[ Home ][ History ] [ Officers ][ Member ] [ Calendar ][ CASSAR ]
CASSAR Ladies Auxiliary
California Society Sons of the American Revolution Ladies Auxiliary
  
 
When the Sons of the American Revolution was first organized as the Sons of the Revolutionary Sires in San Francisco, on July 4th, 1876, they authorized the formation of a ladies auxiliary.

But, in 1889, the Sons of the Revolutionary Sires was reorganized. It was renamed the Sons of the American Revolution. Unfortunately there was no mention of a ladies auxiliary in its new constitution.

Permission was requested by then California Society, S.A.R. Vice President Leland B. Hawkins, III, in a letter to California State President, Colonel Thomas D. Gillis on April 6th 1983, to schedule an organizing meeting for Ladies Auxiliary.

The ladies met and thus, at the Society's Annual Membership Meeting held in Burbank on April 23rd, 1983, they were officially reactivated. The first meeting was hosted by Mrs. Leland B. Hawkins and Mrs. Donald Norman Moran. From that small nucleus of ladies who met in Burbank, the Ladies Auxiliary has grown to over two hundred and fifty members.

In 1989 an occasion presented itself at the National Society's annual Congress to take the idea of the Ladies Auxiliary nationwide. The Society was celebrating its 100th anniversary at its birthplace, San Francisco. Coincidentally, it was also the 100th anniversary of the discontinuance of the orginial Ladies Auxiliary. It seemed like an appropriate time and place for then California Society President, Arthur Wm. Barrett, to introduce a resolution for national acceptance of the Ladies Auxiliary. The resolution passed.

As a result of that historic action, other State Societies are now encouraging their ladies to form their own auxiliaries.

  
 
Historian Linda Moran described the official CASSAR Ladies Auxiliary quilt displayed to the left. The quilt was made in 1985, two years after the Ladies Auxiliary was formed in 1983. The quilt is made up of individual squares-one for each CA chapter and made by members wives in each of the chapters. As of 2002, some of the chapter names have changed, some chapters are non-existent, and new chapters have been formed and are not represented on the quilt.