Rock of the Marne!
We welcome BG John W. Lubas as the New Commanding General of the Third Infantry Division and Honorary President of the Society. Gen Lubas was previously the G3/5/7 at the Pentagon and brings with him a strong background of world-class leadership. Welcome to the Marne Express!
We also want to welcome to the Executive Committee our new Eastern Region Committeeman, Major General (Ret.) Bouford “Buff” Blount. As many of you know, MG Blount was the Division Commanding General during Operation Iraqi Freedom and his election to the EXCOM is a blessing and an honor for our Society. Welcome, Sir!
If you are an annual paying member, you should have paid your dues by June 30th. Members who did not have their dues paid by July 1st, will not receive “The Watch on the Rhine” in August. If your dues are not paid by October 1st, your status will change to “inactive” on the Society roster until dues are received. Please send in your dues as soon as possible so our Roster Manager can update your status on the roster. Your membership is GREATLY appreciated.
The Society Raffle tickets should have arrived in your mailbox. We hope you will support this raffle as you have always done. It is a critical program that keeps our Society afloat. We thank Maggie and John Weis for, once again, managing this program. They always do a superb job!
Society Budget in this issue. As you can see, we were under budget for last FY, which is a good outcome for the Society. We did experience a drop in annual dues income and there are a couple of factors involved with that. If you have not paid your dues, please do so ASAP.
July represents the beginning of several financial “housekeeping” duties, like tax preparation and submission to the IRS, our annual audit, and OP Disbursements. There were no nominations for Secretary-Treasurer this past election cycle, so I will be covering these duties until a replacement is identified. Many thanks to Russel Zeeb for serving in that position for the last few years.
We will attend the Soldiers Ball as part of our annual reunion. The membership decided several years ago to attend the Ball every other year as part of our reunion cycle. Members receive a discounted ticket to the ball WITH the payment of the reunion registration and attendance. Please see the reunion itinerary and registration form in this issue. The Reunion will be November 20-22 in Fort Stewart, GA. The division has agreed to sponsor us, and we will be on Fort Stewart for most of our reunion.
The Scholarship Foundation trustees have done wonderful work again this year, deciding on the finalist for this year’s scholarship recipients. Many thanks to all of our trustees for their hard work helping young people further their education. The Society Scholarship Foundation is one of our strongest recruitment tools and is an integral part of what we do.
Donation cards will be mailed out this month. Please donate and support our Society. This has become a critical program to make sure we can keep our Society solvent and our programs running. As we lose members, we also lose revenue. The card lists all of our funds and what they are for. You can simply check which fund(s) to donate to; put it in an envelope with your check and mail it. Please consider donating. It is important to our Society that you support our funds. Thank you!
That being said, please help us recruit new members. If every Society member recruits one person, we will double our membership! So please talk about your membership in the Society with everyone you meet, wear your third ID hat, or put a Society sticker on your car. We do have some free annual memberships available for anyone who can’t afford it. Just let me know.
If you like what you are reading in our magazine, please send our editor, Bill Blissett, a note via email or USPS. He works extremely hard making sure that our magazine has great content in every issue. There are some great articles in this edition, so I hope you enjoy them.
I implore all Outposts to please return to meeting on a regular basis. I know it is difficult to get folks together, but regardless of the amount that participate, it is important that you meet and send out letters to your OP members keeping them informed of the “goings on.” After your meeting, make sure you send Bill a write-up so he can publish it in the Outposts section of the magazine.
Lastly, Outpost disbursements will go out to the Secretary-Treasurers of the OP’s. Please make sure you deposit these checks within 90 days, or the funds will revert to National.
Thank you all for your membership to our Society.
Rock of the Marne!
Toby Knight, President