The Telecommunications History Group, Inc.

Always looking for a few hours' help!

As in many non-profit organizations, the Telecommunications History Group's volunteers are its life's blood, keeping the group functioning and the archives in good order. Volunteers are essential to the building and maintenance of our archives, performing a variety of jobs, including archival and curator functions.

Duties include research, preservation, inventory, database entry and management, repair of antique equipment, tour conducting, educational speaking and oral history collection. Most of the work is performed at our Denver location, but a limited number of positions are available for long distance "tele-volunteering."

Why volunteer?

Use your existing knowledge or learn new skills
Opportunities to attend professional meeting and seminars
Access to the collection
Challenging work
Can explore one aspect of archiving more deeply, or do something new each week. For example, Betty Vigil has inventoried and entered all the directory information and continues to maintain the database – she’s made the directories her particular project. Jerry Wild, on the other hand, may work on the computers one day, inventory artifacts another day, and clean out the storage room the next time he’s in.
Camaraderie with people of similar interests and background
The satisfaction of helping to preserve our heritage

Note that telephone company experience is not required to become a THG volunteer!

Pictured below are some of our volunteers.

_________________________

Each year, the Telecommunications History Group honors an outstanding volunteer by induction into the THG Volunteer Hall of Fame. Since its inception in 2005, eight people have been chosen as Volunteer of the Year, and one Lifetime Achievement Award has been bestowed.
	Herbert J. Hackenburg – Lifetime Acheivement Award Herb was the founder of THG and its first Executive Director. Herb and two other volunteers began the operation on a shoestring and built it into one of the largest archives in the state of Colorado. After retiring as Director, Herb stayed on to volunteer as a “regular” volunteer. Since moving out of state, he still makes time to write articles for our newsletter.
	Ken Pratt - 2005 Volunteer of the Year A volunteer since 1995, Ken has been steadfast in his dedication to the group. He has spent much of his time cataloguing our extensive collection of industry documents. Ken has a very good eye for what is historically valuable, and often brings items to our attention for display or for use in the Dial-Log.
	Betty Vigil – 2006 Volunteer of the Year Betty has almost single-handedly inventoried, catalogued, and arranged for the preservation of our directory collection that spans the years from 1879 through the present.
	Jerry Wild – 2007 Volunteer of the Year Jerry is our entire IT department, so he’s pretty busy keeping our computers and our network up and running. Additionally, he is very knowledgeable about telephone equipment and networks, and is cataloguing our artifact collection.
	Bruce Amsbury – 2008 Volunteer of the Year Since retirement, Bruce has volunteered at several non-profit organizations in Denver. Bruce helps with directories, mail, fundraising, and general work about the archives. We all appreciate his willingness, good humor and dependability.
	Dale Norblom – 2009 Volunteer of the Year Dale was one of our earliest volunteers, and continues to make a significant contribution. One of the most important things he does is populate our collections database. That’s how we keep track of where each of our thousands of documents is located.
	Ron Swanson – 2010 Volunteer of the Year Ron is an AT&T retiree who has been working with us since 2005. He is a man of wide-ranging interests and knowledge, and is our go to guy when we need to find something out about a piece of equipment or a system. We especially appreciate that he’s always cheerful and more than willing to take on any task we ask him to do.
	Dave Felice – 2011 Volunteer of the Year Dave Felice was named 2011 Volunteer of the Year. Dave is a full-time employee of CenturyLink, who finds time to help us in a variety of ways. He’s always on the lookout for people and material that have contributed to the history of the industry. He’s cheerfully available when we need an extra strong back.
	Renee Lang – 2012 Volunteer of the Year Renee Lang was named 2012 Volunteer of the Year. Renee began volunteering with THG while still working full-time at Qwest. Over the years she has been involved with nearly all aspects of the archives and museums. She has worked extensively with the photograph collection, and is a docent for the 931 14th Street tours. Renee became our secretary this year, when Marty left to take a full-time job. She frequently discovers telecom-related artifacts during her antique store and estate sale raids, and still finds time to volunteer when we need to move exhibits or operate special events. (Sometimes she even volunteers her husband, Jim!)