Present – Hazel Fort (Chairman), Peter Firth, Bob Neate, Roger Mitchell, Alan Potter, John Sharp
The meeting took place via Zoom.
The Secretary apologised for the failure to produce and circulate an agenda but thanks to better organised members, an effective agenda was produced at the meeting.
Website Update
Alan reported that he had sufficient material for this. He has contacted Mike Parr and hopes that the first stages should be complete by the end of the month. He would welcome any examples of good practice from other websites.
Forum
The Christmas edition (Forum 14) had been particularly well received and editor and contributors were thanked.
John will send Forum 15 to Roger and Peter for checking. It is ready to go out, but will be delayed until Saturday so that a brief report on Friday’s lecture can be included. Material for future editions is available but new contributions will be welcomed. Roger is working with Mary Ormsby on a second article on the Scarisbrick Family.
Future Programme
Fri 15th January – The World of Lichens – Alan (Talk)
John will send an email reminder to members
For the meeting itself, Hazel will introduce Alan and, after his talk, invite questions.
The talk (and future ones) will be recorded so that it can be put on the website. Alan also hopes to put other material relating to the talk on the website.
Mon 25th January – 18th and 19th Century Travellers – Roger (Course)
This will be the first of 4 fortnightly meetings. Roger will send out to all members a handout containing documentary material and references to useful books and websites.
Friday 12th February – Montaigne – the first modern man? – John (Talk)
This will be advertised in Forum 15.
Friday 5th March and Friday 26th March
Peter volunteered to take responsibility for these two talk slots. On the 5th March, he intends to talk about source material for his planned course on England under the Norman Kings and on 26th March, there will be a follow-up to the Forum articles on Cardinals.
We continue to hope that we will be able to resume real meetings in April or May, but obviously this is far from certain and the online programme may need to continue for the first half of 2021.
Recruiting New Members
With a full programme, an updated website and free membership until September, we hope to attract new members. Existing members will be encouraged to find recruits and at the next committee meeting, we will discuss publicity. Advertisements in the Champion and via Liverpool University CE might be appropriate.
Finances
Bob reported few changes but HSBC require greater online security and documentation about this is circulating among signatories. It is currently with Hazel.She will send it to Roger who will post it to HSBC
AOB
It was agreed that the next committee meeting should be at 3.30pm on Friday 12th February after John’s talk on Montaigne.
Roger Mitchell
January 2021