September 13^th, 2009 saw our Club gather in Red Deer to celebrate the 15th Anniversary of the creation of the AMCA. This was a time to reflect on the progress of the Club, and to take stock of where we are today.

Rick Johnson, our President, wrote the following reminder of what the Club has accomplished:-

"When we had our first meeting at the Edmonton Inn in Edmonton on September 13, 1994 - those gathered there had no idea of what they had put into motion. We have come a long ways and accomplished a lot since that initial meeting:

Over the years we have had many members serve in the Executive and continue to play important roles in the Club's activities. I have in the last edition mentioned those who served us well and they are the reason we have continued to keep the AMCA alive and vigorous.

As a result we have a newsletter which just keeps getting better. Congratulations to Jennifer who took the torch from Don who took up the torch from Rick, Lenka, Julius and Ken.

We continue to make our special events special! Look at how the Chestermere Lake car show has grown. Congratulations to Mike and Elaine and all members who contributed to make this show such a success each year.

We have in the last 5 years made the World of Wheels car show in Calgary and Powerama in Edmonton into focus events for the AMCA. Our Club has competed in quality of display and vehicles shown with the best in the Province. We have taken trophies for our cars and also for the quality of our displays!

We have had a lot of volunteers in both Chapters make these two cars shows really special and a lot of fun. So many have contributed time and effort each year that I can't name you all but you have done the AMCA proud!"

The celebration was held at the Bower Place Community Centre in Red Deer, and was attended by [42] AMCA members. The reason for holding the celebration in Red Deer was because that city is half-way between Edmonton and Calgary, thereby making it more accessible to members of both Chapters.

The weather couldn't have been more co-operative: sun, light winds, and gentle warmth provided the event with an almost perfect venue. It also gave the two Chapter's members the chance to re-acquaint themselves with old friends in the Club, and make new ones with new members that they hadn't met before. That inter-Chapter camaraderie has become more and more a part of the Club.

One of the more important events at this, or any other, Anniversary celebration is, naturally, the "refreshments". We were fortunate enough that our Treasurer, Gayle Domshy, was in "Gastronomic Mode" on the days before the celebration. Gayle provided us with lots of sandwiches of different varities, a "chocolate fountain", complete with fresh fruit and cheese, and several different delicious salads! For those members that were on a diet, this spread was "temptation, taken to the n^th degree!

As can be seen here, Gayle's culinary efforts were not wasted! Our Calgary Secretaty, Larry Chapple, has that, "Gee, this tastes like 'More' to me" look about him!

Despite the line-up of Club members, there was enough to go around for everybody, with room left over for some Anniversary cake.

Here we can see our President, Rick Johnson, getting ready to perform the ritual ceremony of "cutting the cake". On the left is our Vice-President, Gerry Joly, doing what he seems to do best — "supervising"!

That look on Rick's face happened when he was told that he might not get the first piece!!. Fortunately, by a unanimous vote, that idea was defeated. Even though Gerry was trying his best to maintain his "youthful figure", I think he went back at least once for another piece, and I may have missed a couple of other "refills"!! Mind you, Gayle did such a wonderful job of making the cake, even I had more than one piece — and my diet had to be restarted all over again!

As you can see, the line-up moved constantly, and no one left feeling that they were still hungry.

Besides eating, everyone had the opportunity to reacquaint themselves with old friends and to make new ones. Despite the 200 miles that separate the two Chapters from each other, it was plainly evident that the Club's camaraderie had no trouble overcoming the distance.


 

In the above photos you can see some of the Club members enjoying the wonderful spread that was laid out. Also shown is Gayle's Chocolate Fountain that was heavily sampled. The third picture is of Ken Ames (left) and Ervin Cummings. Ervin awarded Ken a "Special" spare fan belt ("one–size–fits–all?") — seems that Ken had one break while trying to make it to the Lake Chestermere Show 'n' Shine, and he almost didn't make it!