Library of Congress Bicentennial Celebration Presentation - Page 25
stamp commissions, and first federal duck stamp award in 1998. "It took me years to figure out that
the Feds don't like backgrounds," he admits.
There are now less than a handful of these revered Rats still competing, or near the center of things, and the great wonder of the P.F.D.A. is that while these ancients are now hampered by hearing aids, bifocals, stiff joints and diminished skills, there never was a lack of enthusiastic and responsible newer people moving into the important posts, and handling all the growing complexities with a sophistication and cheerfulness that not even the best and brightest of the old Rats could manage.
Most essential to the continuing success of the club (a blessing also bestowed on the sister club, the P.S.W.A., in southern California), has been an experienced cadre of volunteers, whose labors go back to an almost prehistoric Santa Rosa (or Santa Ana). These are the people you always look for as soon as you enter the show, in order to see if things are going to be all right. What is the most interesting phenomenon of all is that you see these people but once a year, often just long enough to say a few words, yet the bonds go back so many years that they amount to old friends.