Tampa Chapter – October 2019
Contents
Meeting
Announcements
Revolution History note
2023 National SAR Congress
Program Schedule
Color Guard Activities & Opportunities
Missing In America Project
Chapter Facebook Page
Other Dates of Interest
Misc.
Reminders
October Meeting Announcement
The
next meeting of the Tampa Chapter, Sons of the American Revolution, will be
held on Saturday, October 19th at the Golden Corral in Temple
Terrace. Please remember to pay on your
way in and keep your receipt for the waitress.
Social time and lunch will precede the meeting. The formal meeting will start around 12:00
Noon. The street address for the Golden
Corral is:
11801 N 56th St.
Tampa, FL 33617
(813) 899-1833
The
state of colonial/revolutionary education in Florida is the program topic. Compatriot Bob Yarnell made this presentation
at the September meeting of the South Shore Chapter and has agreed to give us
the same presentation this month.
Note
about presentation---my talk
will only be 10-12 minutes to allow plenty of time for questions. To provide some fodder for questions, the
attachment accompanying the newsletter is a letter I wrote to members of the Florida
Legislature’s Education Committee several years ago.
Bob Yarnell
Note
about guests at meeting – Guests
are always welcome at any of our Chapter meetings.
Our
September meeting was a joint
meeting with the St. Petersburg Chapter at the St Pete Yacht Club. The featured speaker was Joseph Hardesty,
Director of the SAR Genealogical Research Library in Louisville, Kentucky. Several of our members were in attendance, as
were many members from the surrounding DAR chapters.
American
Revolution Notes
After the summer hiatus, the Revolutionary Notes section of the newsletter has returned. When this column first began, it discussed events that happened in the same month as the newsletter date. We’ll return to that practice now and look at an event that took place in October 1774.
In October 1774, the First Continental Congress was meeting in Philadelphia to find a solution to the crisis brought about by the Coercive/Intolerable Acts passed by the British Parliament as a reaction to the Boston Tea Party. After the rules of procedure had been established, Joseph Galloway of Pennsylvania put a proposal on the floor that he hoped would appease the colonial radicals and be acceptable to Britain. His plan would have established a continental, colonial assembly—a Grand Council—that would legislate for the colonies just as Parliament legislated for Great Britain. Many of the delegates liked the idea and it seemed destined to pass.
Joseph Galloway
However, before a final vote could be taken, a messenger (Paul Revere) from Massachusetts arrived carrying a copy of the Suffolk Resolves. Representatives from various towns in Massachusetts had met to arrive at a response to the Intolerable Acts and, in particular, the parts that effected Boston specifically and Massachusetts more generally. The Resolves endorsed boycotts of British goods, increased militia training and continued refusal to pay British taxes.
The resolves enabled the radicals in the Continental Congress to gain the upper hand and the Congress endorsed them. A few days later Congress voted to table the Galloway plan by a 6-5 vote, essentially killing what may have been the last hope of reconciliation.
Addendum—it should be added that is unlikely George III, his ministers and Parliament, would have accepted the Plan even had the colonists approved it.
2023 National SAR Congress
After two previous failed attempts the Florida SAR has been awarded the Host State responsibility for the 2023 National SAR Congress. Congress is held either the week before or week after Independence Day. The proposed Host City is Orlando. There will be delegation from the National SAR Congress Planning Committee visiting the Orlando/Kissimmee area within the next few weeks to visit several proposed hotels and select a Host Hotel. Even though Congress is still 45 months away, the Florida SAR has formed its own Congress Planning Committee. Our primary responsibility is the hosting of a Welcome Reception for attendees on the Saturday evening of the Congress and hosting the First Lady’s Tea. These receptions and other costs are expected to cost Florida SAR some $30,000 or more. At the recent BOM, several fund-raising opportunities were discussed and approved. One of these is a $1 per active member assessment on each chapter, each year for five years from 2019 to 2023.
In addition to cash, the most pressing need for hosting a National Congress is volunteer help in both planning and working during the Congress itself. If interested in assisting in the effort, please let President John Goolsby know and he will pass your name and contact information on the Chairman of the Florida Congress Planning Committee.
This will be discussed more at Saturday’s meeting.
Program Schedule
Nov. Law Enforcement Awards
Dec. Wreathes Across America
Color Guard Activities & Opportunities
Activities
September
10 – David Bryant, Bill
Swain and Dick Young from Tampa and John Stewart from St Petersburg made up a
Color Guard to participate in the Welcome Home Ceremony of Honor Flight. They are pictured below with the “Bomber Girls”
who greet each returning veteran personally.
September
22 – David Bryant, Bill Swain and
Dick Young from Tampa and Robert Anderson of Clearwater made up the Color Guard
for presentation of the Colors at the opening of the joint Tampa/St. Petersburg
Chapters meeting in St. Petersburg.
September
26 – Bill Swain and Dick Young
joined Doug Erb and Steve Fields of Saramana and Robert Anderson of Clearwater in participating
in the Missing in American Project Ceremony (see below) at the Sarasota
National Cemetery in the internment of the unclaimed cremains of 12 veterans
and 5 spouses of veterans. There were
also several DAR Chapters and other patriotic organizations present.
Opportunities
October
22 – Welcome Home for Honor Flight - Clearwater-St Petersburg
Airport
November 9 – Veterans Day Parade - James A Haley Veterans
Hospital.
(details to be provided)
December 14 – Wreaths Across America – American Legion Post
#5 USS Tampa
Other
Dates of Interest
November
9 – West Central Region meeting at the Golden Corral
(John Goolsby is current
Regional Vice President)
Missing In America
Project
Recently, I had the honor of participating
in a Missing in America Project Interment Ceremony at Sarasota National
Cemetery. The purpose of the Missing in
America Project is to locate, identify and inter the unclaimed cremated remains
of American Veterans through the joint efforts of private, state and federal
organizations. To provide honor, respect and dignity to those who have served
this country by securing a final resting place for these forgotten heroes. On September 26, Bill Swain and I were there
representing the SAR. We were each asked to carry an urn containing the
cremains of one of the veterans interred that day. This was a moving ceremony recognizing the
lives and sacrifices of those veterans and family members who have been
otherwise forgotten.
Dick Young
FACEBOOK PAGE
From the President - The new Facebook page for the Tampa Sons of the American Revolution is Tampa Sar. The password to add anything is American1776. Please
feel free to upload pictures or comments. Invite all your friends to look.
Miscellaneous
Reminders
Chapter
Website—remember you can find information about the chapter and programs on the
chapter website. http://www.tampasar.org/
One of
the duties of the Chapter Chaplain is to send cards to our members that are
sick. Another is to send a sympathy card to the family of a member who has
passed away. If you know of anyone that should be the recipient of these cards
please mention it to Chaplain Sessums or one of the other officers at our next
meeting.
Chapter officers and committee chairman are encouraged to send any pertinent information they wish included in the newsletter to the editor.