Brian Peck and I left July 20 for Omaha Nebraska to go to the nationals. This is the third time Omaha has hosted the nationals I’ve been twice and both times they put on an excellent show. So after a 13 hour trip we showed up at the venue, unpacked, got a good nights sleep and first thing Thursday we hit the vendor room. The largest mobile hobby shop had a lot of good stuff and we shopped and shopped. Unfortunately not all vendors could make it but we found what we were after.
Then it was time to enter our models. Brian had eight entries, several in large scale World War I stuff and several in jets and an F-51 mustang. I had 27 entries in many different categories; two were 1/48 scale the rest 1/72 scale. As I was putting my entries at I was stunned to see dozens and dozens of entries in many of the categories. The quality of the entries was extremely high and there were multiple entries in categories I had not seen a lot of interest in in the past.
We scored tickets to the dinner at the SAC Museum, so about 300 of us had the place to ourselves and several of the exhibits were open that you could walk in and sit in.
Friday was more shopping and more walking up and down the isles look at all of the amazing entries. There were lots of seminars to go to, and other activities. There was a real good raffle with lots of really good stuff which neither of us won anything.
Another great part of being at the national is meeting up with people you’ve met before like Dem brothers and some former ASM members; Larry Glenn and Mark Walcott and Donald Silience were there. The only other ASM member there was Dave Straub and his son.
Judging began Friday night and I did not envy the judge‘s job as the quality of entries on the table was extremely good. As I was looking in the categories I was in I didn’t think my chances were very good, but one never knows. On Saturday we got up and hit the model room where they had put out the best of awards and then hit the vendors room to see what fire sale deals we could score. Then came Saturday evening and time for the banquet. The banquet was well attended I think there were more than 300 people there. Then came time for the announcements. There were 2808 entries, which made it the third biggest nationals in history, 900+ participants and hundreds of walk-through visitors due to having news stories on two different local television stations. Then there were the announcements about next year in San Marcos and then 2024 in Madison Wisconsin, and then the awards presentation started. They were going to live stream it for the people who did not have banquet tickets but something went wrong and they had to open up the side room for people to see the awards. They also had some guest presenters as one of the of the two usual duo presenters could not make the convention. I was of course surprised to take a third place in category 154 basic kit built small scale helicopters. Dave Straub took a second place in category 185 scratch built aircraft with a Seaplane. As the awards went on Brian leaned over to me and whispered I’ve been skunked! But I knew we hadn’t. Then they got to the special awards one of which is the Jack Morris memorial award for best Korean subject, which was won this year by Brian Peck with his Korean war F-51 mustang in 1/32. Brian of course was totally stunned! Former member Larry Glenn got a third place and a first place and of course the Engar brothers did well as usual.
Then of course came time for the 13 Hour drive home on Sunday and back to reality.
