Dear Brothers,
Looking forward to our meeting on May 14, 2024 at 7 pm at St. Michael’s. Hope to see you there.
At our April meeting, we voted to donate $2,000 to St. Elizabeth’s Church. This money is earmarked for needy students (mostly refugees) who are attending Catholic Schools. We will let our Chaplain and St. Elizabeth’s Pastor, Fr. Jim Arsenault, determine how and whom to allocate these monies to.
We are also sending checks totaling $7,250 from our 2024 Raffle to St. Mary’s ($2,000), St. Michael’s ($2,000), St. Bridget’s ($1,250), St. Elizabeth’s ($1,000) and St. Patrick’s ($1,000).
I will have some AOH Bears (small stuffed bears) for sale at our meetings. $20 per bear. They’ll make nice gifts to children. We have 19 bears to sell. This is a fundraiser for the AOH State Board to recoup expenses from their last AOH State Convention.
We celebrated Major James H. Dooley on April 13 but proceeding into Maymont and laying flowers at his Mausoleum. Thanks to Mike Valacer for leading this and talking about Dooley. Also, we had someone from Maymont do a nice presentation on Dooley. Afterwards we retired to Rare Olde Times. We’ll look to have this in January in 2025 (our normal time frame). Maymont is doing some restoration on the Dooley Mansion that we might consider donating to.
We had 14 of us, mostly AOHers, on our Golf Trip to Mrytle Beach April 19-22. We had a great time.
On May 4th we were at the Montpelier Celtic Festival. We had a good time selling tickets and helping at the event. Thanks to Kevin Kitrick and Annie McEntee (LAOH) for helping in the kitchen prior to the start of the event. Also, Steve McGann for working the grill during the event. Thanks to Dan McLaughlin for setting up and taking down the AOH stuff, also Vince Eikmeier. Thanks to John Condon for selling tickets at the event. Also, Mike Smith and Peter George were there. There was a Bob McNulty sighting and his son signed up for our Division.
Good news on the Raffle Front. John Condon signed us up for Square. So, now we can sell tickets by credit card with a tap on the phone. This was tested out at the Montpelier Festival and went great. I believe it will lead to more ticket sales. Remember our goal is to sell as many tickets as we can so we can donate more money to charities. The tickets that we buy as members (10 tickets) waive our dues and help us fund our events throughout the year (beer, food, etc.). I would encourage everyone to buy and/or sell at least 20 raffle tickets this year (2025 raffle year). If John can sell 1,250 tickets, I should be able sell 20 tickets.
Please look at our Calendar of Events for the year (see in the newsletter) and see where you might be able to volunteer.
Hope you can attend our May and June meetings before our summer break. Remember, we don’t meet in July and August.
The Flying Squirrels season has kicked off. Looking forward to attending the game on June 8th with our group (see below), please let Tim know how many tickets you want. I’m also looking forward to the Silver Squirrels Group at every Tuesday home game with a number of us that attend.
See below for our upcoming events, please plan to attend if you can:
June 8, 2024, Saturday, at 6:35 pm; Richmond Flying Squirrels Baseball Game Outing (Family), The Diamond, 3001 N. Boulevard, Richmond, VA 23230 – (Tim McDonnell – Chair) (ph 804-678-9764; tmc1918@gmail.com – let Tim know how many tickets).
(TBC) 4th of July Picnic at Columbian Center (Family Event) with the KOC 4th Degree Assembly. Ashland Parade.
August 3, 2024, Saturday, from 12 to 7 pm – St. Elizabeth’s Jazz Festival, 2712 2nd Ave, Richmond, VA 23222. Work the Beer Tent.
In Friendship, Unity and Christian Charity,
Big Dan Caffrey
