A Celebration of Our Chapter Founders
by Catherine Shely, AN, Morehead, Kentucky
In the spring of 2021, Judy Cain of Chapter AA in Morehead, Kentucky, proposed that we consider crafting presentations to honor the founders of our respective chapters. This immediately resonated with the program committee of my chapter, AN, also in Morehead. Our two chapters have observed Founders’ Day with each other ever since Chapter AN was formed in 2009, as seven sisters had agreed to transfer from Chapter AA to establish the new chapter. Chapter AN had been in existence just long enough to have a number of new members that did not know the chapter history but young enough that we had access to six of the seven sisters who did the hard work of growing a new chapter. A joint program meant that Chapter AN members had a unique opportunity to learn more about the group that it sprang from. Two members of the Chapter AN history committee, Kristi Wilson and Cathy Shely, took on the challenge of putting together a video that provided the desired information about the formation of the chapter. All the technology available for the project was daunting. We had to figure it out as we went along, but the final result was worth the effort. We wanted to use the opportunity to capture biographical information about each founding sister as well as pose one question to each. The first step was to email each founding sister and obtain basic information—facts about her life and her P.E.O. journey. That information was written as scripts to be read as an introduction to the interview. Next we requested photos to include in the video as each biography was read. We used Zoom to contact sisters who now live out of state and recorded them as they spoke. We reached out to the family of Joyce Herron to get facts about her life as well as some pictures, as she joined Chapter Eternal in 2018. Next we compiled the interviews into one video. Even with the careful construction of each sister’s introductory biography, limited opening and closing statements, and only one question per sister, we still ended up with a 43-minute video! Obviously we couldn’t use it in its entirety for our meeting so the presentation was shortened to include only direct interview questions with some opening and closing comments, about 15 minutes total. The presentation was given via Zoom on January 25, 2022, and was well received by members of both chapters. Afterward, we sent a link to the full version of the video on a private YouTube account. The script and transcription of the oral responses will be retained as part of Chapter AN’s history going forward. It was a fascinating process and we all learned so much about each other. Chapter AN salutes each of our founding sisters and appreciate their efforts to model P.E.O. goals and ideals. Their interest in each of us has helped us grow as individuals and as a chapter. This project had so many benefits: teamwork, discovering hidden talents, mastering new skills and honoring the contributions of the sisters who came before us. Consider it as a possible project for your own chapter!
In the summer of 2020 sisters in Chapter IT, Durango, Colorado, had a social gathering with a twist. Two of the members live on the Animas River which flows through town. Sarah Musil Burris paddled upstream to Shawna Off’s house, where they all met along the banks for coffee and loving distancing. Then afterwards Shawna and Sarah continued upstream for a bit. They both returned home via the paddle boards.
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May–June 2022 | THE P.E.O. RECORD
WWW.PEOINTERNATIONAL.ORG
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