NSA 1999 (Green Bay) Convention Report

Wow, what a great Convention!

I arrived in Green Bay Wednesday afternoon. Had met Dan Shelley waiting for the same plane out of Chicago and found that we were seated near to each other, I in seat 2D, he in 3D (how did he do that?).

Room-hopped for a while after check-in Wednesday, catching up with Mary Ann Sell on the latest news for the Buffalo Convention. It is now confirmed that the first NSA Convention of the new millennium will be July 2001 at the Adam's Mark Hotel in Buffalo NY! Good news for me is that my good friend Marty Abramson is set to handle Chairman duties, freeing me up to do more of the behind-the-scenes activities. More to come about NSA 2001 later...

Wednesday PM I hit the Happy Hour bar and spent an hour or so in the lounge area with Bill and Krys Walton and Tex Treadwell and his wife (whose name I have forgotton), talking about everything from photography to conventions to pony tails. :--)

Thursday AM I helped set up the Stereo Theatre chairs, screen and projection stands with a bunch of others, including Bob Armstrong, LeRoy Barco, Ernst Lipps, Larry Haines, Wolfgang Sell and of course, the overworked John Roll. Things went well, even without Bill Duggan's expert supervision (he was there in spirit). Hopped some more rooms Thursday PM, then of course the Happy Hour, where I sat and chatted with Jack Swarthout of the SSA, among others .

Some memorable rooms hopped:

• Hayden (3DBear) Baldwin had a slew of stereos from his 30 years as an Illinois State Police Investigator, showing various crime scenes, including murders, suicides, autopsies and more; some *very* graphic and a bit disturbing to someone (like I) more accustomed to the sanitized body-under-a-sheet images normally seen in the media.
• Steve Berezin, with all of his "achromatized" viewers, from V-M Virtual Viewers to Star-D's to PinSharp 2x2's. I grabbed (okay, purchased) one of the PinSharps for slides from Frankenpony, my 8-p Kodak plus a couple of frosted halogen bulbs for my other viewers.
• Boris Starosta, with so many amazing stereo pairs showing his considerable artistic talents. Makes me realize how amateurish my efforts at photography are. I finally got to see his large (life-size?) Phantogram "Surprise" that we've heard so much about on Photo-3D. REAL cool! This Phantogram turned up missing for a while, but fortunately was recovered (albeit slightly wrinkled) before noon Sunday.
• DrT (George Themelis), with his usual selection of viewers, cameras and literature. He even had a Red Button with 40mm achromats for sale. Too bad it was shrink-wrapped, so I didn't get to see the effect.
• Jon Golden and Jan, with their mouth-watering de Wijs viewers and variety of mounts, mounting supplies and mounting equipment. His copies of Dalia's "Inside 3D" were going fast, so I grabbed one of those.

Friday AM I got a big dose of Stereo Theatre, then hobnobbed for a bit before presenting the world's shortest workshop on field case repair in the afternoon. Friday night about 60 people walked or drove across the lift bridge to the Titletown Brewing Company, a converted railroad station now a restaurant/microbrewery for the Stereoscopic Society of America (SSA) dinner. Got to sit with Harry and Jean Richards, discussing all the joys of putting on an NSA Convention. Even joined the SSA, passing my ten bucks across the table to Shab Levy, Membership Chairman.

Saturday of course was the Trade Fair. As always, this was the largest collection of stereo-related equipment, views, literature and collectibles that one is likely to see during the year.

I added to my meager collection of View-Master reels with a couple of packets from the Sells, a half-dozen of the newly re-released scenic sets from Charley Van Pelt, the Frank Lloyd Wright set of Michael Kaplan and some assorted single reels.

One dealer had brought a whole bunch of VM viewers and projectors and was selling them relatively cheap. I picked up a few Model G's for projects at 3 for two dollars.

Later bumped into Dick Twichell, who clued me in about the Model H viewer, with which I had been unfamiliar. Seems this lighted viewer has considerably higher magnification than the standard viewer but hasn't (yet) hit the hard-to-justify price of the similarly-featured Model F. Dick and I popped open most of the Model H's on the table, looking for one with all the parts and none of the corrosion. Found a nice blue one for $10. Thanks Dick!

Picked up a Kodak Stereo for my brother Dan, to replace the one he lost in the Easter fire. In a big box of cases at another dealer, I found (separately) two halves of a field case. It's in need of re-stitching, but I know someone who can do that. :--)

Stopped at Dan Shelley's/Bill Walton's table, where I got a copy of the new Bill Walton CD plus Bill's "Back to Basics" book, which he autographed for me. Bill and Dan also allowed me to leave some of my "Take Pictures. Deeper." T-shirts at their table, and promptly sold them. Thanks very much, guys!

More Stereo Theatre Saturday afternoon, then Happy Hour (Free beer? Outta my way, please!) where I got to chat a bit with my friend George Themelis and a couple of younger guys whose names I promptly forgot. These guys didn't even have any grey hair yet!

Saturday evening was the Awards Banquet up the street at the Day's Inn, where I sat with Ron Fross and his wife and talked photography with them and that other gentleman whom I could recognize but not name at this point. Enjoyed a talk by the Fisher-Price representative on the history and future of View-Master.

Afterwards I wandered around impersonating a photographer, getting some (maybe) good night shots of bridges, buildings and fountains with cable and tripod. I went down to the Regency Suites' lounge later on, and ended up sitting and talking with Al Sieg and Bill Moll, putting away beer and potato chips until they booted us out in the wee hours. We covered everything from camera collecting to international business relations to the high cost of stereo mounting. (Did someone really pay _two grand_ to have their stereo slides mounted for a show?)

Sunday I did a bit more shopping at the Trade Fair, where prices were being cut to clear things out. Finally headed for the airport around noon for the trip home.

One of the first things I did at home was to put a frosty bulb and two ni-cad C cells in the Model H to view my new reel acquisitions. Excellent viewer! How come none of the web sites mention this viewer's high magnification, I wonder?

Regulars noticably absent from the Convention:
Ron Labbe, Bill Duggan, Dalia, Harry Poster, Gabriel Jacob, Alexander Klein, Paul Milligan and Paul Wing.

All in all, this was a most enjoyable convention for me. Big thanks go to Harry Richards for doing it all again (Harry was also the Convention Chairman/Coordinator for NSA 94 in Milwaukee). Your efforts resulted in a very well-run and well-attended Convention. Please convey my appreciation to everyone who contributed to this wonderful event!

Bill Davis
July, 1999