September 2007 Editor's Letter

Fifty Years of Communicating
by Steve Earle
As your new editor, I welcome you to the Houston Geological Society 2007-2008 season. Your officers and other volunteers are already hard at work insuring this will be another exciting year. This also marks the golden anniversary for the HGS Bulletin. Yes, we embark on Volume 50 starting with this issue and I am truly honored to facilitate the effort. I will talk about what I hope to achieve for the Bulletin and how you, the members, can help; but first, let’s talk about the HGS.
The Houston Geological Society is easily the largest local geological society in the United States. We are affiliated with the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, and I like to think that the two organizations work together to provide all geologists and geophysicists with the support they need to continually expand their professional spheres (a not so subtle plug for us and the AAPG).
The majority of our members are Active Members and I encourage you to become more involved your society. The recent election is an interesting case study. This year was the first time we offered electronic balloting for our members and it was clearly well received with a record 949 votes cast. That’s the good news. The bad news, this is only 26% of eligible members. This is representative of most our activities and I challenge you to do better.
The HGS hosts many different functions throughout the year. Perhaps the most significant are the lunch and dinner meetings. Some very interesting geology is discussed at these meetings and I guarantee, if you love geology, you will be stimulated. Plus the networking opportunities are phenomenal. Speaking of networking, our Shrimp Peel, Guest Night or one of the sporting tournaments are other venues to get out, mingle and have some fun. Additionally, we host a number of continuing education events. Try one or more of these this year. Be active, get involved.
For those of you who have hung in thus far, it’s time for my monthly "words of wisdom." This one seems appropriate as I begin my tenure here. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and leaky tire.
OK, back to the Bulletin. I hope you will find it lively and easy to read. I am in search of good technical articles or case studies and I encourage you to submit one. We also started a new "Recollections" column last year and this issue begins a "Rocks" column. This is where you can really help and have some fun at the same time. Both these are meant to be short stories that readers will find interesting, "Recollections" being an anecdote about your life in the patch, while "Rocks" tells the story of a significant rock. I wish to thank George Klein and Charles Sternbach for providing such fine articles to introduce the respective columns. Read and enjoy! And don’t forget to send us feedback; we enjoy hearing from you.