Sports Illustrated, August 22, 1960

On Jul 25, 9:15*am, Jim Beckman wrote:
At 14:32 24 July 2009, Vsoars wrote:



Check out my article.http://www.drive.subaru.com/CurrentIssue.htm

The magazine with this cover story was just received by 800,000
subscribers + internet traffic.

And a very nice article indeed. *Seems to me that Subaru is doing more to
promote soaring than the SSA does.

And remember- you are the SSA. Contact me if you would like to promote
the sport. It's our responsibility to take action on the local level.
as well as the national level. .

The last time we were visited by an SSA rep, we were talking about some
issue (I forget what it was, airspace restrictions or something like that)
and I asked if SSA was cooperating with AOPA. *The answer was basically no,
we aren't, we're going to do it our own way.This struck me as
astoundingly stupid. *There is strength in numbers, and the SSA just
doesn't have the numbers. *Cooperating with AOPA helps both of us, but
SSA doesn't like to do that sort of thing. *I'm sorry to say that the
Old Boy Network survives, and is pretty much in control of the SSA. *

The biggest thing I do to promote soaring is to schmooze folks standing
along the fence at the gliderport. *I'm surprised to notice how insular,
how downright unfriendly, most glider clubs are. *People standing around
are generally ignored while we go about our business of assembly,
pre-flight, and all the little bits of business we go through, and we give
the impression of being unapproachable. *My own club is as guilty of this
as any other. *When I first get interested, I was ignored for weeks before
somebody finally gave me a nudge to sort of force my way in. *I try to be
different now that I'm one of the oldtimers. *And if I do say it myself,
I've got a smooth line of BS to feed to the fence watchers.

Jim Beckman

I am glad you enjoyed the article in DRIVE magazine, sponsored by
Subaru. Larry Tuohino made the contact with the magazine and made the
cover story possible, One SSA member can accomplish great things -for
free. THere are many more opportunities for us to explore.

The SSA is working with the AOPA. Chris O'Callaghan, the editor of the
On-line AOPA publication, is on the Board of the SSA. This is a
tremendous opportunity for soaring.

The AOPA is an excellent organization. In addition to the SSA, it
really is worth the membership- cost. Since it has 4000,000 members,
it can produce tremendous publications and education tools we all can
use. You can read my articles on soaring in the Let's Go Flying
section. This section is open to the public. It has published several
of my articles including "Cheap Thrills? about the ridiculously low
cost of soaring. Bill Daniels has a blog on that same site on
soaring. THe APOA is working hard to include us. The SSA consist of a
small staff and a band of dedicated volunteers. We need more
volunteers. I hope many of you will get involved. Contact me if you
would like to volunteer.


I am sorry that your club isn't very friendly. You can change the
climate just by being the one to jump up and greet people and show
them around. It all starts with one person. Come to the Soaring Club
of Houston where we are ready to welcome everyone. We just topped the
170 mark. Our many instructors are eager to take the new students up.
In today's economy, soaring is the perfect spot for many pilots,