23rd CALLERLAB Convention 
MILESTONE AWARD
Presented by Bob Osgood
Tonight, it is my honor to present the MILESTONE to another leader in our activity.
This individual who started a very successful calling career 46 years ago has had to more than prove herself, for, in her own words, “Every lady caller must realize that she is entering a man’s field and be willing to work that much harder to become a good caller.” Tonight’s recipient has taken this as her challenge.
She was the first lady to be invited to join CALLERLAB; the first to call on a “Square Dance Documentary-in-Sound” and the first lady to call at the Penticton Peach Festival in Canada. As a matter of fact, so impressed was the local Canadian press that they ran a major story in the newspaper that carried the headline: “California Call-girl to Appear on Festival.”
This caller entered the activity in 1949 and started calling that same year.
She taught two classes each year until her retirement in 1994. She called on the nationally televised Art Linkletter Show and on the Pat Boone Program. For many years she made an annual calling trip of the Western United States and on several occasions called for and led groups of dancers to Europe, the South Pacific, the Orient, the Caribbean, Canada, Hawaii, and Alaska, fostering square dancing goodwill throughout the world.
She helped to organize and called on the program for the first National Square Dance Convention in 1952. She has hosted a very successful three-day square dance festival the first weekend in March for the past 20 years and coordinates and produces the Annual Arthritis Hoedown in her city.
She served on the Board of the Southern California Callers Assn., held the position of President of the Orange County Callers Assn., and President of the Cow Counties Callers Assn. three times. She has served as moderator at a number of state and National Conventions and the subject, “Styling and Comfortable Dancing”, is one that is very important to her. Over the years she has served on the staff of a number of area callers schools. Together with her husband and enthusiastic supporter, our recipient was chosen as “Patron” of the Penticton, British Columbia Square Dance Festival. In recognition of her many contributions of Community Service through square dancing, she has been twice honored (in 1981.and again in 1990) by her hometown of Palm Springs, California, with an official day named after her.
Because she lives and called in a world-renowned vacation spot, she and her husband, Clif, have, over the years, had the opportunity to introduce square dancing to many men and women from all parts of North America as well as from around the world. And so, on behalf of the members of CALLERLAB, it gives me great pleasure to award this MILESTONE to that “call girl” from Palm Springs, California – OSA MATHEWS!