Born Chlotrudis Awards, the fledgeling group were named after the Founders’ cats, Chloe and Gertrudis. Together they seemed to be judging everything that went on in our home, why not judging the movies as well. Hence Chlotrudis Awards were born. In 2000, the group was granted 501(c)3 status from the Internal Revenue Service and became a full-fledged non-profit organization. Most recently in 2003, Chlotrudis went one step further, changing its name to the Chlotrudis Society for Independent Film to more accurately reflect its purpose. The logo was designed by Michael’s sister-in-law, Dawn Didham Colford who now serves faithfully on the organization’s entertainment committee.
The First Annual Chlotrudis Awards ceremony was held in March of 1995. The Founders, Michael R. Colford, Bridget Rawding and Trent Stephenson were roommates at the time, sharing a house in Andover, MA. Michael owned a kitten, Gertrudis, and Bridget owned an older cat, Chloe. After a dismal 1995 Academy Awards, Michael was disgusted that so many fine films were overlooked due to their lack of distribution or marketing or the shortsightedness of moviemakers and viewers. He, Trent and Bridget felt that they and their friends could do a better job awarding fine films. It was around the same time that they discovered that the International Hollywood Foreign Press, who are responsible for the Golden Globe Awards, was only made up of approximately 70 critics. Why couldn’t they form a group of movie fans to choose their own awards? And so the awards were born. During the first two years, the entire voting group also nominated the films. When preparing for the Third Annual Chlotrudis Awards, the Founders thought there might be a way to streamline things even more. A Nominating Committee was formed, that required a minimum of twenty movies be seen in any given year, in order to participate. That way a wider breadth of films would be available in the Nominating pool. The final nominations would be decided at an annual meeting of the committee. Then the nominations would be mailed out to the voting body and the nominees. The votes would be tallied at the Award Ceremony. In 1997, the first time things were done this way, two nominees returned their ballots; Jeff Daniels, who was nominated for Best Actor in the film Fly Away Home, and Kevin Corrigan nominated as Best Supporting Actor for the film Walking & Talking. Since then the involvement of the entertainment industry in Chlotrudis Awards has grown, and the Chlotrudis Society for Independent Film has grown as well, holding an annual Short Film Festival, and working with other film organizations to educate audiences about independent film.