We are now in rehearsals for VK's third season back in competition. Each year the corps has become stronger, and there's no reason to believe that momentum will fade as the 2009 season approaches.

As the corps gets stronger, alumni participation gets stronger, too. The last camp saw a record number of alumni watching, feeding and generally helping out the corps. Just as alumni came out to help us when we marched, this corps needs your support, too. and they love to hear "war stories" from back in the corps' history.

And as the corps grows, so should our alumni base and services offered by our alumni web site. We apologize for the inconvenience caused by the involuntary closing of the previous forum. A lack of communication with the host resulted in our account being deleted, including all previous posts and contact information. We have set up a new forum (with a new host) and are actively trying to contact previous forum members. If you know someone who was a member, or just as importantly those who were not, please let them know that the forum is alive.

When registering for the forum you will have to fill out some profile information for your account to be activated. Screen names can be clever but sometimes do not tell other forum members anything about you. I used the signature line for my corps info. Include your real name, years you marched/instructed/volunteered, and section.

Some new services we are exploring will be:

    - photo galleries by year    - downloadable mp3 files of every year VK has existed.

    - an alumni event this summer at a show TBA

If you have photos you'd like to submit, please send them to vkalumni@aol.com <mailto:vkalumni@aol.com> . Charlie Groh was instrumental in tracking down sound files for every year from 1964 to 1996, with the exception of the inactive year of 1980. I've added 2008 to the roster and I'm still looking for a recording of 2007. If you have that file, please forward it to the same address. The files we have are on the way to our webmaster and I will post a message on the forum when they become available.

Oh, one more thing. You can get some souvenirs with the old corps Coat of Arms logo at http://www.cafepress.com/vkalumni <http://www.cafepress.com/vkalumni> . All proceeds will go to the corps. If we get enough traffic I will create another site with the palm tree logo. Current corps souvenirs are available at http://vkyao.org/vk/Store.html.

Thanks again for your patience as we try to put the pieces back together.

Garry Parker, VK Alumni Coordinator