nize a course, v;ell. Page 8 hortly before bring ing the business usion. called upon Jack Leyland to ial pe rson who wi 11 soon be leav ing s and the foil ov7ing is more or 1 ess )n of the Nov )rth and "recog-The person, of "Laura is going to take v/hat some people refer to as a sabbatical. That is, she's going to leave us for awhile and leave her duties as archival consultant and as a professor at Simon Fraser University and she's not going to take a rest but she's going to London - to the University of London to take her PhD in Arch- ival Studies. When she has finished that, she v;ill be one of only tv/o people with that degree in Canada. So, we are very honoured to have Laura as our Archivist and to be able to say what a \7ell educated and hard working person she is. But with that, we have a lot of sorrow because Laura has really been the main stay of the growth of our Society in the last 4 years. She came to us in 1988. We found that we could get a grant for handling our Archives through the Nation- al Archives and through the Archival Association of B.C. We applied for that and, not knov;ing V7hat an Archivist did, Hugh Johnston and I said, "What does an Archivist do and how do we hire one and how to get a good one." Well, we were told, there's a few people around and some names were mentioned and then Hugh and I V7ent around and talked to Archivists all over the lov7er mainland ‘and one name kept popping up. We put out applications and we had a number that came in and the outstanding one was from that one name that had kept coming up - Laura Coles. Laura has changed our organization from a collection - a large collection - of Archives which was brought together in the first 8 years of our Soc- iety by Bernie Holt and Hugh Johnston and all those people v7ho worked so hard. We had a collection and although it was here and they knevj where it was, nobody else did and we all decided it was time to get some expert advice and Laura came in and transformed everything. The Archives are all in order; they are catalogued; they are preserved and they are available for public use and Laura, we want to thank you for all of that. This is not goodbye. This is bon voyage. We v;ant to wish you luck and certainly have fun while you are over there and on behalf of the Society" .... the rest V7as drov7ned out by applause but would "please accept this token of our appreciation" be far off the mark? IT'S ALWAYS HARD TO SAY GOODBYE We V7ill miss Allix Duncan, James Elizabeth Grubbe, Doug Hookham, Joshua Nellie Searle and Ilavis C. Sharpe. Elwell, Peggy Grainger, Gertrude Griffin, Lawrence, Hans Gunther iMueller, Miss MEMBERSHIP REPORT An analysis of the Society's membership records for the past eight years, puts one in mind of the formula for infant growth ie, double the baby's birthweight at six months and triple it at a year. We've gone from 67 members in 1934 -doubled in '85 and trebled in '85 to an estimable 1992 total of 393 including a record breaking 85 new members. Now unlike Mrs. William Backhouse Astor (that's the Mrs. Astor, famed in the 1870s as Queen of Knickerbocker Society), we've no intention of limitiiig our numbers at the 400 mark. You may recall that Mrs. Astor boasted one of the few private ballrooms in her Nev7 York City mansion at 34th and 5th. The ballroom was designed 'to accommodated just 400 guests, hence the term "The Four Hundred". Many of our 1992 members V7ere introduced to the Society via Gift Memberships. Please keep that in mind when family and friends' birthdays or anniversaries crop up throughout the year and do your part tov7ards making 1993 a 400 plus year.