Either we were a very succinct lot in those days (unlikely) or the Secretary (B. Rogers, Esq) was exceedingly choosy in what he recorded for posterity, as the AGM minutes in 2002, 2003 and 2004 only ran to two pages each year. And half of one side of the paper was taken up with a listing of attendees - a good trick for making it look like more had happened than actually did. I must remember this for next year, instead of packing all the names onto a couple of lines. But I digress...….
May 2004 - The AGM is held on the sixth of the month, with 17 people in attendance, plus apologies from Geoff King and Tom Swallow. Two new names appear in the form of Nick Waterman (ex Leamington) and Rob Olley. Membership is 24-25 people. I wonder who the undecided person was? Rod is in the Chair and with great foresight stresses the need for more junior members - Paul was in attendance and doubtless took these words to heart, though it was a good few years before he put his plan into action!
Hurrah!!!! Subsequent to the nomination by Mrs Lam (for which, many thanks!), the club had won the BCF's Club of the Year award. This had been presented by David Anderton who had visited us shortly before Xmas, 2003. A photograph and article had appeared in the KWN. As a bonus the award gave us full BCF membership until January 31, 2005. (I remember the small, framed certificate sitting on a shelf at The Royal Oak when I first started attending on a Thursday evening (2010 or 2011), but regrettably the award subsequently disappeared without trace. Anyone who tries to link my arrival on the scene with the disappearance of the award will be hearing from my solicitor. Chris, are you taking on new clients?!)
Adam Collinson is back on the scene, and had won the Club Championship, with Carl winning the Plate. Adam and Paul were joint winners (seemingly - the Secretary is less than definitive in his records!) of the Club Lightning tournament. Five teams had been run in the Leamington League, with finishing positions as follows:-
A Team - 4th of 9 in Division 1
B Team - 7th of 8 in Division 2
C Team - 1st of 9 in Division 3
D Team - 9th of 9 in Division 3
E Team - 6th of 7 in Division 4
The U-625 Cup had also been won, while one of our two (!) teams in the U-100 Cup had got to the final. So two excuses for an end of season celebratory meal! And the silverware just kept coming, with Carl winning the LDCL Open Individual title and Tom Swallow sharing the U-125 prize.
For the third year in a row the Secretary has nothing to report. Talk about an easy job, eh?
The Treasurer was not in attendance, but the accounts were presented and presumably accepted. However, I have no idea of how we had fared financially, as the Secretary neglects to provide any details of our P&L or Balance Sheet, though does let on that subs will be unchanged. Well, he's clearly not a numbers man, so its probably unfair to expect too much. The BCF game fee is going up from 36p to 44p (+22%!), and either in protest, or because we've won the Club of the Year award and no longer need to curry favour, the meeting votes to discontinue the Club's BCF Corporate and Vice Presidents membership.
Our 24-25 members were clearly champing at the bit for more chess, as it was decided to enter 6 teams in the Leamington League the following season - A in Div 1; B & C in Div 2; D in Div 3; and E & F in Div 4. I don't know how, but 6 Match Captains were recruited:-
A - Carl
B - Phil
C - Nigel
D - Mike W
E - Frank
F - Rob (another newbie gets press-ganged into office!)
But that's not all, as we also had captains for our 4 Cup teams, and while Carl doubles up by taking on the Open team, we need separate skippers for the other three. Step forward Paul M, Tony and Steve. Which means we had 9 volunteers to captain our various teams. 9!!! Plus three Club Officers. So 50% of the membership took part in the organisation and running of the club. Many hands make light work - or too many cooks spoil the broth? I just can't decide.
Well, that leaves me with just two more years worth of AGM Minutes to document on the club web site. If I'd known it was going to take 14 or 15 instalments to recount our early history, I might have thought twice before starting this journey!
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