Monthly Meeting Minutes
Third Monday, May 20, 2013

Attendance: 25 members
A little light this month.

George Phariss brought the meeting to order with a bang of the gavel at 8:02 p.m.

There were no new members in attendance this month.

George began the meeting by reminding us of the tragedy in Oklahoma, as the tornado’s hit close to where he grew up. Hopefully next month’s meeting will not be on the same day as another tragedy.

George then acknowledged the resignation of Vice President Joel-Paul Brossard. Retirement has caused Joel to decide to move closer to his boyhood home, Canada, and his family, by moving to Washington. I believe he just won’t be able to bear watching the Blackhawks lose to the Detroit Red Wings, but that’s me. George thanked Joel for his work in getting the club re-involved with the Miata club’s autocross, being an outstanding VP, and for being a long-standing member who will be missed.

Joel then introduced author Phil Aleo who gave us a 37 minute presentation about the history of Meadowdale Raceway, which has a fascinating history, but sadly closed in 1969 (If I remember correctly). It’s now a forest preserve named Raceway Woods. Check it out.

After which we had a 10-minute break.

Dan Herman showed the club his new bimini top. Thankfully it was for his MG, to keep the cockpit shaded on those sunny hot days.
Russ Mehaffey found a mouse nest in the trunk of their MGA. Luckily the only casualty was the spare-tire cover.
Jim Evans is nearly back on the road after a fuel pump failure that was traced to a wiring short, cause by a mouse as well. Jim found out, the hard way, that Irish Spring soap does NOT keep mice away.
Martin Fey, and others, put their anti-mouse trust in dryer sheets around the car, and steel wool in the tail-pipe. I find that peppermint oil, on a cotton ball in baby-food jars with holes poked in the lid seems to work well, and leaves the car smelling fresh. Some people mentioned moth-balls, but I’ve had mixed results with those.

Finance: Ralph Arata gave another exciting recap of the clubs finances. And now that he’s retired, he pledges to dive deeper and deeper in the club’s finances. Oh joy.
Library: There was no library report tonight.
Regalia: Badge mold was found, and 100 more badges are on their way!
Website: Up and running and otherwise doing just fine.

Driveline: Victor noted that the size of the newsletter usually goes to nearly 20 pages in the summer as the driving season picks up. Victor also mentioned that he is always looking for pictures to use in Driveline, and they could also be used by the website.
Driving events: Something that’s come up a lot, in light of the recent financial scrutiny, is that activities organizers need to know ahead of time how many people are planning to attend. To help with this, we are working on an ‘RSVP system’. If you’ve seen your email lately, you’ve seen our early attempts at doing this with the Lands’ End Rally.

Driving Events: Looking for a host for Garage Tour #2. Upcoming Lands’ End Rally, which should be ~70 miles of fun-filled rally. Dan told us that there are 24 cars signed up for Jo Daviess tour, which will be stopping at Potosi Brewery (which is great), a ferry ride across the Mississippi, and otherwise sounds like a fantastic trip. Sorry we can’t make it this year.

Next month we have another guest speaker, Yves Boode, of Historic Race Car and Vintage Sports Car will give a presentation on the Mille Miglia race held in Italy. Should be a good one, don’t miss it.

Jim Evans mentioned that a Jack Beck from Hinsdale was looking for the club member who gave a presentation at his church in Hinsdale. If you’re that presenter, please call Jim or Jack.

George said that 25 cars made it on the Spring Chicken Rally, which was a fantastic run! It was so well run, that the winner had to be chosen from a tiebreaker between 10 teams!

After which we held the 50/50 raffle. Victor L’Heureux won $12! A number of hats were donated and were raffled off as well. Barney Gaylord, Phil Wydra, Jim Smith, Dino Perez, and another member whose name I didn’t catch! My bad.

George banged the gavel again to close the meeting at 9:41PM.

Yours respectfully,
David Novak
CMGC Secretary