Note:  After the drafting of this letter, Jerry was pleased to announce that Bob Swander has added his name to the list of "backers."

ATO Newsletter #7

July 21, 2005

 “Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country!”

Hello Zeta Omicron Brothers,

 I have so many things to report to you, I do not know where to start.  So, I guess I will just jump in!  First, we have all kinds of people busting their butts to get the project of building the new house completed.  Let me give you a few profiles on what is happening.  Bob Murray is leading the way with on site professional management everyday.  Not too bad for a 67 year old brother!  He is checking and coordinating the work, providing all of the appropriate information to the various governmental agencies, approving all bill payments and acts as our liaison to the bank.  Larry Neidigh is our contractor and fraternity brother and is working arm and arm with Bob.  He is pouring his heart and soul into the project.  He has made many changes to the project that has enhanced the facility in many ways.  Recently, he added a kitchen and bathroom to the downstairs, a 28^th bedroom, which increases revenue, a study room, a centralized ventilation system for the entire house, and a data and communications system that is state of the art.  He even got Warren “Pinky” Engstrom down to help bury the HVAC ducts in the concrete floor of the downstairs so the floor is warm!  He is also busting his ass to get this done for the move in day!

    Adam Fischer is managing the moving into the house and establishing rules for the house that pertains to its general use, maintenance and upkeep.  John Custer is working on a plaque to commemorate 3 brothers who died in our countries service during the Vietnam era.  Also, in relation to that Steve “Crusher” Williams and Bob Baesler has taken on the very important job of developing the “Wall of Fame” in the formal lounge.  This will be unveiled on dedication day with many interesting displays and honors for those who have done so much!  Alan Tehan is building us a new Pen Light just like he did in the mid 60’s with the same dedication and talent.  You the best, Alan!

    Speaking of the formal lounge, a word about Bill Korn, who has helped us furnish the house.  Bill is a big time furniture magnate and has gotten us quality furniture at prices you would not believe!  Leather sofas, love seat, sectionals, ottomans, cocktail tables, end tables, sofa tables and lamps are all purchased for the upstairs formal lounge.  A place you would be proud to take your mother!  Downstairs a rec-room for the chapter with three sofas, two coffee tables, two floor lamps and a big screen TV for all of the brothers to hang out.  Finally, the rec-room will be a place for the active members who do not live in the house to gather and call their own area.  It will be a place to hang out between classes, a first for our chapter. Thank You Bill Korn!

    Of course, John Newton, John Purcell, Frank Volkers, Charlie Williams and Dennie McGuire are pushing hard to close out the fund raising campaign.  We are over $500 K in pledges now!  If you have not pledged please do so, if you have pledged please send us some money.  Cash flow will soon be a problem.

    Bill Volkers and Russ Ferrell are watching our money for us and working hard!  Tom Newlin has been our inside guy.  When we have a difficult problem we cannot solve, Tom gets the call.

    October 1^st is dedication day!  John Woelfle and Jon Stinson are planning the parties and the food.  Kevin Barr and David Haynes are planning the dedication program and David will be the program host.  Look for information coming soon from them concerning times, dates locations, cost and reservations.  Do not miss this one, particularly if you missed last year.  We are looking for 400 brothers and significant others just like last year.  Too much fun to pass up!

    Finally, we have to mention Brad Heiny, the current chapter president.  He has been instrumental in filling the house with actives, has attending board meetings and has done a tremendous job of coordination with the alumni.

 “Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their fraternity!”

 Corny?  Maybe?  However, there are several brothers in Terre Haute that has it all hung out for this project.  Life would be a lot easier and people could sleep a lot better if those of you who have not yet pledge to generously do so!  It is simple, just contact Bill Volkers @The Campaign for Zeta Omicron, P.O. Box 10523, Terre Haute, IN 47802.  His email is volkers7@gte.net.  We are making a significant difference to the landscape and perception of I.S.U. and it’s Greek system.

    See you this fall!

 VTL,

ATO Christmas Newsletter

December 22, 2004

 Merry Christmas Everyone!

 You have not heard from me for a while, but the ATO Elves have been busy.  I have a lot to report to you concerning where we stand with the new house and the fundraising campaign.  First, let me say that we are very close to the conclusion of the sale of the old house.  We are vacating the premises on December 31^st.  The active chapter has been busy emptying the house of all its contents.  All of the valuable items such as trophies, insignias and the “Caribou” have been removed and taken to brother “Weefs” house.  It has taken two 30-yard dumpsters to remove the trash from the house.  I think we found a pair of “Mendenhall’s” underwear in the basement.  There are telltale signs that lead us to this conclusion! 

 We have reached an purchase agreement with Mrs. Colleen Chestnut, who is purchasing the house, and is going to restore it to its original prominence.  It will be a part of the Farrington Grove historical community.  Appraisals and inspections have been completed.  The closing on the house will be conducted on approximately January 7^th by Tom Newlin and myself closing forever the first chapter in our history.  Dennie McGuire is going to remove the asphalt strip that the evil “Tekes” took from us in the late 60’s and remove the asphalt in the back of the house for Mrs. Chestnut.

 Dennie is going to start removing the trees and preparing the new building site between Christmas and New Years.  Larry Neideigh has been busy with our architect and has completed the final plans.  The plans have been reviewed by the appropriate Indiana State Office and have been approved.  In addition, he has taken the state release number and has applied for the appropriate building permits in Terre Haute.  He has also submitted the drainage plan.  He plans to start work right after New Year’s.  Finally the active chapter and the campus will have something to look at!  Eat your heart out other Greeks!

 We have had several people step forward with significant contributions to the fundraiser.  We have raised an additional $160,000.00 since the party in September.  The committee has been working tirelessly for almost two years now on this project.  There will be a major telephoning effort in January and February to try and finish off this campaign.  Please help put this committee out of their misery.  They are getting tired!  If you have made a verbal pledge to the committee, please forward you pledge card and your initial payment.  If you haven’t pledged yet, please do so.  Be giving and receptive to these volunteers.  They are your brother’s!  We still need $70,000.00 minimum and anything that we can get over that will enhance the house and lower fees for the active members.  It will be the premier house on campus in the absolute best location. 

Information will be forthcoming in the next couple of months concerning the dedication of the new home of Zeta Omicron.

 Best Wishes and VTL,

 Grayski

 P.S.  I am going to be a grandfather!

ATO Newsletter

 The reservations for the “Once Before We Are Dead” Party are rolling in to my home.  Please do not wait until the last minute to make your reservation.  The number of attendees will directly determine the size of the tents and the number of tables and chairs that will be needed.  John “Big Weef” Woelfle has a big job in setting this party up, so let’s give him all of the help that we can.  Those of you who are attending take a minute and think of any memorabilia that you might like to bring.  Pledge books, pictures etc. are just some of the items.  Also, remember to wear your “pin”.  Maps to “Woelfle Park” will be made available.

 So far in percentages of attendees, the founder’s are leading the way in attendance.  Seems like we should have some kind of award for the highest percentage of attendees for any given year or pledge class, active body excluded.  So far, the furthest attendee is from California.  Hey “Hump”, where are you!  You need to grab Woody too! 

If anyone has lost his registration form, I should be able to send it to you via email.  Just let me know.

 Some have asked the question of what would it cost if I just came for Saturday night.  Is the price of the party still $75.00?  The answer is yes for the following reasons.  First of all, I am not a professional at doing this and I am trying to keep my life as simple as possible, particularly since my daughter is getting married the week before.  I want to make sure that this party doesn’t accidentally cost “Weef” and myself money by not predicting the price correctly.  It also makes the accounting easier.  Secondly, about $60.00 of the cost is for the main party on Saturday night.  The tents, tables, chairs, decorations, mailings, catered food, bars and all preparations come out of this dollar figure.  So, please consider the other $15.00 a donation to “Old Alpha”. 

The architect has informed has provided some information concerning the construction schedule of the new ATO House.  The plans and specifications have been sent out to prospective bidders this week and bids will be received on September 1^st.  It sounds like they are on their way!

 Life is good!

 Grayski

ATO Newsletter

 I have some very exciting news about the construction of the new ATO house.  Since the party in late September the campaign to raise money for the new house has been extremely successful.  David Haynes conducted a phone-a-thon on October 7^th and we received a pledge rate of over 90% from those brothers whom we were able to contact.  The average gift is still $3,000.00 over five years.  At this point we have commitments from about 150 brothers that have pushed the campaign to over $400,000.00.  This represents only about one sixth of our alumni.  This is very good news because we still have 750 brothers to talk too!

 The ZO Housing Corporation and the Fundraising Committee agreed that this now puts us in the safe zone for starting construction of the new house.  Larry Neidigh, a ZO brother from the early 60’s and an experienced contractor, was given authorization to begin the construction process as soon as possible.  He will begin quickly to get the foundation work completed before winter.  This is necessary in order to have the house ready for next fall. 

 The $400,000.00 allows us to only build a bare bones structure.  We are still $150,000.00 short of our minimum goal in order to provide the house with additional amenities and another $50,000.00 away from putting us into a completely secure financial position.  During the next few weeks as the fundraising committee and it’s approximately 60 volunteers pound away to achieve these final goals, please prepare your self to participate with the rest of us.  If you cannot give in the $3,000.00 range, consider what you can give.  It is only important that your name be on the list of givers.  Remember a pledge of $500.00 over five years is only two golf games less a year, taking your wife or girlfriend out to a nice dinner per year or purchasing a pair of pants and a cheap sweater.  Please help us all in this group effort!

 John Purcell is struggling with getting the pictures out to you of the “Once Before We Are Dead”, Party!  Technical difficulties abound, but he is working on it!

 VTL,

Grayski

ATO Newsletter

 Last Friday was certainly a strange day for me.  I, like most of you had virtually no contact with Zeta Omicron over the past twenty-five years.  In fact, I had not seen Indiana State University since the mid 80’s and had no idea of the many improvements to the campus.  So, sitting in the offices of a title company last Friday afternoon with Russ Ferrell and Bill Volkers to put my signature on the closing sale and last chapter of 1304 S. 6^th St. seemed almost surreal.  Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that I would in my lifetime be placed in the position to perform this act.  Certainly not looking back on the spring of 1967 when I was a pledge, or the 70’s when Sally and I were creating a family, or the 80’s when I was building my business and career, or the 90’s when my life was maturing and my children were leaving or now as I am looking towards retirement and the closing chapters of my own 1304. 

When you get to this stage of your life your values change.  You do not look at money in the same way, you do not have the same drive to build your career and resume’ and you do not have the overwhelming since of responsibility that you once had when you were nurturing and taking care of your children.  So, where do your thoughts go and where are your values now?  As I sat in that title company signing those papers, I realized that friendships that we had created were our greatest treasures.  John Purcell and I have wondered many times driving back and forth to Terre Haute for the ATO meetings, why in the world are we doing this?  Certainly there are better things that we should be working on like Tsunami victims or children’s hospitals.  Well, it is almost unexplainable in direct or concrete terms.  It can only be explained in thoughts and memories!

 Sitting there last Friday afternoon and on the drive back to Indy, a lot of those memories came back to me.   I remember riding in the car, being one of the pall bearers for Steve Czomak’s funeral, and looking our of the back window and seeing a line of cars following the hearse as far as the eye could see on that cold wintry day.  I remember getting Jack Volkers as my pledge father and watching him fall off of the top of the garage during the pledge class take over of the house.  It was a true war!  I remember the pounding beat of the Spencer Davis band singing “Gimme, Gimme Some Lovin” while we all danced ourselves into a sweaty heap at the Plumbers and Steamfitters Hall.  I remembered make out parties at Marty Aimones farm.  I also remembered the frailties and humanness of all of our personalities in our youth.  Those who were insecure, those who were poor, the “Phantom”, Gordes passing out in a pledge class lineup and I remember drinking beer with Mendenhall in the “Four Wheel Tavern” as I drove down I-70.  I remember how mature I thought Paul Humphrey was in my pledge class and how old I thought John Custer was!  I remember going to every home basketball game and taking every campus contest whether it was Campus Review or building the float as an all out assault on defending our ATO honor.

 So, now I have sold the old house.  I was there last Monday to check out the empty house and it looked very, very tired.  It was telling me that it too was ready to retire!  I have put others and myself completely in harms way.  We have an active chapter floating out there in the cosmos wondering whether they will have a place to live next year.  I am not concerned, because this will be another good memory to pile on the top of others.  I know this because of what I have experienced in the past year.  Tom Newlin and Bob Baesler have so completely covered my back on so many issues.  It was easy to see why we are such good friends.  Seeing old friends in September like Copper, O’Kane, Simms, Lada, Wooden, Pelle, Scott, Beaver, Bonacorsi, Newton, Williams, York and both Woelfles and many more and realizing that we are still just as good of friends as we have always been.  And lastly, finding the new friendships in generations past mine with people like Dennie McGuire, Chad Lasure, Andy Hadley, Will Lacey, Adam Fischer, and Brad Heiny and realizing that these younger people would have fit easily into our circles of friendship in our day!  So, 1304 S. 6^th St. is gone, but I am not afraid.  Fear left me along time ago!  It is on to building those memories for the young people who are coming after we are gone.  I do not know how exactly the new house it will come to a completion.  However, we will all dance and sing at the dedication next fall and let the new memories start.  

Rah, Rah, Rega!

 Grayski

 P.S. Thanks for allowing me to let the sap run off of this page and Tom Clark, yes I am ready to springboard dive again if you are ready to run 5 miles in a cross country event!

March 20, 2005

 Hello ZO Brothers, 

A lot has happened since the last newsletter that I sent out!  Let me try to catch you up on where we are.  Construction has begun on the house by Larry Neideigh.  The basement has been dug, poured and backfilled.  My good friend John Purcell will soon post pictures on the Internet.  Bob Murray is acting as the onsite coordinator and inspector on the project.  He is invaluable to this process with his extensive knowledge of construction procedures that he gained in his position at Indiana State University.  Money cannot buy this kind of help and expertise.  Several minor design changes have already been made to the new house.  An additional six living units have been added to the basement, which now makes capacity for the house at 27 brothers.  The active chapter has been doing their job and has signed up 21 people already to live in the house for next year.  Do not worry; it will be full by August, setting the project of on good financial footing right from the beginning.   

The basement walls were poured with a brick mold on the inside giving the appearance of brick walls in the basement.  It adds to the aesthetic appearance as well as the acoustical qualities of the house.  The chapter room downstairs is quite large and will easily handle large parties and fraternity functions.  A direct outside access door was added so that the chapter will better be able to control who attends fraternity parties and functions.  Since this door was added, we were able to eliminate the second stairwell to the basement.  This allowed us to add more storage and to provide the utility leads necessary for a serving buffet / kitchen for the chapter room.  This kitchen will allow for the ability to better cater special events.  In addition a special ventilating system has been added to the house to better exhaust all of the bathrooms (thank God) and the chapter / party room.  It will make the environment in the basement much better when you have a lot of people down there.

 I have had success in coaxing Alan Tehan to build us a new pin light for the house.  He and Dick Geyer built the last one and it lasted for almost 40 years.  He tells me that he is going after Dick as his able assistant once again.  This is the true meaning of Deja Vu.  We are in Alan and Dick’s debt. 

Yesterday I met with our bank, First Financial Bank, in Terre Haute and signed the mortgage papers for $900,000.00.  This act officially put us past the point of no return.

We owe Tom Newlin and Bob Murray a debt of gratitude for making this possible.  I am putting the entire chapter on notice that commencing on Sunday evening, April 10^th, we will start with a “full court press” telephone campaign to finish off our fundraiser.  We have until August to complete this work.  Those of you on the fundraising team get prepared for that night.  Those of you, who are not, get ready to give.  John Purcell and I will have this all ironed out who is going to call who by April 4^th and ready to distribute to you.  Those who have already pledged be prepared to make you second year payment.  We will be asking all on you who can to bring as much of your pledge forward as possible to help us meet our demands by August.  We need an additional 100 people giving $200.00 per year for five years.  Do the math!

Keep your eye on October 1^st.  That is when we are planning the dedication of the house and a party to rival last years!  John Stinson and “Big Weef” are heading up that effort.

More soon!

VTL,

Grayski

MOVING IN SATURDAY!

730 North Sixth Street

                         A quick update on the new house: 

                        (1)  Construction.  If you have seen the new house, you know what a quality piece of construction it is.  If you haven't, check out the website photos - at http://www.zoalum.org (then click on the "New House" box in the top row, then the red "view pictures" link on that page).  It's a first-rate building in a first-rate location.  The primary credit goes to charter member Larry Neidigh and his construction company; charter member Bob Murray, the volunteer construction superintendent; and "epicenter"-guy Jerry Gray, the House Corporation president (and part-time interior designer).  There probably is no such thing as fraternity-proof construction, but this is pretty damn close.  You might want to hang out there during the next nuclear attack. 

                        (2)  Financing.  Yesterday, the bank team - Russ Ferrell, Jerry Gray, Bob Murray, Larry Neidigh, and Tom Newlin - met with Terre Haute First and worked out the final details on financing.  They also took some of the Bank representatives through the house and impressed them with the quality of their collateral.  The Bank - already committed to lending us $850,000 in a long-term mortgage - agreed to lend us gap financing on a short-term basis (over the expected pledge payment period) on very reasonable terms.  It is clear that we owe a special thank-you to Bob Murray and Tom Newlin, who have let us ride on the credibility that they have built up over decades of doing real estate financing transactions with Terre Haute First.  They and our other Terre Haute brethren clearly have a lot of respect at the Bank, and it has made all the difference for the financing of this project. 

                        (3)  Move-In.  We have 26 guys now signed up with house contracts, and we expect the other two spots to fill up in the near future.  (The house was designed to hold 27, but we found a last-minute way to fit in a 28th.)  The guys move in officially on Saturday (August 20th), and it looks like the rooms will be ready.  Some of the common areas (like the formal lounge) will still be in play for a while, but we expect them to be done by the dedication weekend. 

                        (4)  Fundraising.  The campaign has hit the $500,000 mark with official, signed pledges, but we need another $100,000 to make the project work financially.  John Newton and several other guys are working the prospect lists.  We have 160 pledges, with an average pledge of $3,000.  Please take a look at the following chart, which compares our results to date with what the fundraising consultants told us was typical.  Figure out where you should be, and if you're not there yet, please make - or increase - your pledge.  Several guys have already increased their original pledges - one by $20,000 - to help us get there.  If you need a pledge card, email me at john.purcell@bakerd.com.