Toe PATO; DU BrOINS| BU Lo LOE r EN 13 
increased gradually, then became nearly static at about 420 during 1952, 
1953, and 1954. A new upturn brought membership to 576 in June, 1956, and 
our present membership chairman, Mrs. Thure Waller, reports continued 
gains in the last year. In a state as populous as Illinois, and with a con- 
tinuing record of progress by the Society in its work, we can and should 
reach a membership total of 1,000 or more if each of us will tell and show 
others what I.A.S. is doing. 
BOARD OF DIRECTORS: With a membership such as ours, spread all over the 
state, it has long been deemed advisable that the business affairs of the So- 
ciety be placed in the hands of a board of directors. Nominations to the 
board are made at the annual meeting of the Society and election is by the 
members present. Each board member serves three years. The board at its 
June meeting elects officers to serve for the following year. 
The board was handicapped in the early post-war years by lack of a regu- 
lar meeting place. Meetings were held irregularly, usually at a restaurant 
or aS a preliminary to a meeting of some other ornithological or conserva- 
tion group. In May, 1949, the Society moved its headquarters to the Chicago 
Natural History Museum, where office space for regular board meetings was 
available. New bylaws were adopted in the fall of 1949, establishing among 
other things a schedule of 10 monthly meetings of the board of directors, 
excepting only July and August. The meetings average two hours in length, 
with reports from committees and discussion and action on the many prob- 
lems and projects of the Society. On some of these, the board calls on the 
members to support its decision with letters or telegrams to their congress- 
men, state legislators or public officials. We hope you will respond quickly 
to such requests. And as the board calls on you in an urgent matter, you as 
a member may call on the board for action you regard as a proper matter 
for I.A.S. consideration. The board welcomes your suggestions. 
OFFICERS: The bylaws revision in 1949 created three vice-presidencies in- 
stead of our previous one in addition to a president, secretary, and treasurer. 
Each vice-president was placed in charge of a committee, in order: finance, 
conservation, and education. A fourth vice-presidency in charge of extension 
work to encourage greater cooperation among affiliated nature groups 
throughout the state, was created in 1955, and the job of secretary was re- 
cently divided into two positions, corresponding secretary and recording 
secretary. 
MEETINGS: Prior to the annual meetings of the membership, annual teas 
were held in January of 1949, 1950, and 1951 in the Art Institute of Chica- 
go, with attendance of 64, 110, and 50 persons, respectively. The first field 
trip after the end of wartime gasoline rationing was held at Rockford on 
Sept. 18, 1949, with about 50 participating. A field trip to Allerton Park 
near Monticello in April, 1950, drew 80 persons. In November, 1951, 48 per- 
sons turned out for a field trip in Springfield, and 51 attended a field trip 
and meeting in the Moline area in April, 1953. The first of what we hope 
will be annual campouts was held Sept. 22-23, 1956, at New Salem State 
Park near Springfield, with about 60 members and friends present. 
Our first annual membership meeting since the war was May 17, 1952, in 
the Chicago Academy of Sciences, held jointly with the Inland Bird Banding 
