Spring 2013 - Westminster Chapter - Maryland Society Sons of the

Volume 3, Issue 2
Spring 2013
The Westminster Associator
A Quarterly Newsletter of the Westminster Chapter, Sons of the American Revolution
Proudly Serving Carroll County, Maryland,
Chapter Established 9 March 1985
C h a p t e r
S P E C I A L
P O I N T S O F
I N T E R E S T :

Chapter Wins at
State Level

Some Vacant
Positions Filled

Method to Assess
Chapter Health
Proposed; Working Group to develop Action Plan
I N S I D E TH I S
I S S U E :
President’s Message
2
State Challenge Met
2
Chapter to March in
Westminster Memorial
Day Parade
2
High School Seniors to
be Honored
2
Chapter holds Annual
Spring Dinner/Business
Meeting
3
How are we Doing?
4
Compatriots Volunteer
for Vacant Positions
5
Getting to Know Your
Compatriots
6
Reminders
7
Calendar
8
E a g l e
S t a t e
S c o u t R e c e i v e s
A w a r d
Carroll County resident
Robert Crumbaugh, an
Eagle Scout withTroop 9
(Emory United Methodist
Church, Upperco, MD)
received the State Eagle
Scout Award at the MDSSAR George Washington
Luncheon on 23 February 2013 at the Towson
Golf and Country Club.
During the meeting, he
read his winning essay
“More than Common
Sense” (an abridged verShown Left to right: MDSSAR President Lou Raborg, Thomas
sion of his Knight Essay Crumbaugh, Eagle Scout Robert Crumbaugh, Kathleen Crumbaugh,
submission) . He will rep- NSSAR Eagle Scout Chairman Jon Street, MDSSAR 1VP Pat Warner
resent our state at the
Golf and Country Club. During the meetNational level during the NSSAR Coning, he read his winning essay “More
gress in July. He’ll be competing for an
award of $8,000 (runner up gets $4,000 than Common Sense” (an abridged verand the second runner up $2,000). Car- sion of his Knight Essay submission) .
He will represent our state at the Nationroll County resident Robert Crumbaugh,
an Eagle Scout with Troop 9 (Emory Unit- al level during the NSSAR Congress in
July. He’ll be competing for an award of
ed Methodist Church, Upperco, MD) re$8,000 (runner up gets $4,000 and the
ceived the State Eagle Scout Award at
the MDSSAR George Washington Lunch- second runner up $2,000).
eon on 23 February 2013 at the Towson
S t a t e
A n n u a l M e e t i n g t o
a t G r e y R o c k
b e
h e l d
This year’s MDSSAR Annual Meeting will be held 13
April 2013 at Grey Rock Mansion, 400 Grey Rock
Rd., Pikesville, MD 21208. The birthplace of Revolutionary patriot, John Eagar Howard, the site has been
used before by MDSSAR for meetings, and is always
a pleasant and enjoyable location for our events.
Considering its close location, all our chapter’s Compatriots are urged to attend. Registration form is included. Let the Contact know by 1 Apr, even by phone ,if you are going.
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P r e s i d e n t ’ s M e s s a g e
Greetings to my fellow compatriots
To those of you who we
were not at the last meeting at
Buttersburg Inn, we missed you.
We realize that there are many
reasons for not being there, however we missed you. We had the
privilege of meeting and hearing
from our . essayist He placed second in state competition. He also
entered the Eagle Scout competiDr. Cecil M.
tion and is the state winner. He is
Massie, Sr.
in competition on the national level. We also presented to Art
Petrucelli his Military service medal. If there are members who were in the Armed Forces
and have received your medal we need to know about
it so that you can be recognized.
Jake Yingling agreed to assume the responsibility of Flag Chairman. If you know of individuals who
fly the U.S. flag daily in an acceptable manner please
let Jake know of this.
It appears that the lady who has provided the
convertible for the Memorial Day Parade has changed
vehicles and we no longer have a convertible for those
who cannot walk the distance. If you either have a convertible or know of someone who does, please see if
they will assist us. We will have a wreath to be placed
at the monument.
We lost seven members for non-payment of
dues. Please encourage all the members that you
know to pay their dues. They can be reinstates. Dr.
Charles Wolf, one of our newest members, is moving
to the Houston area. He was our chaplain.
I will soon be contacting you for assistance in
presenting the Outstanding Citizenship Awards to the
graduating seniors in the county.
Be on the lookout for individuals who should
be recognized for their outstanding contributions in our
community.
If you know of any DAR members, they probably have a brother, a husband, or son{s} all of whom
could join our chapter very easily. Seek them out and
encourage them to join us.
Congratulations to James Engler on his nomination for 3rd vice president of the Maryland Society
SAR.
I hope you have an enjoyable spring and that
your observance of Easter is worthwhile.
Regards,
Cecil
The Westminster Associator
S t a t e
C h a l l e n g e
M e t
At the spring chapter meeting, the membership present voted to approve a donation for the new
Washington Memorial to be erected in Hagerstown.
This was in response to the challenge by MDSSAR
President Lou Raborg to all SAR chapters in the state
to donate $100 towards defraying the costs involved
with the statue’s design , fabrication and installation.
We join at least 7 chapters who have taken up the
challenge. The project, which the City of Hagerstown
started planning in 2011, is to be a 7 foot statue depicting George Washington, c. 1755. The statue, with
a four to five foot tall boulder as its base, is to be
placed in front of the Washington County Circuit Court
building. At a cost of about $68,000, about $30,000
has been raised from City and County budgets, with
more sought from private sources.
C h a p t e r t o M a r c h i n
W e s t m i n s t e r
M e m o r i a l D a y P a r a d e
Memorial Day is just around the corner, and
the chapter again plans to be marching in the parade in Westminster. Plans are still being made, but
based on past years, we can expect to meet on Monroe Ave. in Westminster at 9:30 on Memorial Day.
This year, Compatriot Jake Yingling is donating the
cost of the wreath we place at the cemetery. If anyone has a convertible they’d be willing to lend for
our march, please contact Bill Hiatt at 410-8768023.
We’d like to see a big turnout , so we encourage all our Compatriots to attend, and we hope to
see you there!
H i g h S c h o o l S e n i o r s
t o b e H o n o r e d
Continuing our Chapter's tradition, we will be
awarding Bronze Good Citizenship Awards to a senior at each of the high schools in Carroll County. The
presentation of each award is done at the annual
Senior Awards Ceremony held at each school. These usually happen in the first week in June, and often there are several ceremonies on the same evening. We need Compatriots to volunteer to present
the awards. When Dr. Massie calls, please consider
agreeing to make one or more of these presentations.
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h o l d s A n n u a l S p r i n g
B u s i n e s s M e e t i n g
Eleven Compatriots plus guests attended our
chapter’s annual Spring Dinner and Business meeting
on 14 March 2013 at the Buttersburg Inn in Union
Bridge, Md.
Robert Crumbaugh, Eagle Scout and North Carroll High School senior, winner of the George S. and
Stella M. Knight Essay program for the Westminster
Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution, was
the guest speaker. His essay, entitled “More Than
Common Sense”, provided insight into the actions and
influence of Thomas Paine’s pamphlet “Common
Sense” and how Paine helped the majority of the colonists realize what was occurring and how to fix the
problems of government. The essay program is designed to give sophomore, junior and senior students
an opportunity to explore events that shaped American
history. Conducted at the Chapter, State Society and
National Society levels, the student must submit an
original essay with topics based on original research
that deal with an event, person, philosophy or ideal associated with the American Revolution, the Declaration
of Independence, or the framing of the United States
Constitution.
A number of topics were discussed at the business portion of our meeting. Topics included upcoming
plans for Memorial Day, The MDSSAR Challenge to contribute to the George Washington statue fund, and a
discussion on how we can measure our chapter’s
Art Petruccelli, Knight Essay chairman is shown congratulating Robert Crumbaugh for his winning essay.
3
D i n n e r /
health and improve it. All these topics are to be
found in articles in this newsletter.
Upon conclusion of the business meeting,
Charles Hedges, the awards and medals chairman,
presented Art Petruccelli the war service medal
with the “war on terrorism” service bar in recognition of his military service
Charlie Hedges is shown presenting the War Service Medal
to Art Petruccelli
Attendees of our Spring Dinner/Business Meeting!
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The Westminster Associator
H o w a r e w e D o i n g ?
B y J a m e s F . E n g l e r , S r .
How are we doing? It’s such a simple question, with a range of answers. For some of us, so
early in the year, the answer might be related to our weight and attempts to reduce it. In business,
there are typically a wide range of metrics, financial and otherwise, which try to address the question.
In our own chapter meetings, we hear the regular report of our financial well-being, but how about our
overall health as a chapter?
Certainly one way many of us jump to first is the size of our chapter: are we growing or shrinking
in size? Using information on our chapter membership and rosters since 1995, I came up with an estimate (see chart, below). In our early ears, many chapter members had dual memberships, with other
chapters as their true homes. While I don’t have exact information on when they dropped from our
chapter, they did within a few years, from comments our chapter president, Dr. Cecil Massie, has made.
We started getting new members from our earliest years and with the exception of a time in the early
2000s, continued to grow.
How are we doing at attracting and retaining membership, or getting lapsed Compatriots to rejoin? Indeed, the Winter issue of SAR Magazine has a message from the President General on the top-
ic, addressing the four Rs: recruit, retain, reconnect, reinstate. It could be said that an active chapter is
more likely to be successful in all four Rs. The question then becomes, “how do we determine how active we are?”
There is a way that we could track our non-financial well-being: the President’s Cup. The Cup is
the combination of two awards: the Americanism Award and the President General’s Streamer. The
former covers a set of activities related to activity in the community (publicity in print and broadcasting,
speakers bureau, multimedia distribution, youth programs, public service programs, scholarship grants,
veteran support, observances/ceremonies, grave markings of patriots, medals/certificates awarded
non-members) and the streamer those activities related to service to the SAR (CAR/DAR support, compatriot grave marking, medals/certificates awarded members, national society service, membership,
attendance at state/regional/national meetings, SAR contributions). Both are covered in a single
spreadsheet, and provide points for each of the different activities, and many of these points are given
based on membership attendence. The file’s contents thus take what is generally a qualitative assess-
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ment of health and turn it into quantitative values. For the engineers, scientists, accountants and just plain
numbers-friendly out there, a specific value is a very comforting thing: it allows for a direct comparison, with
where we have been as a chapter, and where we are now in comparison to other chapters of our size.
As an exercise, I tried to chart our values, using the current version of the spreadsheet (revised 7 Mar
2012), for each year since we were chartered in 1985. This has been a little bit of a challenge, since I have not
been involved in the chapter the entire time, but with the help of our Chapter officers and notes I took at the
MDSSAR archives, I’ve come up with a rough estimate.
So how are we doing? I’ve normalized the number of points by coming up with a model of what we could
be doing, considering our size and local situation (I even assumed only a 20% participation rate by our Compatriots in different events, which seems about the level that has actually occurred). Based on that, we’ve been generally earning about half the points we could be making for our service to SAR (president’s Banner), but our
numbers in service to the community remain low, seem to be dropping off, and are the bigger contributor to the
overall score. Now, some of the topic areas in the spreadsheet may not be ones we want to address, but there
are some that maybe we should be considering.
These charts were presented at our March 2013 Business Meeting. A lot of very good ideas were
brought up on specific things that could be done. I’m looking for volunteers interested in pulling together a plan
of what we should be doing and how to get there, to be presented at our August Dinner/Business Meeting.
C o m p a t r i o t s
V o l u n t e e r
P o s i t i o n s
f o r
V a c a n t
As mentioned in our Winter issue, NSSAR is partnering with Ancestry.com in Operation Reach, which is
geared to increase overall membership in SAR by sending messages to Ancestry.com clients who may have patriot ancestors. Each MDSSAR chapter has been asked to identify an Ambassador, who will field responses forwarded to the chapter and help them to connect with the chapter’s Registrar. The messages are expected to go
out to Ancestry.com clients in VA, MD, and DC in the March/April timeframe. Compatriot Art Petruccelli has volunteered to serve as our chapter Ambassador.
Compatriot Jake Yingling volunteered at our March meeting to serve as Acting Chairman for the Flag Certificate Committee. If you see someone who is regularly displaying the American flag correctly, let Jake know.
Contact him at 170 Willis St., Westminster, MD 21157.
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The Westminster Associator
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G e t t i n g
t o
K n o w
Y o u r
C o m p a t r i o t s
This feature is an attempt to help our membership get to know one another and our backgrounds. We hope to have a mix
of new and current members’ biographies in each issue
J a c o b M . “ J a k e ”
Y i n g l i n g
D r .
C e c i l M a s s i e ,
S r .
Born in Aspers, PA (1930),
Jake grew up in Gettysburg,
Born in 1927 in Lowesville
PA. After graduating from GetVirginia, Cecil was raised
tysburg High School and havon a nearby farm. He grading saved up his money from
uated from Fleetwood High
odd jobs, he started at East
School in 1944. He attendStroudburg (PA) University in
ed Virginia Polytechnic in
1948 but soon thereafter
the fall of 1944 before jointransferred to Gettysburg Coling the US Navy and servlege and graduated (1952)
ing on Guam. He mustered
with a B. A. in history. He then
out of the Navy in 1946 at
took a job teaching in Manthe rank of third class petchester, MD before turning to
ty officer and returned to
a job selling textbooks. Jake then ran for and served as Virginia Polytechnic, graduating (1950) with a Bacha Carroll County representative in the Maryland House of elor of Science in Agricultural Education. He
Delegates (1963-1972) and then as Assistant Secretary earned a Master of Science (1957) from Virginia
for the Maryland Department of Economic and Commu- Polytechnic. He attended several graduate schools,
nity Development. He also has served in a number of
including Western Maryland College (Westminster,
state and local government roles. Jake was owner and Md.), University of Georgia (Athens Ga.), Ohio State
president of Westminster Hardware and Plumbing, retir- University (Columbus ,Ohio) and the University of
ing in 1997. Jake served in the boards of a number pri- Maryland (College Park, Md.), earning from the latvate organizations, including being a director for Regal ter a Ph.D.(1979).
Bank & Trust (and chairman of its Carroll Co. Advisory
Cecil served as vocational agriculture teachBoard), Taneytown Bank & Trist Co., Monocacy
er and FFA advisor in Virginia (1950-1957) before
Bancshares, Inc., and Chairman of the Board for TBT
moving to Carroll County, Md. He served in these
Investments, Inc. of Wilmington, Del, retiring from most same roles at Elmer Wolfe, Taneytown and Francis
Scott Key High Schools (1957-1969). At the Univerof these boards in 1997.
He has long been involved in numerous civic and com- sity of Maryland (College Park, Md), he taught farm
munity organizations, including: past president, Carroll mechanics, power and machinery, and machines
Co. Historical Society; former president and member of operation (1969-1990) before retiring. During his
teaching career he was: a life member of the Marythe Board of Visitors, Maryland School for the Deaf;
land Agriculture Teachers Association (MATA), servboard of trustees, St. joseph Hospital, Towson; past
president, Kiwanis Club. He has been honored numer- ing as secretary, treasurer, vice president and president; a member Maryland Vocational Teachers Asous times for his services by many organizations.
He is a member of numerous fraternal organizations, sociation; a member American Vocational Associaincluding SAR. Jake joined the SAR and our chapter in tion, a life member Maryland FFA affiliate and the
National FFA. Association. For his many efforts, he
1993 and was our chapter ‘s vice president (19942002). He joined through his ancestor, George Weikert, received numerous awards from farming organizations. Cecil also served as: Member of Board of DiCaptain of the Militia, 3rd. Company, York Co., PA.
rectors of Carroll County Agriculture Center (8
Jake’s autobiography, A Man From the Palatinate,
goes into more detail of his life than we can do justice to years); Member of Board of Governors of Carroll
in this article. Jake has donated his life’s papers to Get- County Farm Museum (6 years); and currently is a
member of education committee for Hoff Barn, part
tysburg College, which bestowed the Distinguished
of County Farm Museum.
Alumni Award on him in 2000.
Cecil has been a member of Lions Club InHe and his wife Genevieve have two sons and five
ternational
since 1956. He has held numerous
grandchildren.
leadership offices in the local club and district levels
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including District Governor for District 22W. He has
been a Lion’s fund-raising regional chair for two international campaigns to eliminate blindness. Cecil is also a VFW Life Member and member of the American
Legion. He also served as a Cubmaster and Scoutmaster for the pack and troop charted by the United
Methodist Church in Westminster.
He has held numerous roles in the Sons of the
American Revolution since he joined in 1985 through
the service of his ancestor, Charles Massie (SGT in
CAPT Gaskins Company, 5th Virginia Battalion). He
was the Organizing President of our Chapter and has
served since that time as our president. In addition,
he served at the state level as MDSSAR vice president,
as president (1998-1999) and as a National trustee of
NSSAR, as well as serving as chair of various committees at the state and national SAR levels. Besides SAR
activity, he is a life member, 1812 Society, serving on
its board of directors (10 years), and a member of the
St. Andrews Society.
Cecil and his wife Virginia have two sons and
two grandsons.
L o u i s
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R e m i n d e r s
.Electronic Edition. Paper copies of The Westminster
Associator go out to members for whom we have no email address; electronic copies (viewable using the
freely downloaded Adobe Acrobat™) are sent to the
rest of our chapter members. If you have a new or
changed e-mail address, please let President Massie
and VP Engler know (contact information on the
back) , as sending electronically will save our chapter
the cost of printing and postage.
Articles Needed. Are there any items you’d like to
share with the rest of the chapter? If so, contact Compatriot Engler for inclusion in the next issue of The
Westminster Associator.
Photos and Memories Needed. Anyone with photos of
or information on past events, please contact Compatriot Engler at 410.781.6622. His goal is to have a
complete chapter photo history on our website (see
our website’s “Chapter History” page for progress on
this project).
Website Updated. The Chapter website has been updated to include recent chapter activities. Check us
out at http://westminster.marylandsar.org/index.html.
If you see anything to change or add, contact the webmaster.
Bios Needed. Know your Compatriots! This makes
the second issue in which we’ve run short bios on current members. The feature only works, though, if
Compatriots provide a biography. So please send
your paragraph bio and a current picture to
mdssarwestminster@yahoo.com, or send to Jim Engler at 2038 Red River Rd., Sykesville, MD, 21784.
Volunteers Needed for Activities Working Group. As
mentioned in this issue, we’re looking for volunteers
who would come up with a plan for improving our
chapter activities. The working group will meet of the
next few months and report out at our next Chapter
meeting in August.
Born in 1948 In Chesaco
Park, Rosedale Md., Louis was
raised there and moved to a 10
acre farm in Hampstead in 1975.
He left school when he was 16 and
graduated from high school while in
the army.
He enlisted in the U.S. Army
in 1968 and served for 13 months
in Viet Nam as part of the Signal
Corp. Louis was honorably discharged from the army in Sept
1969 with a rank of Sp 4.
He started drywall finishing at the age of 17, continued in that job after his tour of duty, and was a member of
Painters Local #1. Over the years he worked for various contractors and retired in 2008.
Louis does a lot of work on his old Chevrolet cars and
particularly loves the 1950's Chevys.
Louis is one of our newest members, joining SAR and
our chapter in 2012 through the service of George Abel and
John Stephan Abel ,his 5th and 6th great-grandfathers, respectively, who both served as Privates under CAPT Jacob
Bieber (1776) and CAPT Michael Kauffelt's Co (1781) in York
Co., Penn..
He and his wife Flora have two daughters and three Third Maryland Regimental Flag, aka Cowpens Flag (1781), is
grandsons.
held by the Maryland State Archives
OUR WEB ADDRESS:
HTTP://WESTMINSTER.MARYLANDSAR.ORG/
INDEX.HTML
W E S T M I N S T E R
C H A P T E R ,
S O N S
O F
T H E
A M E R I C A N
R E V O L U T I O N
114 Virginia Dr
Westminster, MD 21158
Phone: 410-848-4156
E-mail: mdssarwestminster@yahoo.com
Chartered on 9 March 1985, the Westminster
Chapter, SAR proudly serves Carroll County, Maryland.
In keeping with the mission of SAR, our chapter
seeks to maintain and extend the institutions of
American freedom through an appreciation for true
patriotism, a respect for our national symbols, the
value of American citizenship, and for the unifying
force that has created, from the people of many nations, one nation and one people.
We do this by perpetuating in our local community,
among all age groups, the stories of patriotism, courage, sacrifice, tragedy, and triumph of the men who
achieved the independence of the American people in
the belief that these stories are universal ones of
man's eternal struggle against tyranny, relevant to all
time, and will inspire and strengthen each succeeding
generation as it too is called upon to defend our freedoms on the battlefield and in our public institutions.
Libertas et Patria
C a l e n d a r ,
Date, Time and Place
A p r i l - J u n e
2 0 1 3
Subject
13 April 2013
Grey Rock Mansion
Maryland State Society Sons of the American Revolution
Annual Meeting
Pikesville, MD
27 May 2013
9:30 A. M.
The 146th Annual Westminster Memorial Day Parade
Monroe Ave., Westminster MD
June 2013
Awarding of Good Citizenship Medals to
Carroll County, MD High Schools
Graduating Seniors
Items in italics are state, regional or national SAR events, see the State site (accessible from our chapter’s “Links” page) for more information on these events.
MARYLAND SOCIETY
SONS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
Cordially invites you to attend
the 124th Annual Meeting at the
Grey Rock Mansion
400 Grey Rock Rd
Pikesville,
Pikesville, MD 2120
21208
Saturday, April 13, 2013
Schedule:
Continental Breakfast: 8:00am
Freshly Baked Morning Pastries: Chocolate Croissants, Fruited & Cheese Danish, Mini Blueberry & Bran Muffins
Assorted Bagels: Plain, Everything, & French Toast, Jellies, Jams, Butter & Cream Cheese
Morning Beverages: Orange, Cranberry & Tomato Juice, Regular & Decaf Coffee, Traditional & Herbal Tea
Board Meeting: 8:30 – 11:30 am
There will be a Flower Arranging Demonstration for the Ladies
Buffett Luncheon: 11:30 am – 1:00 pm
Garden / Tossed Salad: Crisp Iceberg Lettuce with Vine Ripe Tomatoes, Sliced Cucumber & Croutons With
Raspberry Vinaigrette Dressing. Warm Rolls and Sweet Whipped Butter. Sliced Sirloin of Beef With Demi Glaze.
Chicken Francaise Lightly Battered Sautéed with Chardonnay, Lemon & Butter. Oven Roasted New Potatoes with
Fresh Herbs. Roasted Vegetable Medley. Dessert: Strawberry Shortcake. Beverages: Assorted Soft Drinks & Bottled
Water.
Orations Contest Presentations, Awards Presentations, Installation of New Officers:
1:00 – 3:30 pm
Please make checks payable to MDSSAR and send to Treasurer: Professor Barrett
McKown, 3580 South River Terrace, Edgewater, MD 21037-3245.
RSVP: By April 1, 2013
Please indicate the number of meals required.
Breakfast $12.00 ______
Lunch
$45.00 ______
Signature: ______________________________________________