The meeting was called to order at 8:40 a.m. Saturday, April 17, 2004, by President Dale, K3CN, who then led us in the Pledge of Allegiance with 34 people attending. Dale reminded the club that the next regular meeting would be held at the Leesburg Safety Center since the Lutheran Church was being used for another event.

Carol, KF4TJJ, reported for our Treasurer, Gary, NC4S, who was out of town that the treasury had $3,072.62; the Treasurer's report was approved as presented.

An abbreviated version of the March minutes were read by John, W4AU, and were approved.

Dale reported that a tragic fire in Lovettsville last week destroyed the house and contents of the family of Jacob and Dominic Mason, two young members of LARG. Dale asked for donations from club members to purchase new ham radio equipment for Jacob and Dominic, and a committee consisting of Randy, K4SLY, Don, K8DSJ, and Karl, KI4BDS, was appointed to oversee the donations and purchase of equipment.

Xerxes, KI4CTW, a Boy Scout Scoutmaster in western Loudoun County, asked the club to join with other amateur radio clubs in the region to make amateur radio one of the featured attractions at the annual Camporee to be held in western Loudoun in the spring of 2005. A motion was made, seconded, and approved that the club participate in this event.

Tom, NA4MA, Field Day this year, described the location for this event at Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve. It appears as if this site has all the prerequisites for an excellent Field Day. The preserve is only open to the public the third weekend of every month, but will be available for the club and the public on a special basis for the weekend of Field Day. Tom said that we would try to set up enough stations to operate as 5A. Charlie, K4LJH, Ray, K4AJA, Chester WA9LAZ, and Allon, KF4FYL, volunteered to serve as the food committee. Interested LARG members visited the site after the meeting.

Dick, W2YE, gave a very interesting and well-received talk on the QSLing in general and on the detailed operations of a official ARRL stateside QSL bureau. Dick had many good tips for maximizing the return rate and minimizing the cost of obtaining those badly needed QSL's for various awards. It was apparent that a lot of hard work and coordination are required to keep a QSL bureau functions smoothly.

John, W4AU, reported the preliminary results from LARG for the Virginia QSO Party. We received 27 logs from 22 club members for a total of 480,709 points. Other club members have submitted their scores independently to SPARC.

Tom, WB3AKD, our ARES representative for Loudoun County, reported on the preparations for the emergency drill to be held at Dulles Airport on May 8. Tom described the assignments and roles of LARG and some of the other participating radio clubs in this drill. The drill will probably involve the entire day, starting early in the morning.

A video of the Dulles drill that was held in 2000 was shown and a mini-hamfest was held after the adjournment of the meeting.

The meeting was adjourned at 10:30

John Unger - W4AU, Secretary

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