By Lisa Hochgraf
CUES President/CEO Fred Johnson shows off the "CUES Managers Society" stein, featuring an early CUES logo.Perhaps it's fair to say that the staff at CUES is all a little nostalgic this year as we both celebrate CUES' 50th anniversary and prepare to say "happy retirement" this December to Fred Johnson, who's been president/CEO of this professional development association for nearly half of the organization's history.
It's probably also fair to say that--in our current state of nostalgia--we all rather enjoyed learning about a stein from a CUES conference in Montreal in 1970 that was being put up on ebay for sale. And we thought it was cool that our esteemed CEO bought it and brought it home.
Bill Tkacz found the stein in a thrift store in Vermont and posted it for sale on ebay. Tkacz and his wife, Belinda, run the ebay business b and b and 9kids fair trade.
"We were quite tickled that the stein returned to the original organization," Tkacz says. "We look for things to sell that are unique and nostalgic, and that might be something people will have a heartfelt connection to."
Notably, The Tkacz family now has 10 children (up one from the nine referenced in the business name), ranging in age from one to 11 years old. And, they do their financial business with Navy Federal Credit Union. "My wife is retired Navy and we get great service from them," Tkacz says.
Anyone else have a nostalgic CUES item? Please send me a picture of it at lisa@cues.org.
Lisa Hochgraf is a CUES editor.
CUES will be celebrating its 50th anniversary and Fred Johnson's retirement at CEO/Executive Team Network, Nov. 4-7 in Florida. It's not too late to register to be part of it!
