News and Notices

July 7, 2015

This year’s scholarship winners have been chosen. You can get read about them on our Scholarship Page. Congratulations to them, and to all our applicants for some fine essays. It was a close competition.


March 8, 2015

Applications for scholarship for the 2015-2016 academic year are now available. You can get more information on our Scholarship Page.

Also, The Red Cross is offering scholarships for leaders in another cause dear to our hearts, blood drives.


March 28, 2014

If you’ve seen our February newsletter, you know that a past president of The Heinlein Society, David Silver, passed away on February 4th. We have information on his memorial service.

The service will be Monday, April 21, 2014 at the Los Angeles National Cemetery, 950 S. Sepulveda Blvd. LA 90049 (just north of Wilshire) at 11:30 a.m. in the Chapel.

Following the service there will be a Celebration of Life at Cathy McCabe’s, 2309 26th St., Santa Monica, 90405 (maps with directions will be provided at the Chapel).

The burial is for immediate family only. Please no flowers.

Please direct any questions to


August 19, 2012

Our by-laws, adopted by the Board of Directors in 2002, and as amended, require that the board conduct an annual general membership meeting each year during the time and at the place of the annual World Science Fiction convention, when held in North America, and when not at a place in North America, at whatever place it shall determine.

Family Meeting of 2012This is written notice of that meeting, as required in our by-laws, to each member entitled or likely to be entitled to vote at the meeting. You will be entitled to vote only if you are registered as a regular member and only if your dues are fully paid up through the current year of 2012 at the time of the meeting. An opportunity to make dues current will be afforded members prior to and at the beginning of the meeting. Supporting members are not entitled to vote, but, subject to ruling of the chair, may address the meeting.

This year’s meeting will be our Society’s eleventh annual general meeting. The meeting will be held during Chicon 7, in Chicago, Illinois, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, Sunday, September 2, 2012 from 4:30-6:00 p.m. Visitors are encouraged to attend.

The regular order of business specified in the by-laws to be observed is that customary for non-profit membership charitable corporations and will include election of three directors of The Society for three positions on the Board for a term of three years, as specified in the bylaws. Further business consistent with the by-laws will occur at the meeting.

You may vote at the meeting in person, or by an assigned written proxy, if you are eligible to vote at the time of the meeting. All proxies must be written, signed, and notarized, or accompanied by a clear and legible photocopy of a government-issued photo identification containing a signature for comparison purposes, to be valid.

Further, the proxy must designate in writing the person to exercise the proxy; and must be received by the Secretary of the Society by postal mail or in person at or before the time of the meeting. If you mail your proxy to the Society’s postal address in Long Beach, California, please note that an officer of the Society will finally check that post office box address on the evening of August 23, 2012, and it is solely your responsibility to ensure it arrives by that time. You may designate any natural person to attend the meeting and vote your proxy. The by-laws specify that failure of a non-attending member to designate a proxy shall constitute designation of the president as the holder of the proxy of the member not in attendance.

We all hope as many of the Society’s members as possible do attend the meeting.

The Heinlein Society


January 2012 Heinlein Society President Mike Sheffield’s updates::

Our trip to Renovation (the 69th World Science Fiction convention in Reno, NV) was a tremendous success. We were well received there, and signed up 10 new members during the course of the convention, and a number of others have become members since after discovering us there. We had a lot of interesting discussions with Heinlein fans who stopped by the table. On the first day of the convention a fan named Rich Wood stopped by the table, sporting a most interesting tattoo. TANSTAAFL. Definitely a great conversation starter. A fan by the name of Bruce Lee came by on the third day of the convention and donated half a dozen Heinlein paperback books, all signed by Heinlein at various convention blood drives where Bruce had given blood. Paying It Forward, then and now.

The art work display was also very popular. As I mentioned in our last newsletter, we have three paintings that were formerly owned by the Robert and Ginny: a Chesley Bonestell moonscape, a portrait of Nichelle Nichols as Uhura by Kelly Freas, and the original interior art for “The Green Hills of Earth” by Fred Ludekens, which was published in The Saturday Evening Post. Many people at the convention expressed their appreciation at being able to see these paintings in person. We plan to show them at future conventions, while continuing to look for a more permanent venue for them.

Friday afternoon we had our annual membership meeting. You can read more about that in Keith Kato’s report on the convention in the newsletter.

On Friday night of con, we hosted our first ever open party at a Worldcon, which was well attended and very well received. We had intended to close down at midnight, but things were so lively that we didn’t start shooing people out until one. A number of people who stopped by the table during the remainder of the con made a point of telling us how much they enjoyed the party.

In other news, the Society will be offering two $1,000 scholarships for the 2012-2013 academic year, criteria for application to be announced shortly. We hope to be able to offer more an larger scholarships in the coming years as the Society grows. We are also offering a $500 prize for the best Heinlein paper presented at the PCA/ACA (Pop Culture Association/American Culture Association) conference next April in Boston.

Finally, we note with sadness the passing, in early October, of a long time member of the Society, Stephen Charles Jordan. Mr. Jordan was one of our earliest members, having joined the Society in July of 2001. He will be missed. We have been notified by the attorney handling his estate that Mr. Jordan honored us in his will, along with the Boy Scouts of America and the National Rifle Association. I think Heinlein would have approved of his choices.


 

July 2011, Heinlein Society President Mike Sheffield’s updates:
One thousand “I Grok Heinlein” ribbons have been ordered to give away at Renovation. Stop by The Heinlein Society fan table to pick up yours. We also have more of our “Pay It Forward” ribbons for Society members and volunteers.

There are enough donors signed up for the blood drive to go ahead, but we’d still like more. See information the Blood Drives page for how you can make your donation pledge. We’ll have copies of Bill Patterson’s “A Martian Named Smith” to give away as donor incentives, and probably some other Heinlein books, as well.

In the Renovation Art Show, we’ll be displaying three rare paintings the Heinleins owned, along with copies of the publications in which they originally appeared: March 4, 1946 Life magazine (A moonscape by Chesley Bonestell); February 8, 1947 Saturday Evening Post (“Green Hills of Earth” by Fred Ludekens); Program Book from the January, 1976 New York Star Trek Convention (“Uhura” by Kelly Freas).

Uhura painting

Uhura by Kelly Freas on the wall of Heinlein’s Bonny Doon home

February 2011, Heinlein Society President Mike Sheffield’s updates::

February 20, 2011— In recent years our membership has waned, and we will be focusing a great deal on increasing membership outreach and growth. We will be looking for volunteers to help pay it forward by helping to recruit new members. If you haven’t paid your 2010 dues yet, please do!

As part of the process of appraising several paintings which were donated to the Society after Ginny’s death, we have uncovered an interesting history of each. A portrait of Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhura, which was part of a set of seven “Officers of the Bridge”, painted by Kelly Freas was also once displayed in the Smithsonian Institute as part of a Star Trek exhibit. “The Green Hills of Earth”, by Fred Ludekens, was painted to accompany the publication of that story in The Saturday Evening Post in 1947. And a moonscape, painted by Chesley Bonestell, was part of a group of eleven which were published in the March 4, 1946 edition of Life Magazine as part of an article titled “A Trip to the Moon by Rocket”.

July 2010, The Heinlein Society announces:

July 26, 2010— The Heinlein Society announced today that Robert A. Heinlein Blood Drive Chair, Mike Sheffield, has been elected President/Chairman of the Society, replacing former president David M. Silver effective immediately. “The Board voted David our thanks for his long service, and I am honored that they have chosen me to succeed him to lead the Society forward,” said the new president.

In explaining why the choice for Mr. Silver’s successor fell to Mr. Sheffield, fellow board member Keith Kato reported, “Mike immediately seemed like the obvious choice. Everyone inside and outside the Society respects his long service, and the leadership and community-building he has exhibited over the years in leading a great group of volunteers to collecting over 7,400 pints of blood as part of the Robert A. Heinlein Memorial Blood Drive.” Added Mr. Kato, “Of course, any time you have a transition to new leadership, it creates the opportunity to re-examine your priorities and make adjustments in the way you operate going forward — I think you’ll see more of that from The Heinlein Society in the months ahead.”

Mike Sheffield, 50, works in the aerospace industry, and has been involved in every Worldcon blood drive since 2000, leading THS blood drive committee since 2001. Mr. Sheffield has served on the board of directors since June, 2006.