The Legenda Aurea Service Award & Scholarship

The Legenda Aurea, Latin for "the golden legend," is the service award presented by HHRW to a chapter member who has provided outstanding service to Hearts Through History Romance Writers and who has become a legend among us.

This year's recipient has stepped forward time and again when the chapter needed her. In the past year, she has held two volunteer chairwoman positions, Membership and Volunteering. Membership is a highly demanding job, especially during the yearly renewal period from February to April. The job entails welcoming new members, verifying they have paid their dues, are members of good standing with RWA®, and signing them up on Hearts Through History's various Yahoo loops. During renewal time, the Membership volunteer must process the applications of over 250 members, purge non-returning members from the loops, and verify with National that all members are in good standing with them. In addition to this highly demanding job, this year's recipient was also our Volunteer Chair. This job entailed recruiting members to serve as volunteers on our various committees. This is an often dirty and thankless job, frequently requiring begging and pleading on the chair's part. However, she always did a very good job at finding people to fill the service needs of our chapter. Due to personal reasons, this chairwoman had to step down from her jobs a few months ago. However, we couldn't let her go without an acknowledgment of her many deeds and service to our chapter. It is with great pleasure that we announce the 2008 recipient of the Legenda Aurea Service Award, Courtney Hoffman.