What a great September meeting we had! If you didn’t attend, you missed an excellent pro-gram featuring Dr. Jack Bergstresser and Anthony Bingham. Dr. Jack and Anthony told the story of how iron making brought them together. Dr. Jack has spent his career in Industrial Archaeology and focused heavily on Alabama iron making in the 1800’s. Mr. Bingham, as an artist, has studied and become entrenched in African and African-American metal working history. Together they walked us through a recent dig at Tannehill Iron works. In addition tothe fantastic presentation, the social hour and meal time were once again excellent. Thank you, Tommy Horton, for making sure the first Wynfrey Hotel meeting went smoothly!
 
Be sure to mark your calendar with several upcoming AFS events! The International Ferrous Melting Conference is October 7th-9th in Nashville. The Southeastern Regional will be March 2nd-4th at Isle of Palms, SC. Also, start making plans to attend Cast Expo in April; this year it will be in Minneapolis.
 
Besides our local meetings and regional/national conferences, here are a few other ways to enhance your AFS experience:
​ --Get involved with an AFS technical committee. There is a committee for every branch of our industry; these committees meet regularly to share ideas and work hard to grow their interests. For more information, visit the AFS national website.
--Take a class through the AFS institute. The Cast Metals Institute has been renamed and has reorganized its course structure.
--Reach out to a younger generation with Foundry in a Box. We will continue to announce dates for these events. If you are interested, contact Ken Murphy. This is a great experience!
 
Our next meeting will be October 12th in Anniston at The Classic on Noble. Our guest speaker will be Jeet Radia. Jeet is an environmental expert in the foundry industry and will review several hot topics that are affecting and will be affecting us. Be sure to make a reservation early. I look forward to seeing you in Anniston.
 
Jeremy Mowry
2015—2016 Chapter Chairman

Thank you to the officers and volunteers who made the Ben Dunning Golf Outing an outstanding event! Early this summer, Jon Pollard and Tommy Horton began coordinating the transition to Oxmoor Valley, and did a fantastic job. I am grateful for all of the volunteers who made and placed signs and banners, who kept up with the teams, who coordinated college students, who registered golfers and lunchers, who handled the door prizes and trophies, who put gift bags together, who entertained with bingo and cornhole, and who ran the multitude of errands that made this outing run smoothly.
 
Thank you also to the contributors. Your donations and tee box ad purchases gave us more opportunities to enhance the golf outing. Also, the chapter sponsorships for this year are off to a great start. As always, I am very appreciative of our sponsors! There is still time to send in your sponsorship for this year.
 
The first regular meeting is coming up soon (September 14th) andwill be a the Wynfrey Hotel in Birmingham. Our guest speakers will be Anthony Bingham and Dr. Jack Bergstresser. They will speak on antebellum iron making in Alabama and will focus on local ironworks. Be sure to make a reservation early.
 
I look forward to seeing you at the September Meeting.
 
Jeremy Mowry
2015—20156 Chapter Chairman