Parker Pages arrived .....

[Bill Murphy]

Robin, funny you should ask. Among items that PGCA has in its collection is a collection of Parker correspondence that Chuck received from the Board of Directors not long after he took over his Research Committee job. Ron Kirby and I and others went over this interesting group of papers years ago and discussed possibly making it available to the members. It never happened. The "Clown Catalog" in our collection is another piece of Parker history that hardly anyone has ever seen. Ed Muderlak offered to copy that catalog and make it available to members, but the BOD famously refused to allow that. Kevin McCormack and I were nearly finished with a very interesting research project that would have been shared with members. The BOD refused to let us examine a few records to complete our project. It remains unfinished. I'm sure there are other examples of the "Black Hole of Curatorship" if you are interested.

[Bruce Day]

The "Black Hole" referenced above is neither black nor a hole.

It is a PGCA owned white cargo trailer kept in a storage shed. Drop lights are used for illumination if a person needs to find something in it, like some of the things we take to the PF and NRA exhibitions or get sent out for the PGCA meetings. A person has to be careful or he will whack his head stepping in and out of the trailer.

I have seen the PGCA owned Clown cover catalog and its a very high condition one. if copies were made of it then I could get an original when the values fell for a lot less than they sell for now when they rarely come up for sale. The unhappy people would be the owners of the rare originals who bought at high price. Maybe they might have some concerns about inexpensive reproductions. Until I saw the original, I had to look at the one in The Parker Story. We had a cover reproduction at the 2013 NRA show in Houston if people were interested, but it didn't draw any attention.

[Bill Murphy]

Bruce, values for originals do not fall when reproductions are made. End of story. I didn't understand any of the other points you were trying to make either. There is a "Black Hole of Curatorship" in the PGCA and we all know it. Ed Muderlak was not everyone's friend, but he was right about a lot of things. The Black Hole was one of them.

[Bruce Day]

The Parker Clown Cover Catalog is no different inside than other contemporary Parker catalogs. If people want to see the cover, its in TPS and we displayed it at the NRA show where 87,000 people saw it, or at least had an opportunity to see it.

[Bill Murphy]

Bruce, give it up. Ed Muderlak was right. It isn't about the Clown Catalog, it's about the Black Hole. Now that we have a slightly different BOD than in previous years, things could change, slightly. Although the present board members are friends of mine, they have not cleared up the problems of the past. I have high hopes for the future of PGCA. Don't wave what you are doing for PGCA in front of me. I and a couple of my PGCA fellow members have been doing it for years, with no support or thanks from the Board of Directors. Thank you for what you are doing, but my fellow members and I would be doing the same thing if the Board of Directors had given us some support or thanks. The support and thanks didn't happen but we are still out there trying.