HISTORY 1986-1990 |
The first problem was to find a place to meet. The Western
Hills Inn in Euless offered Rick a room large enough for thirty
people for the paltry sum of fifty dollars a night, and a home
was established for the group. Rick placed a notice on Startext
indicating the group would have a formation meeting on October
1, 1986 at 7:00 PM, and handed out some fliers to local businesses.
On the night of October first, the Mid-Cities IBM-PC Users' Group was formed with a total of twelve people in attendance. They were:
| Rick Howell | Bob Kotyk |
| Jackson Fang | Tony Caliendo |
| Paul Harmon | Debbie Cavasos |
| Terry Koelsch | Maureen Gonska |
| Bruce Clevel | Steven Turner |
| Bill Smith | Bruce Baker |
The following is a copy of the letter that was handed to each person attending:
October 1, 1986
WELCOME to the founding members of the MID-CITIES IBM-PC USERS'
GROUP. Our next meeting will be Wednesday, November 5, at 7:00
P.M. here at the Western Hills Inn, unless otherwise notified.
Please bring a friend.
The purpose of this meeting is to assemble a group of people
who share a common interest in computing. It does not matter if
this interest is self-motivational or if it was motivated by a
boss who told you to learn all you can about computers, it is
nonetheless an interest, and we shall try to cultivate that interest.
We eventually plan to offer a monthly newsletter, public domain
software, a users'group online bulletin board, discounts on hardware
and software through local merchants, and monthly programs of
interest at the meetings. All these things will be possible if
YOU volunteer.
Meetings will consist of a business session, followed by the
monthly program. This may be a lecture, a discussion, or a demonstration
of new products or services. Following the program, the club will
split into special interest groups, headed by group chairmen.
Possible topics for SIG's are spreadsheets, database programs,
scientific and technical programming, investments, and even computer
games. Nothing is impossible.
I would like to thank each of you for attending tonight, and
ask that you fill out the attached questionnaire and return it
to me prior to our meeting. This will help to ensure that you
get what you want from the group, and may provide suggestions
for future programs. All questionnaires will be considered confidential
and not released to the public without your consent. If you have
any questions concerning the group between now and the next meeting,
feel free to call me at (817) 485-0302, preferably between 6:30
P.M. and 9:00 P.M.
Thanks and Happy Computing,
Rick Howell
The twelve members attending the first meeting selected Rick
Howell to act as President of the group, until such time as formal
elections could be held. Rick asked that Tony Caliendo be appointed
as Vice-President, and that Terry Koelsch assume the duties of
Secretary/Treasurer. All present were in agreement.
By December of 1986, a constitution had been drafted, and at
the meeting on January 7, 1987, the constitution was approved
by the membership. The Mid-Cities IBM PC Users' group was now
official. In February, elections were held to make official the
appointments that had been made earlier. The results of the elections
were as follows:
President.............Rick Howell
Vice President........Tony Caliendo
Secretary/Treasurer...Mildred Ingram
Bill Garland and Bruce Baker agreed to assume the responsibilities
of software librarians, and Steven Turner took over the newsletter.
Fred Cushman agreed to handle the public relations activities
of the group.
By March of 1987, Rick Howell had become tired of paying for
a place for the group to meet, and arrangements were made with
the Euless Public Library to use their meeting room at no charge.
It was also at this point in time that the Board of Directors
of the group decided we could no longer provide membership services
without charging a fee for membership. It was felt that we should
question the group to ascertain their feelings on paying dues.
A figure of $10.00 per year was agreed upon, and the members overwhelmingly
accepted the proposal.
By July of 1987, our membership had swelled to 73 members,
and we had three special interest groups going full-tilt. They
were the Database SIG, led by Bill Huston, the Beginner's SIG,
led by Gary Chambers, and the PC Jr. SIG, led by Bill Smith. Dan
Smith, SYSOP of What's Up, a local bulletin board system, offered
the group a dedicated area on his board, and we suddenly found
ourselves online. The Board of Directors proposed at the July
meeting that the fee for membership be increased from $10.00 to
$20.00 and the membership agreed. Dues were officially to go in
effect in August of 1987.
With such a healthy increase in membership, however, we soon
realized the library meeting room was inadequate for our needs.
So, in September of 1987, the MCIBMPCUG moved to it's new home
at the Northeast Campus of Tarrant County Junior College.
October of 1987 brought election time once again to the MCIBMPCUG,
and with the inalienable sense of logic all computer people are
born with, the incumbent officers were re-elected. So, for the
period of October, 1987 to October, 1988, our officers were:
President.............Rick Howell
Vice President........Tony Caliendo
Secretary/Treasurer...Mildred Ingram
The appointed officials included:
Newsletter.....................Steven Turner
Membership.....................Fred Cushman
The Mid-Cities IBM-PC Users' Group is hereby declaring war
on the person or persons responsible for the willfull origination
and propagation of computer "VIRUS" or "TROJAN
HORSE" programs. We hereby challenge all area user groups
and computer organizations to meet or beat our offer of $ 100.00
reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of
those people responsible for these programs. We will no longer
tolerate this wanton disregard for the right of computer owners
to have peace of mind and security in utilizing the vast quantities
of public domain software available.
Any person or group interested in meeting this challenge is
urged to contact Rick Howell, President, MCIBMPCUG, at 485-0302,
or on STARTEXT at MC 176063.
Fortunately, for our treasury, we had no takers on the reward.
In April of 1988, the newsletter editorship was assumed by
Hallie Broday and Mildred Ingram, and in June of 1988, Earl Drake
and Roland Barber assumed the duties of club librarians. With
Bill Huston's relocation to Arkansas, we lost both our database
SIG leader and our BBS. Dave Agarwal, one of our new members,
agreed to provide a space on his BBS, The Taj Mahal, for our members
to use at no cost. In September, we obtained priveleges for our
members on "Spare Parts", a BBS operated by another
of our members, Larry Mundy.
October of 1988 brought election time around again, and the
1988 election proved to have some interesting quirks. For the
first time, we were having a runoff election, with multiple candidates
for each position. For the office of President, the nominees were
Dave Agarwal and Steven Turner. For Vice-President, Roland Barber
and Pat Louthen, and for Secretary/Treasurer, Mildred Ingram,
Dave Agarwal, and Pat Louthen. The results were even stranger.
President...........Steven Turner
Vice-President......Dave Agarwal
Sec./Treasurer......Mildred Ingram
Larry Mundy assumed the duties of newsletter chairman.
January of 1989 brought about a lot of changes. Mildred Ingram
had to resign from her office as Secretary/Treasurer, and the
Board of Directors decided to separate that position into two
offices. Taking over the duties of Secretary was Ann Bartholomew,
and as Treasurer, Roland Barber. Four additions were approved
for the constitution, including one to change the name of the
group to Mid-Cities PC Users' Group, dropping the implication
of affiliation with Big Blue. The changes read as follows:
1.Mid-Cities IBM PC Users' Group may also be known as Mid-Cities
PC Users' Group.
2.Redefinition of the executive board as 4 elected officers
and 3 appointed members.
3.Defines a Quorum for a board meeting as 51% 4.Defines a vote
for each membership has one whole vote.
With these changes in effect, three board members had to be
appointed. Lloyd Ash, Harold Washburn, and Rick Howell were selected
as appointed board members. Steven Turner also assumed the responsibilities
of the database SIG vacated by Bill Huston.
In April of 1989, Dave Agarwal returned to India, and the club
was without a Vice-President, as well as having lost a BBS. Chuck
Long volunteered to assume the responsibilities as membership
chairman. In May, Bill Smith was selected to assume the office
of Vice-President for the remainder of the term.
Elections rolled around again in October with the following
results:
President...................Steven Turner
Vice-President..............Bill Smith
Secretary...................Ann Bartholomew
Treasurer...................Owen Clark
On October 16th, the MCPCUG-BBS was born. It was the first
BBS for the exclusive use of club members, and Rick Howell assumed
the duties of SYSOP (SYStem OPerator).
In January of 1990, Bill Smith announced he would no longer
be able to perform as Vice-President and resigned. Lloyd Ash was
chosen to replace him.
On February 11th, the Board of Directors approved formation
of a Hardware SIG with the intent of designing, researching and
building an 80386 or 80486 computer. An agreement was reached
with one of our members, Jim Butler, President of Chamberlain
Computer Systems, in which Jim would fund the procurement of all
parts necessary to build the system, with Jim retaining ownership
of the end result.
In June, Rick Howell built a computer for the BBS utilizing
donated and new parts, and the group reimbursed Rick for his expenses.
This represented the first purchase of hardware specifically for
the group, by the group.
The group also had another first in July of 1990, when we had
a picnic instead of our regular meeting. The picnic was held at
Bedford Boys' Ranch, and proved to be a very enjoyable event,
attended by a large portion of the membership, and some Russian
immigrants as well.
Steven Turner found a printer who needed a computer, and made
a deal to trade a computer and some software for printing services
for the newsletter.
October of 1990 brought election time again to MCPCUG, and
with Steven Turner reaching his two-term limit imposed by the
constitution, some changes were to be made in the group's leadership.
The elections had the following results:
President............Ann Bartholomew
Vice-President.......Jim Butler
Secretary............Norita McCullough
Treasurer............Owen Clark
Also, in October, an impromptu board meeting was held and the
Board of Directors voted to provide past presidents of the group
with a position on the Board of Directors.
Special Interest Groups and their leaders are:
Hardware.................Jim Butler
Desktop Publishing.......Chuck Long
XBase....................Steven Turner
Beginning DOS............Ann Bartholomew
Newsletter...............Jennifer Bates
BBS/Communications.......Rick Howell
Editor's Note: This group history was compiled by Rick Howell using old newsletters ( which are great ) and Rick's memory(which ain't so great). If you have any additions or corrections to this document, please contact Rick at 485-0302.
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