The new dues structure taking effect on January 1, 2016 includes a lifetime membership ($500) and lifetime benefactor membership ($1000). With The John Updike Childhood Home restoration in progress, the timing couldn’t be better for members to take advantage of these options and help the museum project move forward at the same time.

Professor Takashi Nakatani, of Yokohama City University, Japan, has generously stepped forward to become the first lifetime benefactor. Professor Nakatani has been an active member of the society since the beginning, moderating a panel at the First Biennial Conference at Alvernia and presenting papers at the Second Biennial Conference at Suffolk and the Third Biennial Conference at Alvernia. He has also taken several research trips on his own to Updike collections in Boston and Reading.

At the 3rd Biennial Conference pre-conference social (l to r): Yue Wang, James Plath, Carla Alexandra Ferreira, and Takashi Nakatani.