
received. 11 Any Other Business. There was no other
business.
12 The Chairman closed the meeting with an
announcement that the next Annual General Meeting
will be held at Windsor.
