Greater Los Angeles Area Mensa (GLAAM) is one of the oldest chapters in American Mensa. Records show that the first LocSec (Local Secretary, referenced internally as ‘Chair’) of the L.A. chapter was elected in September 1962; since that time, dozens of people have served as the head of our organization.
When the group was first founded, there were no local newsletters, only a publication called Interim, generated in New York, which listed all the Mensa activities scheduled for the entire North American continent. As more members became active on the West Coast, it was felt that a publication tailored to the needs of the local membership was needed. The leadership of the chapter attempted to obtain a subsidy from the national office to produce a local newsletter, but we were told that such a subsidy could not be granted under the budgetary structure prevalent at that time. Undaunted, several local members pooled their personal resources and created the first issue of Lament in December 1964, asking for a subscription fee of one dollar per year. The name of the newsletter combined the abbreviation for the city of Los Angeles with the beginning of the word ‘mental’; it also served to express the collective disappointment of the group at that time with the fact that the newsletter needed to be produced without a subsidy. Since then, local group support from the National Office has become commonplace, and the chapter officially changed the name of the newsletter to L.A. Mentary in November 1998.
The first issue of Lament also contained a draft of the first set of bylaws for the chapter. These bylaws, which took up less than a full page, established a Los Angeles Mensa Committee which any member of the chapter could join by attending three consecutive meetings. Our bylaws have undergone extensive revision and expansion since then, particularly when Greater Los Angeles Area Mensa became incorporated in 1977.
In July 1965, American Mensa was divided into four regions (Eastern, Mid-Western, Western, and Canadian). In addition, any local group comprising at least 10% of the total American Mensa membership could send a representative to the North American Mensa Committee. At the time, only New York City was large enough to have a separate NAMC representative, but Los Angeles achieved this status in February 1967. The L.A. constituency was expanded in January 1980 to become the Southern California Region, or Region #9 of the nine regions which then constituted American Mensa. It was renamed the Far West Region in August 1985, while what was originally called the Western Region became the Pacific Intermountain Region (Region #8) in November of that same year.
By May 1967, the L.A. group had become so large that it was divided into no less than eleven sub-groups (or areas). Over time, two of these sub-groups split off to become independent chapters, being Inland Empire (first separated in 1972, then rejoined GLAAM in 1975, then split again in 1983, part of it rejoining in 2013) and Orange County (split in 1980). In May 1993, GLAAM was re-organized into six sub-groups; of these, the Southeast sub-group split off to become Harbor Area Mensa in 1994, leaving five of the sub-groups (Mid-City, Coastal, San Fernando Valley, East Los Angeles County, and Hi-Desert) which exist today, Inland Empire being restored as a sixth sub-group later.
In 1973, GLAAM began holding local conventions in the Southern California area. For five years, this was done as a joint venture (known as Asilomar South, after the popular Labor Day gatherings in Monterey County) with the Santa Barbara chapter, after which time it became known as the Channel Islands RG (‘regional gathering’). The first actual Los Angeles RG was held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in January 1980 and was chaired by Paul Victor. The second RG, chaired by Bob Abrahams, was held at the Pacifica Hotel in Culver City in October 1981, and was known as LARGO (Los Angeles Regional Gathering in October); the next two RG’s were held at the same time of year. It was decided afterwards to conduct the event in the early spring. The next LARG was therefore conducted in March 1985. By 1989, we had settled upon Presidents’ Day weekend as the normal time for our RG, and we have conducted one nearly every year since then.
Several GLAAM members have achieved distinction at the national and international levels. These include: Margie Mandelblatt (Editor of the Mensa Bulletin 1992-98); Henry Miller (Western Regional Vice-Chairman 1969-72, AMC Representative 1972-73); Herb Selwyn (IGC Counsel 1968-72); Joan Anne Finan (AMC Representative 1967, AMC SIGs officer 1967-68); Byron Cole (national Elections Committee chairman 1969); Margot Miller Wood (national SIGHT Coordinator 1979); Peggy Cobb (national Historian 1976-79); Paul Victor (AMC Representative 1976-77, AMC Local Groups officer 1977-79, AMC First Vice-Chairman 1979-80); Mary Jane Watson/Stevens (AMC Representative 1968-70, Editor of InterLoc 1970-72, National SIGHT Zone Coordinator 1974-77, Editor of the Mensa International Journal 1987-92); and others.
Of particular note is GLAAM member Dave Felt, who served as Greater Los Angeles Area RVC (1978-79), Southern California RVC (1980-83), AMC Secretary (1983-88), AMC Second Vice-Chairman (1988-91), AMC Chairman and IBD NatRep (1991-93), International Ombudsman (1999-2008), national Awards Chair (2004-11). Dave was the 1998 recipient of the Margot Award for outstanding service to Mensa, the 2003 recipient of the Salny Award for exceptional contributions to our testing program, Proctor of the Year in 2010 and 2014, and the 2014 recipient of the National Chair’s Award.
More recent contributors at the national level of Mensa include Jonathan Elliott (CultureQuest Coordinator 2007, national SIGs Officer 2007-09), Megan Edwards (national Elections Chair 2010-16, recipient of National Service Award in 2016), Desiree Sagray (Region 9 RVC 2013-17), and Michael Wong (Region 9 RVC 2017-19). National Certificates of Appreciation were awarded to Chris Brodsky in 2000, Jonathan Elliott in 2016, Desiree Elliott in 2018, and Billie Lee in 2020. Madeline Walker received an Award of Excellence in 2008 for her work with gifted children.
We celebrated our 50th anniversary in 2012, by rolling out an ongoing Awards program which presents annual recognitions to exceptional volunteers for the Mensa organization. Rollout included appointing a special Awards Committee which undertook the monumental task to review all the newsletters for the preceding 50 years, and to catalog every single thing that anybody ever did, so that we could create a Hall of Fame for our most prolific lifetime volunteers, as assessed over time by the same objective points-based criteria. We announced the initial inductees in a gala ‘family reunion’ at the 2012 RG, and it was a very special evening, with former adversaries now reconciled as friends. The special Awards Committee was made permanent, and has continued to issue annual awards and update its Hall of Fame, as described in the Awards section of this website.