MINUTES OF THE BARNES AREA HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION MEETING OF FEBRUARY 16, 2006
Members present: Dave Pease, Carol Pease, Kurt Kuhlman, George Martin, Bob Oberstar, Linda Oberstar, Nori Newago and Lu Peet.
Chairman Dave Pease called the meeting to order at 9:15am.
The secretary reported that the minutes were inadvertently left at home and that she would send them out to everyone either by regular mail or email. Motion (Carol Pease / Linda Oberstar) to dispense with the reading of the minutes. Call for discussion. Motion carried.
The Treasurer stated that she had not brought the report with her. She did say that $95.00 was deposited in the account and that as of today the balance in the checkbook was $20,572.29. This amount does not include the amount in our CD taken out in November. There was discussion on the CD situation. Linda said that the old CD was going to go on to our own tax id number now that we have one and that there would be no penalty for early withdrawal. She said that the bank would start the reissued CD from today’s date and that it would be for $10,500.00 and would mature in one year from today. There is still a question on this issue on the bank’s end. Linda will go to the bank today and get everything straightened out. She will also take out another CD for $10,000.00 that will be a one-year CD from today’s date. There was discussion on having the CD maturity dates staggered. This would be the preferable way to do it. Linda will see what the rate differences are and if the rates are close, she will try to get the new one at a different maturity date. There was discussion on having just Lu Peet and Linda Oberstar as signers for the CD’s as it would facilitate the process. Motion (Nori Newago / Carol Pease) to change the old CD to a one-year CD and to take out a new CD for $10,000.00 for either 9 months or a year depending on the interest rates. If the difference is too great it should be left as a one-year maturity date, otherwise it would be a nine-month maturity date. The signatures on the CD’s would remain as Linda Oberstar as Treasurer and Lu Peet as Secretary. Call for discussion. Motion carried.
There was discussion on the funding of the carbon dating of the elk. Linda Oberstar said that Quentin Ruprecht in his emails to her said that there have been donations for this project and he is sending them to Linda. Linda said she also had about $525.00 for this here. There should be no problem in getting the $1,400.00 down to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee for the carbon dating. Quentin felt that the money should come from the BAHA as a sign of support for this project. Motion (Dave Pease / Carol Pease) to have the BAHA sponsor, through donations, the $1,400.00 for the cost of carbon dating the elk to show our support of the project. Call for discussion. Motion carried. Linda Oberstar will send the money when she gets the other donations from Quentin.
There was a discussion on membership. This should be one of the BAHA’s top priorities. We need to get the word out on our organization. It will help when we have a more concrete plan for the museum. Linda Oberstar gave the Secretary the list of current members and their paid status. Lu Peet will update the membership roster and also send a notice to those members who have not yet paid their dues for 2006. Labels with the names of our current members have been given to the Pease’s to give to the Bayfield County Historical Society for its mailing purposes as requested.
Carol Pease spoke about visiting other museums to see how they are set up. She said that the museum in Grantsburg is open by appointment only in the winter months. This would be on a Tuesday. She felt that we should go as a group to see it. This should be delayed until the weather is more stable, possibly in April. There was discussion on how small many of the museums are and that ours would have to be larger than most of them. Carol also spoke on having tables at the flea markets that are held in summer as fund raisers. The AARP has one on July 8th and the VFW has one on July 15th. Donations are welcome and all proceeds would go to BAHA. The word should get out before hand on accepting donations for the flea markets. Carol said she would need help with the tables. Our name should be on the tables to show we are doing something. Kurt Kuhlman asked if there were any banners or other displays with our name on it. There was discussion on the Centennial banners and that many of them had been stolen. Lu Peet will look into getting a logo designed that could be used for this purpose
and also any letterheads, etc. She will work with Advanced Printing of Hayward on this. The logo should be fairly simplistic in design. There was discussion of having an "elk" on the logo as well. George Martin asked Dave Pease if his family still had the "elk" design from years ago. Martin felt that this would be a great idea if it could be found. Dave said he didn’t know if it was still in the family as he hasn’t seen it in many years. He will get back to BAHA on this for possible inclusion in the logo design. An oval design was the one most of the members present agreed on. There could be buttons made up with the logo on them for fund-raising also.
George Martin spoke on getting a replica of the "Melo Musky" for the museum. He said that he had been in contact with the owner of Dun Rovin’ to accomplish this. The original is at Dun Rovin’ in Hayward. There was discussion on who would do this kind of work. There are local firms that do this kind of taxidermy. Kurt Kuhlman said that he has connections to other people who have done replicas of other famous muskies. He will look into this for us also. George and Kurt will work on this issue. This would definitely be a plus for our museum.
Bob Oberstar did a presentation on the site for the museum. He showed an aerial photo of the Town of Barnes site that is a possible location for the museum. This map showed the land behind the town-owned land that is currently owned by Mosinee Paper Company. There was much discussion on this idea of securing the land from the paper company. It was decided to make the proposal to Mosinee of having the land donated to the BAHA as simply stated as possible. There is a delicate balance in all of this Nori said. If they accept the idea, fine. If not, we will work on another plan. Linda Oberstar will write a letter to the paper company with our request. This would ask that the land be donated to BAHA. It was noted that we need to work closely with the Town of Barnes on this whole issue. Dave Pease said that there are other properties held in the town’s name that could possibly be traded for the land if the Town has to get involved. There was discussion of the site on State Highway 27 and N. George showed a map of the proposed Land Use Plan that shows the area in that location as being the next area set to be developed commercially. Right now there is nothing there. There was discussion that the museum has to be near other areas where people gather. BAHA needs to have some sort of proposed layout of the site and this should be done for our next meeting. George and Bob will work on this plan for the next meeting.
Bob Oberstar said we need to consider handicap access when designing the museum. George said the building itself could be a 2-story building. There is much to think about for the actual building itself. Carol Pease spoke on the issue of how we will be able to afford the maintenance on the museum once it is built. The costs of heating, insurance, electricity and security could be higher that we could afford. Nori said that an endowment should be created for such expenses. People are more willing to donate to this kind of fund. Only the interest is used and the principle is not touched. There has to be a sizable amount in the endowment for this to succeed. There was discussion that BAHA should look at getting a web site.
There was discussion on other fund-raising activities. BAHA will definitely hold a raffle in February 2007. This would be held at the Barnes VFW Post and it would be held on the same day that was traditionally used by the Business Association for its Big Buck Picnic. They no longer hold this event, so we will have our raffle on that date. This would be Saturday February 3, 2007. The VFW has given its approval for us to hold our event there. There was discussion on getting a state issued raffle number and if we have to have one if we supply a meal with the ticket as the Big Bucks did. Lu Peet will look into this and will either apply for a number or whatever we need for this event. There was discussion on getting the tickets made up. Tickets would be$25.00 per ticket. There was discussion on how many tickets should be made up. (300 to 600). The next meeting will clarify this. One half of the total ticket money would go to prize money and the rest would go to BAHA. The ticket would include the meal like beef sandwiches, etc. This will need to be confirmed at the next meeting also. Lu Peet will look into the cost of having the tickets printed up at Advanced Printing of Hayward. Door prizes would also be solicited for drawings as additional money makers on that day. Lu Peet spoke on the note cards as a fund raiser. She had gotten prices from Advanced Printing. We can have up to four different black and white pictures on the cards. There was a question on the number of cards for the price quoted. Was this for 100 sets of four different cards or just a total of 100 cards? Lu will check on this. The price for this was given as $97.70 for the textured
ivory paper cards folded in half to 4.25" x 5.5" with our design on the back of the cards (like Ducks Unlimited has, etc.) and a blank interior and the matching unprinted envelopes at $8.71 for a total of $106.41. Plain white paper card printed up as the ivory ones are would be about $20.00 cheaper. The members liked the idea of the ivory textured paper better. If the price is OK, we will get the pictures to Advanced Printing so they can be made up. Kurt Kuhlman, the Peases, Quentin Ruprecht and others have some very good pictures. These pictures should be of structures or scenes and not contain photos of people it was noted.
Nori Newago discussed the changes in the BAHA By -Laws. Lu Peet said that she would get a copy of the revised version of these By-Laws out to each member for their review. If any changes are to be made to this new revision, the members should let us know so that it can be voted on at the next meeting in March. Lu will give the date, place and time of this meeting to each member. This meeting will be held at Downtown Barnes on Thursday March 16, 2006 at 9:00am.There was discussion on voting rights of members. Is it one vote per person or one vote per membership (family versus individual)? Nori will check on this for the next meeting.
Motion (Lu Peet / Linda Oberstar) to adjourn the meeting. Call for discussion. Motion carried.
Respectfully submitted,
Lu Peet
Barnes Area Historical Association Secretary
Dated this 17th day of February 2006