2019 Year in Review
Greetings Brothers,
Congratulations on another great year. We have achieved so much this year, and I am very proud to be part of such an amazing chapter.
Starting our new year at the 2018 Summer Ordeal, we were recognized as the Chapter of the Year. What an amazing achievement to recognize all our Chapter members’ hard work throughout the year. Though we had a very successful year in 2017-2018, we did not sit back on our accomplishments. This year, we have continued to make innovative changes to our chapter, improving the fellowship between our chapter Brothers, and providing extensive amounts of service to our district, lodge, and community. Throughout the year, we have continued to work on our unique Zoo Miami Campsite project, where we built a primitive campsite on Zoo Miami property. The campsite has permanent hammock camping poles, tent campsites, an area for campfires and movies, and a lakefront view. This year we have held 6 workdays at the zoo, completing the construction of all the campsites. This has been a major project for us, lasting over a year. It is amazing to see everything that has been done, and now it is time for enhancing the campsite.
At the Fall Ordeal, our chapter gladly helped cooked for the lodge alongside Pooca-Tooka, having picadillo as our dinner. In October, our chapter put together another great Haunted Forest display with the theme of Zoo-Ra-Con, being based on our zoo campsite project. In November, our chapter planned and staffed the Hurricane District Camporee, where we held a call-out ceremony, encouraging elected candidates to attend the upcoming Winter Ordeal. In December, we held our winter fellowship in place of our regular chapter meeting at Wall’s Old Fashioned Ice Cream, eating a total of four “Wall’s” or 128 scoops of ice cream. At the beginning of 2019, our chapter showed up strong to the Winter Ordeal, inducting 23 new Arrowmen, and having three brothers seal their ties.
The month of March has been more than a success for the Hnu-Ra-Con Chapter. Starting off our busy calendar on March 1-3, we sent two fellow Arrowmen, Tyler Sanford and our District Executive Aaron Gluck, to the Developing Youth Leaders Conference and the National Leadership Seminar where they learned leadership skills that will certainly help improve our chapter. Shortly after, we held our March chapter meeting, where we had special guest Ron Bell lead us in making American Indian beaded bracelets and chokers with a Hnu-Ra-Con Design. That next weekend was the Spring Ordeal. There we inducted six new members, five of them being our first youth female chapter members. This was truly a historic event for our chapter.
The weekend after, on March 16th, we held a Zoo Miami project workday, where we painted the building next to our campsite. This really did enhance the look of our campsite. Our next event was the largest lodge event of the year: The Lodge Banquet. Here one of our dedicated chapter brothers, Jonathan Wong, was awarded the coveted First Year Arrowman Award as well as earning the flap. What an amazing event!
Last month, we had our April chapter meeting, and the theme was “patches.” There we had our neighbor chapter, To-Hopki-Lagi, in attendance. At this meeting we gave out free patches to Brothers who did not yet have a collection and encouraged them to trade with other Arrowmen. Some Brothers even brought their own patch collection to show off.
Overall, I am very proud of what we have done this year as a chapter. We continued to grow, innovate, and show our chapter spirit at all Order of the Arrow events. It is an honor to be a part of such an amazing group of Arrowmen, surrounded by such a great bunch of advisers. We would not be this successful without the unending cheerful service of every Brother in our chapter. Thank you.
Yours in Brotherhood,
Carson Engelmann