Van Buren's annual "Old Timer's Days" Festival is May 12 and 13, 2007, and AOAS members are there to raise funds for the club. With the decision to raffle off a 6" Celestron StarHopper Dob, we hit the bricks early on the morning of Saturday, May 12, and set up a display with our award winning AOAS t-shirts and the 6" right out front, and then we started our hawking for donations, "Say, would you like to take a chance at winning this fine 6" telescope? It might be yours come this July 13th for as little as a $5-bill."
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| AOAS members Donna Gentry and Sylvia Timmons position themselves for selling as we begin a long, humid Saturday trying to raise funds for AOAS. Photo by author. |
Man, am I tired! It wasn't a good night rest-wise for me on the 11th, and I was up at 6:00am getting things ready to take downtown to the Old Timer's Days Festival. I didn't spend more than about 3 hrs total over the day, but between the loading, the spending time greeting the public and soliciting donations, then packing up everything until tomorrow's follow-up gig, I'm simply DAWG TARD and hurting from head-to-toe, as we say 'round these h'yer parts. Unfortunately, that's what it takes to make this fund-raising thing happen, you gotta DO something to GET something. For our other AOAS members who helped out today, and that'll be back again tomorrow, we flat worked our tails off to make this a successful effort, and I thank you for such a great effort from everyone.
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| "Yes you did," "No I didn't," "Yes you did," "No I didn't," Yes you did," "No I didn't,"......... |
Other AOAS attendees for the first day of the festivities were, Roberta Parks (provider of the overhead cover...THANKS ROBERTA), Dale Hall, Joe Roam, Chuck Larson, and Jon Stone, Jr. Ed Wemmerus and myself, along with new member Leonard Lynch helped out on Sunday, along with return performances by Roberta, Sylvia, and Jon. We had a pretty good 2-day run. The tally for the event was $425 from ALL our efforts since buying the telescope and buying our booth space. Now we're making profits for AOAS, and we hope to see more than $1,000 in the bank by the end of summer. In 2 days, we had 58 more raffle tickets sold, several club t-shirts sold, and even a couple new members. Ed spent half of the entire day on Sunday talking it up and selling everything he could. As I heard Dale Hall say on Saturday, "That Ed is about the best pitch man I've ever seen!" I believe I'll have to agree. As of now, we've sold 74 tickets TOTAL, and Ed has been responsible for nearly 1/2 of all those by himself. I bow to your expertise, Ed! Way to GO!
The rest of the tickets won't sell themselves, and ED can't do it all by himself, so how about sending us an email or a letter to buy your own ticket for this great 6" beginner's telescope and FREE 1st year membership in AOAS so we can help you to learn what your new telescope can do. I'll be happy to mail you a single ticket, or even the bargain-priced 5 tickets for a mere $20 donation. Since its all tax-deductible, you'll never even miss it when you claim it on your 2007 taxes next year. COME ON, its a win-win situation any way you look at it.
