At the inaugural meeting of the IFMC which was held in London in 1947 the delegate of the Brazilian Government was Dr. Renato Almeida. Five years later he attended the fifth Annual Conference, also held in London, and on this occasion he conveyed an invitation to the Council to hold its 1954 Conference in São Paulo in conjunction with the Folklore Congress which was being organised by the Brazilian National Folklore Commission under the auspices of the Fourth Centenary of São Paulo. This invitation was most gratefully and gladly accepted and two years later a number of members of the Council found themselves in Brazil, including seven members of the Executive Board to whom the Folklore Commission gave most generous hospitality.