The Way We Were: Expert on 'Robert's Rules,' Augusta author found laughs in meeting minutes

In the 1870s, an Army major posted in California sought to make sense of parliamentary procedure with the book that we now call "Robert's Rules of Order."

In the 1960s, an Augusta woman became an author and popular speaker by making fun of those who tried to follow the rules.

Runa Erwin Ware, an active local club member and frequent meeting attendee, gained national fame by poking fun at the pretentions that can occur when a garden club tried to sound like the House of Lords.

She often did this by focusing on the malaprops in meeting minutes, and Ware went to a lot of meetings.

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In Augusta she was a member of the Reid Memorial Presbyterian Women and the Hill Top Garden Club. She also was active with the Daughters of the American Revolution, Augusta Symphony, Augusta Assembly, Cancer Society, Red Cross and United Way.

In a 1977 Chronicle interview, she said she tried to improve her effectiveness in such groups by studying the well-known "Robert's Rules," created by Henry M. Robert, a major and later brigadier general who tried to straighten out the many regional variations of parliamentary order.

Ware became an accomplished parliamentarian, and was often asked to speak on the subject, not only to club members but even school and teacher groups.

Lectures on rules could be dull, she admitted, but she found her audience perked up when she began to share missteps from the minutes, like the time a meeting was opened with "the Lord's Prayer, which was approved as read."

Another famous story was the "PTA Showdown" that The Chronicle recounted this way.

"I move that we buy heavy lined draperies for the school music room to drown out the sound with the cost not to exceed $100."

"Is there a second to the motion?"

"I think it's terrible to spend $100 for draperies when the girls powder room has no mirrors."

"There is a motion on the floor. Is there a second?"

"Not only are there no mirrors, but there are no shelves to put books on."

"Is there a second to the motion?"

"You just have boys, Edna, you don't realize what a deplorable condition the powder room is in."

"Is there a second to the motion?"

"What they really need more than draperies is a rug."

Ware said she began to "collect" such examples, almost like a "spy." She said she would take a knitting bag and needles to meetings with a notebook in the bag to jot down the unintended humor of serious-minded speakers and scribes.

That led to a popular book, promoted almost entirely by state garden clubs, and that led to attention from magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post, praise from the Associated Press and notice from nationally syndicated newspaper columnists such as Erma Bombeck.

Ware's popularity blossomed on the garden club circuit and she would make dozens of speaking engagements in nine states and was invited to address the convention of National Council of Garden Clubs, sharing the podium with radio and TV star Arthur Godfrey.

The more she spoke, the more people sent her examples from their own meeting minutes. One was the women's auxiliary of a medical society that was "sponsoring a cookbook, the proceeds from which will go to the hospital to purchase a stomach pump."

Her book "All Those In Favor, Say Something," won her not only the Author of the Year Award for Southern journalists and authors, but recognition from the Garden Club of Georgia.

For all the fun she made, Ware said 90 percent of the meetings she attended were "organized and well conducted, but amusing incidents do occur."

When they did, sometimes there was a woman sitting there with a knitting bag.

Bill Kirby has reported, photographed and commented on life in Augusta and Georgia for 45 years.

This article originally appeared on Augusta Chronicle: Augusta author Runa Erwin Ware was expert on Robert's Rules of Order