Forty Years With the American Name Society

Abstract

I was, as so many others were, introduced to the American Name Society by Professor Margaret M. Bryant. Those who knew that indefatigable lady will recall she carried a large purse which was always full of invitations to join one or another of the many scholarly organizations she supported. In time I was to follow in her footsteps as president (like her, twice) of ANS, as president of the American Society of Geolinguistics, and (obediently, at her urging) as secretary and board member of the International Linguistic Association. Miss Bryant did more to recruit ANS members than anyone else I ever met. I joined ANS and went with Miss Bryant to the second Names Institute, where Professor Christopher Wrenn of Oxford (whose work I knew) was scheduled to speak. Since the early sixties I have attended and read papers at all the Names Institutes save those held when I was out of the country on sabbatical leave. I have spoken at most of the regional meetings based upon Mac McMullen's successful Names Institute, the Connecticut Onomastic Symposium just about every year of its existence, for instance. I was instrumental in getting two other regional meetings started: the North Central in Illinois and the North Country in Upstate New York. I also spoke at almost all the meetings of the Conference on Literary Onomastics, founded by a woman as dynamic as Miss Bryant, Grace Alvarez-Altman. At all of these meetings I much enjoyed the company of fellow names scholars and I regret that even Dean Fred Tarpley's lively Texas regional meeting is no more. Only the Names Institute survives, thanks to Wayne H. Finke, my colleague in CUNY, and I have been happy to assist him in arranging its gala 40th anniversary meeting in 2001.