Good Job!
 

Kudos to our Fearless Leaders and wives and especially to the NRA for a VERY nice evening last night at the PGCA Annual Meeting and Banquet at the NRA Museum!

It was great to see old friends again (especially the Invincibles!) and oogle the high-condition "People's Choice" award candidates, which was about the best short-course on original Parker case colors and bluing one could ever experience.

Our emcees did a great job of keeping the evening on track and moving along, the food was excellent, and I even won a bottle of red wine! Sorry to the person I promised to give the raffle gun to if I won it; (I just won't take the chance shooting those old Damascus guns!). - But you're not getting my wine.

Yup, it was a great evening. Louis Parker's presentation was very interesting. He displayed the 28 gauge DHE factory cutaway pictured in chapter 1 of TPS. The Invincibles were impressive as always and #100,000 was also removed from its display cabinet for our pleasure. Also displayed with the #100,000 gun was a just about brand new hammer gun that was on Emil Linder's used gun list that he mailed to me in 1975. Apparently Emil donated it to NRA and NRA has displayed it in an obscure hallway in a display case that also includes Colonel Townsend Whelens Springfield sporter. Thanks to Josh, the Romigs, and the Freys, a good time was had by all.

Yes! A great gathering for sure. Good turnout as well. It was my first time visiting the Museum and it was a great opportunity to have the detailed tour arranged with the curators.
The board put together a great dinner and program! It was good to see all of you that attended and to meet some new faces as well.

I drove up yesterday, enjoyed the banquet and returned home this morning after visiting Peggy's dad's grave in Arlington. I truly enjoyed seeing everyone and Louis did a great job of covering his family history and the employees of Parker Brothers. I was especially impressed with the number of PB's employees who served for more than 50 years. Thanks Louis for a job "well done". Congrats to Deb Frey and Chuck Bishop for their Disquinished Service Awards. Many thanks to Bill Mullins, Larry Frey and the BOD for the hard work in putting this event together. Peggy and I had a great time.

I would like to thank EVERYONE who helped to make this one of the most enjoyable Annual Meetings yet. This was my first trip to the NRA Museum and it was simply overwhelming. We went in the morning for a couple of hours and could not believe the displays and how these fine arms were presented. Later during our two hour guided tour with head curators Philip Schreier and Doug Wicklund the amount of knowledge these historians shared and the way it was presented was truly unforgettable.

The Banquet feature good food and great guns but for me it was meeting so many new members as well as seeing old friends. I hope that anyone who has never attended one of these gatherings will come and enjoy this wonderful event in the future.

I would once again like to thank former Chairman John Davis for his generous contribution to the PGCA Gun Raffle of the beautiful D Grade Top Lever Hammer Gun. This years winner is Rick Andrelat of Wisconsin. Congratulations to Rick, and I will be arranging shipment of your new Parker in the coming week.

For those of us who couldn't attend, any Photos.....?

Eric,
There were lots of people taking pictures so hopefully when everyone is home and settled some will get posted. I believe Louis Parkers presentation was taped and hope it can be displayed at some point because Deb, Kathy, and I were busy at that time compiling the auction results and missed it.

The CD that Phil Schreier gave me at the end of the evening only had pictures, and no recording of Louis Parker's talk.

Wish I could have made it. Northern VA is out of my quadrant. In fact, James Hall tells me no one goes there anymore, it's too crowded.