December 1921
Business Meeting: The special subject for the evening will be the moving picture problem. Dr. Maxwell Ryder of Los Angeles, formerly lecturer on the Art of Speech, Dramatic Expression and Stagecraft at Oxford, England, will speak on the better film movement. Mrs. Anna V. Dorris of Thousand Oaks School will tell what is being done in the schools by the use of moving pictures, and her talk will be supplemented by some pictures presented by Mr. Edward Mayer of the University Department of Visual Instruction. Mr. Meyer plans to show “The Life of a Frog,” and “A Lesson on Toads.” [The phrases “moving picture problem” and “better film movement” refer to early efforts, starting about 1915, to impose moral standards on the emerging movie industry. It was a long process, culminating in the 1934 adoption of the Motion Picture Production Code. Also known as the Hays Code, it remained in effect until 1968 when it was replaced by the ratings system.]
Christmas Ceremonial: The Christmas Ceremonial was held at the Club rooms on the evening of the 19th, brought together more than two hundred members and their children, and delighted all present with the rich sentiment of the season and quiet satisfaction of a family gathering. Green boughs and mistletoe were used in decoration. An original play written by our member F. C. Piatt was performed by members of the club, in a manner so excellent as to win approval from the critical audience. The work was entitled “A Yuletide Canterbury Tale,” the setting being in the time of Chaucer, with three scenes: 1) The Tabard Inn, Southwark, a week before Christmas 1387, 2) Forest near the village of Bob-up-and-Down, the next day, 3) Home of the Franklins near Southwark, Christmas Eve 1387.
The Club wishes to congratulate Professor J. W. Gregg on his election as member of the American Society of Landscape Architects, the highest recognition within the gift of his profession; and Mr. Frank Morton Todd on the completion of his History of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition.
December 1946
Fireside Meeting: The program for this evening will be presented by the Committee on International Relations. Professor Bellquist will speak to us on “Our Foreign Policy.” Professor Bellquist has recently returned from three and one-half years service with the State Department at Washington, D. C. and is in a position to give us authoritative statements on this vital subject. [Eric Cyril Bellquist (1904-1979) received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Berkeley in 1932 and was first appointed instructor in 1936. He had a life-long interest in Sweden, the birthplace of his parents, and 1949-51 served as First Secretary of the US Embassy in Stockholm. During the anti-Japanese backlash following the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, he and his wife Imogene worked diligently to alleviate the suffering of uprooted Japanese-American citizens. Bellquist was awarded the Berkeley Citation in 1972, and an honorary doctorate from the University of Uppsala in 1973.]
Christmas Ceremonial: As always, the Hillside Club Christmas Ceremonial starts our Holiday celebrations with a bit of the true spirit of Christmas. This year the Committee will present a dramatization of Charles Dickens’s “Christmas Carol.” During the evening, the Boar’s Head will be brought in, according to Hillside Club tradition and there will be singing of carols by the Hillside Juniors. Club members are invited to come to the Club House on Sunday afternoon, December 15th, to assist in “Hanging the Greens.”
December 1971
Fireside Meeting: Mr. Ewald O. Schlachter, Oakland attorney, and an expert on the 3,000-year history of the Olympic Games, will be our Fireside speaker. Mr. Schlachter, a teenage refugee of World War II, was educated in Germany and worked as a farmer, miner, and journalist before coming to the United States. Through private study, he worked in drafting, engineering, and design, then took the La Salle University course, passed the bar examination and was admitted to the practice of law in California and has practiced in Oakland since 1965. His treatment of what might at first seem to be a dry, historical subject is spiced with humor, insight, and real knowledge of the Games, and his visual presentation of the highlights of this outstanding world event add to his listeners’ enjoyment. Even the women, who at first had little or no part in the Games, have managed to take a fair share of the recent history and comment. Final parts of his talk will deal with the upcoming 1972 Games at Sapporo, and at Munich. [The Winter Olympics in Sapporo opened two months later. They were the first Winter Olympics to be held outside of Europe or North America.]
December 1996
The Club’s archive of printed monthly newsletters ended with the May 1994 issue. If you know of a source for any newsletters between 1994 and the Club’s renaissance in the early 2000s, your historian would love to hear about it!
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