Red Knights International Firefighters Motorcycle Club Newsletter Summer 2016 Communications Committee Chairman: Thomas “TomTom” Delboi [email protected] Newsletter Editor: Stephanie Fowle [email protected] Region One Reporter: Mark Guliano [email protected] England/Europe Reporter: Steve Willimson [email protected] New Zealand Reporter: Adam Knezovic [email protected] Australia Reporter: J. Steve “Bull” Payne [email protected] What Region Are You? Region 1: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey and New York Region 2: Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario Region 3: Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Wisconsin Region 4: Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Dist. of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia Region 5: Alaska, Alberta, British Columbia, Idaho, Iowa, Manitoba, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Northwest Territory, Oregon, Saskatche- wan, South Dakota, Washington, Wyoming and Yukon Region 6: Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Utah Region 7: All European Chapters Cover: Patches found by searching the word “patch” on the Red Knights—All Chapters & MAL Facebook page and laid out completely at random and by spacing. Additional patches for filler pulled from Red Knights merchandise webpage. Office of the International President - 2015 End of Year Report An Amazing year 2015 has been. This year brought many great new things to the Red Knights. A convention that was hotter than ____. Thank You Texas for such a warm welcome. Next time please make it a little less warm! Your International Board has been hard at work over the last year as usual handling everyday business and new projects alike. We as officers have attended many local, state, provincial, regional and international events. In the fall I was able to attend the European rally and Association meeting in Switzerland. Thank you to all the hosts of all the events for providing such a great time for all to enjoy the fellowship of each other. This past year we did have many members who passed on and joined Heavens 1 chapter. If you did not know, the International Board sends a flag to the chapter and the International Chaplain sends an Angel coin. Whenever pos- sible, a Board member attends the services to help the chapter during the difficult times in any way. Many believe this is singularly one of the most important missions we take on. Shortly after Christmas I received a phone call to tell me that Dave Hamilton had passed away. Dave was the founding President of the Red Knights, helping forge the organization we enjoy today. It was truly a humbling experience to attend Dave’s services. To simply say Thank You Dave for all you did for the greatest firefighter motorcycle club in the world is not enough, but “Thank You”. With all the work on the history/anthology of the Red Knights now done, the only thing left is for it to go to print. For those that did not get a chance to purchase this or just wanted to see it first, keep an eye out at convention and on the Quartermasters page on the website for you chance to own the first and only professionally edited book about our great club. The information and pictures in the book were submitted 100% by you the members, over 3100 members called in to help out with the book. As a little teaser for you, the book contains about 40 pages on the his- tory, letters from current/past officers and some of the founding fathers as well. There will be over 400 pictures, most submitted directly from the members in addition to over 1,600 short articles from the members that called in. Dynamic Business Solutions out of California is now our web hosting company. They take care of all our website and email needs. The transition started midyear and the email accounts were moved over in August. If you have an RK event you would like to add, a small problem or navigational issue with the new site, please send an email detail- ing your event or concern to [email protected] while coping your regional director. We all owe a huge thanks to our previous Webmaster, Tommy (NC12) for the countless hours he has spent keeping our site running for the last year plus. Keeping up with and trying to decipher what we send him is a chore to say the least. Thanks Tommy! Over the last year plus Amanda “Smooches” Roun of New Jersey took on the daunting task of updating the Help-A- Knight roster. I am certain that she spent hundreds of hours verifying the roster because she first cross referenced the old HAK roster against the current membership removing names that were no longer with the Red Knights then she actually called each of us that made it past her first cull to double check that we were still interested in the pro- gram. If you want to sign up or you want more information about the HAK program, please reach out to helpak- [email protected] so we can get you in on the next quarterly update. Amanda also Helped Scarlett Mullikin of Illinois in taking the “all chapters and MAL Facebook page” to new heights. Thank you Scarlett and Amanda for all you do for our club and congratulations on your Outstanding Contribution Awards! Wear your new patches proudly. A special acknowledgement goes to past President Dave Emery for receiving the Perry Carter award. Congratula- tions on being named the Red Knight of the Year 2015. You are a mentor for us all. On behalf of the entire membership, I thank those behind the scenes at Boylston for all your work building and main- taining the one place that any Red Knight can go to reflect and remember those who have gone before us. You have brought an amazing place to all Red Knights. I would like to specifically thank each of the officers of the International Board, the International Committees and es- pecially those who left their positions in 2015. I can honestly say I have NEVER worked with a finer group of men. Congratulations to the new officers and committee members who started serving your sentence…. oops I meant term; you got some shoes to fill. Time to step up, the rest of the board looks forward to your expertise and life expe- rience to help us serve the membership. I am honored as I look forward to continuing my work for you. Chris Gadway International President Office of the International Vice President - 2015 End of Year Report Hello all, I cannot believe we are already headed into 2016! It seems like I was just in Texas celebrating the beauty of the Alamo with over 300 of my closest friends. What a wonderful convention that was for all that attended. I want to thank everyone for your support in electing me to serve y’all as your International Vice President. It is a great honor to represent this organization and I take great pride in trying to help bring the solutions needed to keep this family growing and prospering. I am now asking for everyone’s support as I try to fill the shoes of our outgoing International Secretary. Yes, I am running in Wisconsin to be our next International Secretary. I am looking forward to the challenge and the opportunity to make the office even more efficient productive. I have spent about 32 hours a week working on the wonderful MAL program that we have and trying to come up with some fresh and new ideas going forward. We have over 600 MAL’s at the current time and I have already started or completed processing many new and renewing members. I have really enjoyed watching the MAL program work to form new chapters and expand our Red Knight borders even further around the world. In 2015 I attended the Spring Board Meeting in Syracuse, the Dixie Rally in New Orleans, the International Conven- tion in Texas, and the fall Board Meeting in Baltimore. I have also been able to assist with a couple chapters getting started and met with quite a few chapters outside my own. I was able to make a trip to see our family in Australia where I met with most of the chapters in that country. They are growing so fast and have an amazing attitude toward what it really means to be a Red Knight. We will certainly be hearing from some of their members in leadership posi- tions soon. Well, that is about all I have this time. I would just like to remind everyone again that YOU, the members, run this or- ganization so keep the ideas coming. I love to see the involvement from all of you. Please take a good look at all the By-Law proposals for this convention. There are some big changes that can really affect our club. If you have any questions, please call and ask one of your board members! It is time to go as the sun is shining and I have a full tank of gas. As always, keep the shiny side up and your knees in the wind! Jack Jarvis International Vice President Office of the International Treasurer - 2015 End of Year Report (Part 1) Greetings Fellow Knights, The highlight of my latest quarterly report would be the trip to San Antonio for my first convention as your treasurer. We covered a lot of business in a few days and still had time to chat and ride with Red Knights from around the world.