General Secretary

Tedd Johansen

We are asking you all to preserve the audiovisual history of your country - an important task.

Now it is time to write the history of the association. FIAT/IFTA was established 25 years ago. We have a history to tell. A history that should be told by using moving images and sounds and photos rather than using the written word.

In 1999 Vittorio Sette published his private collections of photos taken during the years 1981 till 1999. To those of you who do not know the man: Vittorio Sette was elected General Secretary and President of FIAT/IFTA. His private collections of photos were copied to a CD-ROM and given to members at the conference in Santiago de Chile, Chile in 1999. Thank you, Mr Sette! And thank RAI for the active support.

Anne Hanford and Sam Suratt wrote about the first 20 years of FIAT/IFTA. The report was published in 1997. The title of the report is: "The First 20 Years. The History of FIAT/IFTA 1977 - 1997" . The writers took part in setting up the association. Anne Hanford, BBC, was elected Vice-President 1977 - 1982. She was elected President in 1982 and was in charge of FIAT/IFTA till year 1990.

Reading the old documents and reports and viewing the tapes of the activities of the association I am surprised to see the stability of the members. Few left FIAT/IFTA. And to my surprise viewing the photos of Vittorio Sette I see that many of the members socialized privately too. Many got friends for life so to speak. Among the members of the association Dominique Saintville is the only one left among the group that started the work of the association. Her first duty was to work as Treasurer.

The Board has decided that we should make an attempt to produce a historical video of the association. Therefore I ask you dear fellow members to take a look at your own photos and video shots and forward them to me to be used officially. Make a critical selection! I have got a lot of photos from members during the years. I have kept most of them. Good memories!

So let us play the famous song :"As times goes by" from the movie Casablanca and make history of FIAT/IFTA alive! I think the association has done a good job over the years, otherwise we all should have left years ago - and here we are working hard for what we believe in: The collection of audiovisual programmes.

Take care.

Tedd Johansen
FIAT/IFTA General Secretary