Saturday, August 4th, 2018, I made the 80 mile trip from Castle Rock to Pueblo to attend a much anticipated event - the NAR 60 year anniversary Rocketeer Reunion. Despite traffic delays on I-25 just south of Castle Rock because of the big Renaissance Festival at Larkspur, I made it to the Pueblo Convention Center by 4:30 p.m.
(A little aside - I was actually born in Pueblo in 1956, but was there for only a very brief period before being moved to Colorado Springs. I have absolutely no memories of living in Pueblo, so I really claim to be a Springs native.)
After checking in at the door, I proceeded into the big room and found Pat Fitzpatrick, who showed me to the table where I could set up my small NARAM 11 ephemera display. By the time I had everything arranged, a lot of reunion attendees had arrived.
Another little bit of background about me. During the time I was involved in model rocketry back in the 70s and early 80s, I never got out to attend a single NARAM, or even any other large model rocketry event outside of Colorado. The only NAR rocketeers I knew were those who were part of local NAR sections in Colorado and the rest of the mountain states, plus a handful of people who were employed at Estes Industries, or through a bit of letter correspondence with other NAR rocketeers outside of Colorado.
As a result, I had never before met any of the old-timer model rocketeers that would be here at the reunion this night.
The thing is, I knew ALL of their names!
Because I had a nearly complete sets of Model Rocketry Magazine and The Model Rocketeer in my possession that I knew well cover to cover by virtue of reading them so many hundreds of times.
In effect, it blew my mind when I began circulating about the room and talking with all of these model rocketry hobby stalwarts that I knew only through the pages of magazines.
Like a kid in a candy store.....
Anyway, this man's blog is going to be populated over the next couple of weeks with my personal observations of this wonderful event, complete with as many photos as I can cram in.
As I write this post this morning, I am still overwhelmed and euphoric over the event, so it's going to be a lot of fun sharing with the rest of you.
Please enjoy.....
An addendum - For those of you who were also in attendance at the re-union, please don't hesitate to post replies about your experiences here. It would be fun to make this whole blog series into a comprehensive archive of sorts about the event!
No comments:
Post a Comment