What a great response to my The Maps in Schools Project 2006-2007 –we sent out invoices to everyone who signed up to sponsor a map for a school at the KickOff BBQ and almost immediately started receiving the funds to kick start our mapping project. Zdansky’s map store has laminated, dry mounted and framed 25 of the maps and we are in the process of putting them into area schools—as of the writing of this letter five have been placed and the remainder of the initial order should be done by months end.

The Don Boyd Continuing Education Funds are being used to leverage member donations so that we can do all the schools in the Coastal Bend—not just the schools that our member’s children are attending. I called Patricia Boyd and told her of our plan to put these maps in the schools. She was very pleased to hear that and thought it was a very good use of the funds, and she knew Don would have highly approved of the project.

I was recruited to work in Corpus Christi from friends that had moved here from Chevron in Lafayette, and I still remember the pitch they gave me after taking me to lunch at the restaurant at the top of the old Sheraton Hotel (the blue Best Western hotel now) on Shoreline Boulevard. The sales pitch was “Owen– if you move to Corpus Christi, you can play here in the bay, work up on the hill and live down the street!”

Well, I thought about that a lot in the next few weeks back at Chevron as I rode the street car to work at 7:30am every morning with sweat dripping down my neck and my necktie too tight. And I finally decided to take a chance and move to Texas.

It was a risk—I did not know anything about the geology of this area, did not know the rocks, did not know if I would be able to find any oil and gas over here, and on and on. But I decided to do it. I reasoned that I could always go back and work for a major again—but I really did not want to look back on this opportunity in the future and regret that I did not give it a try. So I did. I have always had my boats to play with in the bay. I have always worked up on the hill. I have always lived about a mile away just off Ocean Drive. Tommy and Bruce were right— Corpus Christi is a great place to live, work, play and raise a family.

Moral of the story is: Take a chance. When you come to a crossroads in your life, take the harder path.

Owen Hopkins 10/10/06
CCGS President