As indicated in our newsletter for the past six months, its time for another round of elections for the board of directors of HMGS Great Lakes. Board members serve for two year terms and are charged with directing the growth and actvities of the organization. Typically, board members serve as officers of the organization, but are not required to do so. The current term of office is from March 1, 2000 until February 28, 2002.

Candidates

The following members of HMGS Great Lakes have been nominated for the Board of Directors (incumbents are listed with an (I) following their name), listed alphabetically:

Tom Bryant
J. Matthew Davidson (I)
Jack E. Shaw, Sr.
Darryl R. Smith (I)
David Van Hoose
Andrew A. York

You may vote for up to 6 candiates. Write in candidates are allowed.

The Ballot appears on page 45. Either cut out or photocopy the ballot. It must be filled out completely and mailed to the address indicated on the back. Ballots must be postmarked no later than February 25, 2000. Questions should be referred to Ray Garbee.

Candidates were encouraged to submit a bio or platform to The Herald. Here they are, listed alphabetically.

Tom Bryant

Hello all, my name is Tom Bryant. I am a 30-year-old CAD designer who has been gaming in one form or another since the mid-1980s. For the past two years, I have run my own company, Excailbur Design Specialties, specializing in 3D CAD work for industry. I enjoy all types of board and miniatures wargaming. I am an avid player of Johnny Reb and we are starting Battleground WW II here in Muskegon. I also play science fiction and fantasy games, my favorite Starguard 5th edition.

One of the reasons I decided to run was because we need to have a fresh look at this hobby. We have been battered and beaten by Games Workshop, Magic the Gathering and now the Pokemon craze. All of these have pushed many of our beloved miniatures lines out of the hobby shops. And in many cases, we are treated as unwanted interlopers and outsiders in the new "kewl" world of GW, or Magic/Pokemon. I believe we need to take back the hobby shops by running demos and playing regularly in these places. We need to bring a friendly puiblic face to our hobby. I know this happens in the Dayton/Columbus/Cincinnati areas, and perhaps in Toledo and Detroit. We need to do more and I believe should do more. I intend to help publicize and showcase our hobby. Thank you -- Tom Bryant, Muskegon, MI

J. Matthew Davidson
Born: 1964, Manchester, Connecticut.
Education: Graduate of Lebanon High School, class of 1982. Miami University , currently finishing double major in History/ Political Science.
Personal: Present address: 193 Rosemarie Dr. Lebanon, Ohio 45036-1239, e-mail: jmd@your-net.com. Website: http://www3.your-net.com/~jmd
Profession: Division of Parks and Cemeteries, City of Lebanon, Ohio.
Wargaming: Fist historical miniatures game in 1981: been hooked ever since.
Favorite Periods- ACW, AWI, WW II, Naval(WW II and ACW).
One of the founding members and President of Lebanon Military Strategist Association(Lebanon High School).
One of the founding members, and served a term as Vice President and later a term as President of Historical Simulation Club Miami University Middletown Campus. Also sat on the Miami University Student Advisory Council, as a liaison between the University and the aforementioned club.
Member for many years of Greater Dayton Wargame Club.
Member of Wayne's Legion Historical Gamers.
Member of HMGS East for several years
Member of HMGS Great Lakes
Member of BoD and Vice President of HMGS Great Lakes
Member of BoD and President of HMGS-GL
HMGS-GL's NBoD Representative and Chairman of the National Board of HMGS HMGS Great Lakes' National Coordinating Council Representative.

I have run miniatures games of various periods at a variety of conventions, including COGA CON, CAPCON, Kettering Game Con, Rally Round The Flag, Advance the Colors, Origins and Cold Wars. I have also run many games for the various clubs to which I have belonged over the years, and continue to do so. I have also written articles for several club newsletters including GDWC, WLHG, and HMGS-GL's The Herald, and I have been published in Command Post Quarterly(CPQ) magazine.

As a member of the BoD and Vice President of HMGS Great Lakes, I attended all of the BoD, membership, and convention planning meetings in those two years. I have been directly involved in the Advance the Colors Ô96, and the Advance the Colors Ô97 conventions, by organizing the raffle, working at the "gate" and other related organizational tasks, as well as running games. As President for the past two years I have attended all BoD, membership, and convention planning meetings and have been directly involved with running Advance the Colors Ô98 and Ô99, as well as running numerous events at other conventions and game days at various local shops.

As Great Lakes' Representative to the National Board, I served as Chairman during the trying time up to the dissolution of the HMGS National system. I am currently representing Great Lakes on and helping to build the new HMGS National Coordinating Council, which replaces the old National system. Therefore I have experience on how HMGS works, at all levels, and have established contacts on-line with many of the various other HMGS chapters.

Platform:

My goals for HMGS-Great Lakes: I would like the opportunity to continue the work the current BoD has begun. That is making Advance the Colors a great convention, getting small regional conventions started, such as Drums Along the Maumee and Warparty. Work with the Newsletter Editor to continue to put out a truly first-rate publication for our members. Promote HMGS game days at Local hobby shops and other places. Establish a first rate Website(s) and promote the study of military history in our hobby, not only for the HMGS member's benefit, but also for the general public's benefit as well. We need to be more "visible" to the public. Historical Miniature Gaming is a unique hobby and we need to show it off more to the public. I will continue to seek out members to volunteer their time, efforts and talent to make HMGS Great Lakes a great Chapter.

HMGS Great Lakes is a volunteer organization. The current BoD has volunteered their time, money, efforts and talent to making things happen in HMGS Great Lakes, often at a sacrifice to themselves. I am proud to have served with them all and I hope to continue to do so in the future. Things don't get done without volunteers, and I will continue to volunteer to help make Great Lakes the best chapter it can possibly be. My thanks to all those not on the BoD who have volunteered over the past two years, HMGS Great Lakes could not have enjoyed the current level of success without your efforts. The Board of Directors can't do it alone. -- J. Matthew Davidson, Lebanon, OH

Jack E. Shaw, Sr.

My name is Jack Shaw, candidate for the HMGS Great Lakes Board of Directors. I've been involved in historical wargaming for 10 years. I've been a member of HMGS Great Lakes for the past three years, and I also belong to the Greater Dayton Wargamers Club and Wayne's Legion Historical Gamers. I have also GM'd games at the old Tin Soldier, the Dayton Soldiery, Capcon and Advance the Colors '98. I've helped at the registration table at both the 1998 and 1999 Advance the Colors.

I would like to see HMGS Great Lakes continue to grow by moving in the same direction the past Board of Directors started, getting conventions going in other areas of the Great Lakes region.

At the membership meeting at the 1999 Advance the Colors, I volunteered to contact the media for any free publicity we can get and to find other ways to promote HMGS Great Lakes and Advance the Colors 2000.

If I become a member of the Board of Directors, I will work to promote HMGS Great Lakes and wargaming to the best of my ability. -- Jack E. Shaw, Sr., Dayton, OH

Darryl R. Smith

Putting My Hat in the Ring (Again!). The job is not yet finished! But during my time serving as a board member, we have come so far in making Great Lakes a truly viable chapter of HMGS. The groundwork has been laid, as shown by the increasing success of Advance the Colors, and the advent of two more Great Lakes conventions. It is seen by the number of Friends of Great Lakes that honor our members with discounts on products, and the number of Regional Gaming Groups that are listed in these pages. Bit by bit, we see more members becoming involved, whether it's writing an article for The Herald, running an event at our conventions or Game Days, helping organize a convention, or simply renewing their membership every year. But the job is not yet finished!

Because of my involvement with Great Lakes, I have made some friendships with like-minded individuals. I would have never had the opportunity to meet such folks without this involvement. Besides the "official" mission statement of promoting the hobby, I think Great Lakes' greater purpose is in the social aspect of bringing folks together to share gaming ideas over some cold beers. The only way this can be achieved is through the members, with some direction from the board. The current board has done some wonderful things to allow the members to enjoy their membership, but the job is not yet finished!

To finish the task actually takes more than just the efforts of the board of directors. It takes the efforts of members to help the board complete tasks. The board is just a handful of members. Just like the rest of you, we have our professional and personal lives which take precedence over the hobby we all enjoy. And the current board members have been VERY active in the management of the chapter. Not only do we run events at Game Days, we are seen working at the conventions as well. We support the newsletter with articles, and we spend a lot of our time trying to drum up support from members and answering inquiries from gamers. The board of directors have not only been guiding the chapter, they have been doing a lot of the work as well. But the job is not yet finished.

I can't speak for the rest of the board, but in my mind, the short term goal is the continued success of the conventions, success being that we provide a great gaming atmosphere that more and more gamers come to enjoy. It is also the continued success of The Herald, started by Brian O'Leary and continued by Mike Demana, as well as an increasing membership.

But the long term goal (again, in my mind) is to get gamers in our region to realize that Great Lakes (with lots of membership support) would be able to hold large conventions like the East chapter does. Why drive 8-10 hours when we COULD have a large convention in our own region? When we do the ATC postcard mailing, it goes out to over 1,200 gamers in our region. Imagine if we could get those gamers to attend Great Lakes' conventions! We would be able to match what the East chapter does; more games, more dealers, larger venues, etc. Now I know this won't happen overnight, but through the efforts of the current members, with some direction from the board, it would be a nice goal to achieve. How? The current members need to talk to their gaming friends and let them know what Great Lakes is all about. We can provide membership forms and convention flyers, we need you to bring these gamers into the Great Lakes fold.

So the job isn't finished, and that is why I have decided to run for the Great Lakes board yet again. I hope that all of you will consider giving a little of yourselves to helping Great Lakes an even better chapter in the coming year.

David Van Hoose

(Editor's Note: I did not receive a bio from David, so am reprinting his info from the 1998 Membership Directory.)

Rules, Scales, Figures: Piquet/Les Grognards - 15mm Napoleonic French, British, Russians & Spanish; Piquest/Hallowed

Ground - 15mm ACW; Piquest/Archon & Band of Brothers - 15mm Ancients & Dark Ages (8 armies) Comments: "The chapter is improving every year. I haven't missed an Advance the Colors yet."

Andrew A. York

Born: 1966, San Bernadino, CA
Education: Heidelberg College, BS in Political Science, Alpha Phi Tau Fraternity
Personal: Engaged to be Married in August, Resident of West Chester, OH (Cincinnati Area)
Wargaming History: Began by playing board games (Panzer Leader) with my cousins in 1980. Played Boardgames and AD&D in College. One fateful Saturday in 1989, I strayed into the old Tin Soldier in Dayton while on my lunch break, saw a miniatures game going on...And the rest was history...
Former member of the Heidelberg College Gaming Society - Served as Vice-President.
Member of the Greater Dayton Wargamers Club - Served as Secretary-Treasurer
Favorite Periods: ACW (Land & Naval), Colonials, Napoleonics (Land & Naval), SYW, WW II (Land & Naval)
Favorite Army: British (Good Guys wear Red!) ;-)

Platform:

The past several years have seen tremendous growth for HMGS Great Lakes. This growth has been achieved through the strong support of the membership and the hard work of the current Board of Directors. I am running for the Board because I have seen how hard the present board works for we, the membership, and I think that it is time for me as a rank and file gamer, to get involved.

Our priorities as a board of directors over the next term should be as follows:

1. Successfully launch "Warparty!" and "Drums Along the Maumee" as annual events and HMGS Great Lakes among the general public.

2. Recognize and promote our local gaming clubs, both formal and informal. These groups of gamers, meeting in hobby shops and basements across the Midwest are our heart and soul. We should come up with a way of recognizing those groups for notable achievements, such as longevity, 100% HMGS-GL membership, bringing positive publicity to the hobby, promoting the hobby among students, running conventions, etc. We should also encourage contacts and between clubs such as the recent successful challenge match between the Greater Dayton Wargamers Club and Indianapolis' 19 & 1 Game Club. HMGS-GL should encourage and recognize the initiative shown by these organizations.

3. Promote our local hobby shops. I have lived in cites both with and without local shops. The difference is noticeable. Our local shops not only provide a place to buy paint and figures, but often a place to play and meet with our fellow gamers. We need them and they need us.

4. Maintain our current fiscal responsibility, strive to build a small "rainy day" fund to ensure we always operate in the black.

5. Work to involve the membership more in the operation of this Society. I have long felt that we rank and file gamers need to step up to the plate more to help our board which has worked so hard for this organization, by volunteering to help out with the many labor-intensive tasks that go with running a convention (the front desk in particular), helping to promote the hobby with our families, neighbors and friends, showing up for the annual meeting (your chance to meet the BOD face to face) and offering your opinions and suggestions. Volunteering to help organize game days, cons and minicons in your area.