AMMHA June News

Hello! Here is the report for the month of June. We've added one new member and have seen an increase in Club participation. We have started momentum, but we can't stop now. I need to ask all club members to try to find someone else to join, just one member per person would double our membership. If this goal is achieved then we can consider producing a printed newletter, at least quarterly, with club news and advertisements ... wouldn't that be nice? Just like the old days! The more members, the more activity, the more we all benefit.

Membership:
We are now officially open for membership. If you would like to become a member and haven't paid your 2007/2008 dues, please consider doing so now. First off, since we are starting so late in the season we have decided to make the membership active for both 2007 AND 2008. In essence, when you pay the $5.00 membership dues you will be a member for both 2007 and 2008 ... can't beat that!

Please remit your $5.00 2007/2008 Membership to Thomas Bainbridge. You may do this via PayPal at: bainbridge@jackpine.com or thru snail mail at:

Thomas Bainbridge
7393 Chief Road
Kaleva, MI 49645

When making payment, please be sure to note that it is for AMMHA membership. Effective immediately you must be a member to be eligible to show in AMMHA Point Only Shows (June 2007 onward), gather points towards Year End Awards, gain points towards accumulative AMMHA Medallion awards, entry to Nationals, voting privileges and other forthcoming Club special functions.

The month of June saw one new member added, that is Teresa Botkins, of Ohio, welcome Teresa!!!! Many thanks to Ann Bilon for urging Teresa (her words, not mine!) to join AMMHA. We currently have 20 paid members and 4 "gratis" Members. Gratis members are those who hold an official office in AMMHA, their membership is included.

June Treasurers Report:
We added $8.50 to the Club treasury during May. We had one new member (see above) @ $5.00 each = $5.00. POS entry fee for June brought in $4.50 (5 entrants), thanks to our judge Coreada Kelly for her donation of time and expertise. Our total account balance is $121.50 currently with no expenses to report.

Show News:
Point Only Show (POS) judges will get an adjustment in their points for missing their show as participants. The point keeper will automatically add 5 points to each of your horses previously shown prior to judging date as a leveling effect for your judging. This way someone who doesn't judge all year long will not have an unfair advantage of one additional shows points, which they wouldn't if they had judged and eliminated that option. But this is for horses that were exhibited *prior* to the judging date.

Point Only Shows will also give additional "bonus" points to Champion/Reserves in each division. 20 added points for Champion and 15 added points for Reserve Champion, per division per show. These added bonus points will be added to the class in which the horse qualified for the Championship in. If there were multiple classes in the division (such as performance) then the bonus points will be added to the class with the greatest placing.

The POS are growing in size --- last month had a number of classes with entries of 20 or more in the class. We already have our first judge os 2008 lined up with Ann Bilon taking on the January POS.

We have two people who are now eligible for entering our Grand National Show in October, they are BJ Owen and Thomas Bainbridge. Each person has either entered three shows to date, or entered two shows and judged one to qualify for Grand Nationals. Our judge this year is Kate Cabot, who lives in the heart of Morgan country and is quite knowledge with first hand extensive exposure to the breed. Please be sure to enter the POS to qualify for Grand Nationals, plus remember that GN are double pointed towards Year End Awards.

Show results are now being posted on the official website. Just go to: http://www.starrfyre.com/ammha/results.htm to view. Thank you to Beth Gustas for her endless devotion of time and energy to keep the website updated and fresh. I should hopefully have updated point tabulations soon, these will be posted to our Yahoogroup when done. This will let all exhibitors know where they currently stand/rank in year end points for the point only shows.

Registration News:
Delana Metcalf, our Registrar is working on a computer system to record our horses. There will be some kind of linkage to our main website, where at least the names of all registered model Morgans will be listed so people do not duplicate names. Of course, feel free to add your prefix to any name to ensure there is now duplication of names, a very simple solution. If you have a prefix you would like to record with AMMHA, simply send your desired prefix and your name to the Registrar ( bratcat5@charter.net )

Laura Hornick Behning, founder of this great Club reports that she still has original registrations from past years, so dating back 20 years. She will locate this information and pass it onto Delana so it can be updated and incorportated into the AMMHA registry.

There seems to be renewed interest in registering your model Morgans, and we couldn't be happier. It is alot of fun, and educational, to research bloodlines and family traits to make sure your registered model Morgan represents his heritage well. Even if you have a couple OF Morgans sitting about, think about creating an identity for them and then registering them. Our Club and Registry is only what we make it!

Website Gallery:
This area is still under construction. However, I want to ask everyone to start scanning and saving photos of their model Morgans so they can be added to the Gallery when we are ready to ask for submissions. Simply pick a couple of your personal favorites and when we open up for submissions just send us the jpgs. More on this later, when the Gallery is up and flowing smoothly.

Eventually I think it would be nice if there was a Gallery for all the seperate Morgan sculptures known to exsist. Whether OF plastic, china, resin or any other mass produced composition. This would be an definitive guide for those who have a collection of Morgan Horse sculpture and would be a great asset in educating people on what is out there. I know, speaking personally, I do not recall off the top of my head all the different Morgan sculptures out there. When this is underway we will make a call asking for submissions and additional information, such as edition size (if known), years produced, photos, etc.

Club Donations:
I have been asked if the Club will accept donations? Heavens yes! No matter what it is --- they can be used for Year End awards, National Awards, raffled, auctioned, etc. We are always in need of additional fundage. Also, if you have a skill that you can donate (such as newsletter editing, etc.) please let me know, we can use your help. So clean out that clutter and think about us --- your trash may very well be our treasure. I hope to have a list of donated items in the next couple months - both for sale and for future Club use.

I guess that wraps it up for now. Any questions, comments, ideas, concerns --- please feel free to email me at bainbridge@jackpine.com and I will be sure to pass them along. We are slowly but surely gathering steam and hopefully by 2008 we will have all our programs in full swing and an eager and active membership in place. Thank you and enjoy your Summer!

Thomas Bainbridge
bainbridge@jackpine.com
AMMHA President/Treasurer and 2007 Pointkeeper

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