Membership Recognition 2021

MEMBERSHIP MATTERS: recognizing your milestones

Founding members of the Macnamara Field Naturalists’ Club, 1984 (left) Adolph Vogg, Kevin McDonald, Verna McGiffin, Michael Runtz, Eric Ridgen, Sloan Watters

The MFNC is a friendly club; our president’s wolf howl signals the start of each meeting, cutting through the buzz of conversations that fill our meeting room in normal pre-COVID times. Connecting virtually, we miss that person-to-person bonding.

We used our June 2021 meeting, our send-off to the summer break, to highlight our nature enthusiasts with 10 or more years of participation in the club. We also wanted to acknowledge the contributions of founding members Eric Ridgen and Michael Runtz (still our president! We would love to have had each person stand for applause but had to settle instead for a reading of their names.

You’ll find those below as well as the criteria we used to determine our numbers.

How we arrived at the numbers

  • For our 2020 AGM, we decided to recognize members with 10 or more years of participation in the club.
  • The names we included are based on records that start with the launch of the club in 1984 and continue up to and including the 2019-20 membership year.
  • Grouping the memberships by five-year milestones, we found we had nature enthusiasts with memberships ranging from 10-, 15-, 20-, 25-, 30- and 35-years. All those we’ve named in this report had renewed in 2019-20, which we decided would be a requirement. If you forgot to renew in 2019-20, your membership clock/count goes back to 0.
  • We decided, though, to stop the clock for three members who joined way back in 1984; although not 2019-20 members, we feel they came close enough.

Although we did our best tracking the data we may have gotten yours wrong; if so, we apologize. Let us know and we’ll have a second look. Early club records were not digitized.

Special thanks to Brian Voss and Roger Magoon for helping me compile this information. 

Karen Runtz

NameMilestone
Dave and Mary Forsyth10
Jim Lougheed10
Lyn and Jim Arsenault10
Cathy and Ken Stewart10
Maureen and Paul Carrier10
Bernard Gesicki & Rona Bloomfield10
Liza Badham10
Brian Carson10
Olga Janoska10
Mary Ellen Jack10
Roger Bird10
Susan and Chuck Gillan10
Jan Mansfield10
John Grierson10
Jeff Skevington & family10
Barb and Neil Robertson10
John Willis10
Garry and Linda Lackner10
Karen Runtz10
Susan and Chuck Gillan10
Vern and Judy Seligy10
Estelle Rother10
Stephen Duff10
Norm and Barbara Chouinard10
Nadine Tate & family10
Sandy Bickerstaff10
John Willis10
Anne and Barry Burnett10
NameMilestone
Mary Marsh15
Donna Metcalfe17
Linda Sewell20
Brian and Lucy Voss20
Art Goldsmith and Janice Tripp20
Brian and Lynda Wright20
Ruth Bowes25
Janny De Jager25
Karen Krueger25
Murray and Judy Borer25
Diny and Ken Mcnairn25
Fred Runge and Barbra Smith25
NameMilestone
Ryan and Julie Zimmerling30
Renee Stewart30
Michael Runtz*35
Eric Ridgen*35
* Founding members
NameMilestone
Tony and Mary Crowe** 20+
Betty Anne Beckmann and family**20+
Jim Ferguson**20+
Steve Duffield and Joan ShuteLife Membership
Donna MetcalfeLife Membership
**Although not current members, these 1984 members participated for more than 20 years.