1980

Pastor Douglas H. Strachan, conducting services.

The following is an excerpt from the January issue of The Scroll(1):

Parish thanks to Sue Balzer and Jane Rineer for service as our guest organists during Barbara Pickhardt's absence… to Garry Ives family for donating our church [Christmas] tree.

Congratulations: Mark Anderson on appointment [at the end of the previous year] as Woodstock's new Building Inspector.

The following is from the Bulletin of Reports, from the annual meeting, January 25:

Pastor's Report. 1979 is now history.… For the congregation… it was a year of struggle as you patiently waited for the calling of a new pastor.… I certainly feel very proud and honored to have been called.… The experience of my previous parish and my internships have prepared me well to be your pastor. Even though it is very difficult to fill the shoes of persons like Walter Kortrey and Paul Swank, I… feel that I am perfectly qualified and capable to be your leader.… During the first five months… I have visited over ninety homes.… I have also made over thirty-five hospital visitations.… I have been teaching catechetical classes which meet on alternate Sunday evenings.… I want to thank all of you for making my first… months here a very blessed and delightful experience.

Steve Bambina constructed a new cabinet for the altar and new communion supplies.

There was a large and active Sunday School and a children's choir.

An ecumenical effort on the part of Woodstock's churches called Refugee Lifeline, spearheaded by Carolyn Barrette of Christ's Lutheran Church but consisting as well from four other area churches (St. John's, Woodstock Reformed, Overlook Methodist, and St. Gregory) had begun at the end of the previous year to aid the many Indochinese Boat People. (Pastor Strachan and his family used a house rented for them in Zena, so the parsonage was available.) In April, the Lifeline sponsored the Manh Ngo family; in July it sponsored the Thanh Ngo family of eight; and in October it sponsored two brothers to find quarters in Florida with Jim and Kathy Owens.

The church budget was $38,805 ($100,505 in 2006 dollars).

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Jimmy Carter (Democrat) was President. The 96th Congress was in session. A dollar in that year would be worth $2.59 in 2006 for most consumable products.

Some 71.4% of Americans 17 years and older were high school graduates; this number was about a tenth drop from a decade earlier. During this year, about 3,043,000 Americans graduated from high school (a slight increase from a decade earlier), 929,417 from college (an eighth again as many as a decade earlier). The median school years completed by Americans overall was 12.5 years, an increase of about 4 months from a decade earlier.

Slightly more than 76% of all Americans lived in cities of 2,500 or more. (This was less than a 3% increase from a decade earlier.)

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Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti, 43, the dictator of Iraq, invaded Iran, with U.S. encouragement and arms.

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