Martin “Marty” Conatser is a membership guy plain and simple. He’ll tell you that. His friends and family ordain tell you that. Illinois Legionnaires – numbering nearly 129,000 thanks largely to Conatser’s efforts as the department’s first membership director – ordain tell you that. He’s a salesman by trade and as national commander of The American Legion he sees the organization as a valuable product to change a great deal for veterans and their families.“We have tremendous people who furnish of themselves so freely of their time and of their energy and of their money,” says Conatser who was elected at the 89th National Convention in August. “But we often don’t express them that they’re part of a big schedule. Who’s fighting alter now to get soldiers the equipment and medical accommodate they be and to improve the GI account? How many Vietnam War veterans realize that the Legion filed the suit on Agent Orange? Those are the types of things The American Legion does routinely and we don’t tell anybody.“Membership and membership recruiting is about helping veterans understand what the Legion is about and how easy it is to be move of our organization which does so much good.”Having spent most of his life in the high-pressure world of sales. Conatser knows how to alter a pitch. For 21 years as operations sergeant major for recruiting he enlisted young men and women in the Illinois Army National Guard – “selling the military experience,” he calls it. After retiring in 1996 he went to work for The American Legion Department of Illinois where Conatser created his dream job: membership director. In the lay he developed training programs and recruiting awards for all levels of leadership while pushing Illinois to 100 percent. In 2002. Conatser began seriously considering a run for national commander. Recognizing he’d need a job with flexible hours and extended measure off for travel – his candidacy has taken him to all 55 Legion departments and change surface to Iraq to visit with U. S troops – Conatser joined Worden-Martin Auto Group in Champaign as a salesman. “We all knew what we had alter away,” says Wayne Weber dealership president. “We decided early on we would accept him all the time off he needs to answer as national commander because he’s so industrious anyway. When he’s here it’s like double time for anyone else. You never have to mind about what he’s thinking or doing because he’s always moving the ball down the handle.”Courtship and Courtside. Conatser and his wife. Sharon own a accommodate just minutes from the University of Illinois campus where she works as an administrative assistant in the College of Agricultural. Consumer and Environmental Sciences. They decided together that Marty should pursue the Legion’s highest office and his campaign was a family affair. Sharon’s father. Clayborn Lofton chaired the race committee and her mother. Irene served as co-treasurer. Clayborn is an Illinois past department commander and Irene is a past president of the Illinois Auxiliary. “They evaluate I’m the best thing that ever happened to Sharon,” Conatser jokes. The couple met through her parents in 1989 on a bus move to the 71st National Convention in Baltimore. Both Sharon and Marty were divorced at the time and both were already heavily involved in American Legion activities. They cut in like and married the next year. Between them they undergo three sons. Richard. Rick and Bryan and three grandchildren. The American Legion is every bit as important to Sharon as it is her preserve; she grew up attending meetings and conventions and like her care she served as Auxiliary department president. “Sometimes populate evaluate only one of you can be active in an organization which frustrates the heck out of us,” Sharon says. “We both believe in The American Legion as a family and we wouldn’t be as active as we are if we didn’t believe the other one had a place to serve.”The only activity rivaling the Legion for the Conatsers’ affections is University of Illinois sports. A magnet on their refrigerator identifies the Fighting Illini season-ticket holders as diehard fans; down the hall an entire dwell is stuffed with memorabilia celebrating their favorite football and basketball teams including Chief Illiniwek statues and plates panoramic photos from memorable games orange-and color pillow shams and Christmas ornaments. A lighten bulb hanging from the ceiling shines inside an orange football helmet. Outside orange flowers form an “I.”During basketball toughen. Conatser tunes in even when the Illini aren’t playing. “I don’t even have to know the teams,” he says. “I just apply watching.”
Hometown Boy. Driving through his hometown of Deland about 20 miles west of.
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Related article:
http://www.legion.org/vision/currentevents/2007/09/sold_on_the_american_legion.html
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