Atons 2008 Banquet Bruch

[drewan]

I've just posted pictures from the Atons Officer's Banquet on Sunday. This is our annual event to celebrate another year of brotherhood, and to induct our new members, officers, and award our Friends of the Atons awards and Honorary Associates and Members.

Instead of doing our usual dinner event, we changed it up a bit by hosting the event as a brunch. This meant we were much earlier in the day and didn't conflict as badly with everyone's evening schedules. Plus, I love brunch food. We held the event at the relatively new bar, Pi, located in South East Minneapolis.


L-R: PJ Knight, Sergeant Major and jodi

Along with three "Friends of the Atons," we also awarded an Honorary Associate Membership to PJ Knight, one of the nearly-founding members of the Knights of Leather club.


L-R: Atons member Bobbie Smith with new Honorary Associate PJ Knight and Atons President Andrew Bertke.

We also awarded our newly created class of Honorary Member to Steve Lenius, who has really been one of the faces of the Minnesota leather community. He is the columnist for Lavender Magazine's Leather Life column, he was the Chief Instigator for 2007's Leather Leadership Conference here in Minneapolis, and he is just an all around wonderful man. We managed to completely surprise him with this honor, even though I was calling him asking for his shirt sizes and such, since the honorary membership comes with a vest with the honorary member patch pre-installed.


L-R: Steve Lenius receives new Honorary Member vest from Atons President Andrew Bertke

Following the inductions and awards we took several group photos, staring with the 2008 Officers.


L-R: 2008 Atons officers, Andrew Bertke, President; Sam Carlisle, Treasurer; John Warner, Secretary; Del Vogt, Vice-President.

And of course a shot of all of the members, associates, alumni, and friends who were at the banquet:


Atons members, associates, alumni and friends

And yes, that's our pledge, rick, in the front, wearing nearly nothing.