On March 4, 1899 pneumatic tube mail service became available to the public in Prague. The hundredth anniversary of this event will the theme of this year's annual membership meeting and exhibition of the Society for Czechoslovak Philately which will take place during STAMPSHOW 99 in Cleveland, Ohio. Members are urged to exhibit at this national show, scheduled from Thursday, August 26 through Sunday, August 29, since it will be an excellent venue to publicize to our part of the hobby to a large and broad segment of the American philatelic community. Society medals and other prizes will be awarded for the best exhibits of Czechoslovak related material.

All our activities will be held, as will those of the APS, at the Cleveland Convention Center, 500 Lakeside Avenue in Cleveland. The program for the meeting is currently being developed, but as is our practice it will be a mix of philately, socializing with old and new philatelic friends, and new information on our hobby. The annual meeting itself is scheduled for 2 to 4 PM on Saturday, August 28. After a short business meeting we look forward to a lecture on Prague pneumatic tube mail by Antonin Smid of Prague, perhaps the leading expert on this subject. His award wining collection will also be exhibited during the show. On the social side we are planning an informal dinner for Friday evening and hope all members attending STAMPSHOW will participate. Details of where and when will be posted as soon as they are available and will also be available at the Society table during the Show. Our Society awards breakfast will be held on Sunday morning. As is our tradition, it will be at this event that we recognize our exhibitors and other emmbers for their philatelic accomplishments. For more up to date information or information on Cleveland you can contact our meeting chairmen, Bruce Sebek. Or if you need additional information on STAMPSHOW itself, hotel accommodations, or exhibiting you can get it from the American Philatelic Society web site.

Finally, as is our custom, the Society for Czechoslovak Philately will have a Society table which will be manned through STAMPSHOW. We will have a number of recent books and catalogs on Czechoslovak philately as well as a commemorative cacheted envelope available at the table. And if you are not already a member of our Society you will also be able to correct this oversight at our table. Our experience is that the Society table is an excellent "home base" for our members attending stamps shows and we hope you will make use of it in this way in Cleveland.

We look forward to meeting all you in August!