Centennial Celebration - 100 List (E)
Most Memorable Conference Events
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- Nashville, 2004 - first IT Dance party. First instance of DJ saying "I didn't know librarians could dance like that!" Beginning of a great tradition.
- Nashville, 2004 - the Gaylord location, "inside the globe"
- Toronto, 2005 - opening of the INFO-EXPO Hall with Swedish(?) screaming choir singing O Canada
- New York, 1984 - Best CE course. My first day at an SLA conference, taking the CE course on the One Person Library, taught by Guy St. Clair. It changed my life. Honestly.
- Cincinnati, 1993 - Best dance party. The Coasters ("Poison Ivy"), sponsored by Moody's, as I recall. Runner up: The Four Tops, sponsored by Dialog. Not sure what year, but I'm thinking 2000 in Philadelphia.
- Pittsburgh, 1990 - I have fond memories of Pittsburgh in 1990, culminating in the best field trip for an architectural librarian: Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater. Runnerup for best field trip: The Huntington Library, Art Gallery and Gardens, Anaheim 1987.
- Denver, 2007 - Best Speaker: Al Gore, Denver 2007. Enthralling, especially since I know he threw out his prepared speech 24 hours in advance and spoke extemporaneously about our value. Runnerup: Peter Drucker in Los Angeles, 2002, the "couch conversation".
- Seattle, 1997 - Best one-two punch for speakers: Bill Gates (keynoter) and Jeff Bezos in Seattle, 1997. The richest man in the world talked about information management and then handed off to Mary Lee Kennedy who showed the latest happenings at Microsoft Library. That was the first time I'd seen people line up for the keynote session over an hour before the doors opened. Then the guy who was Time magazine's Person of the Year two years later spoke to an SRO audience about his ambitions for that quirky little book delivery startup called Amazon.com. He wasn't a big shot in the world yet, but we knew who he was and what he was proposing to do.
- San Antonio, 1991 - Most exciting session: The first business meeting of the new Solo Librarians Division. A new tribe in SLA came together. I later served as the third chair.
- New York, 1989 - Best nightlife: Gotta be New York. 1989. Dancing on the revolving dance floor at the Rainbow Room at the top of Rockefeller Center, then ordering a bottle of "Trefethen Library Select" chardonnay for my library friends (I still have the bottle). Ok, maybe this one doesn't go into the top 100, but it's on my list of personal favorites.
- Cincinnati, 1993 - I'm not sure of the specifics, but I remember there was a fire and an evacuation at the Cincinnati meeting in 1993.
- Cincinnati, 1993 - For me, the most memorable part of that meeting was when the Board voted to accept the Legal Division. I was the only Legal Division petitioning member in the room at the time, but now the Division has grown to be the 4th largest in SLA (at one time--we may even be bigger now). That might be a record.
- San Antonio, 2001 - My favorite is dancing to the band Three Dog Night at the Dialog party at the San Antonio in 2001!
- Albuquerque, 2004 - There was a gas leak/fire alarm at the 2004 Leadership Summit in Albuquerque. It wasn't the conference hotel but one across the street. La Posada, maybe? Anyway, a number of us spent the night in the lobby of the conference hotel since we had to evacuate ours.
- Atlanta, 1994 - O.J. Simpson was arrested the same week as the conference.
- Boston, 1996 - Gay Pride Parade held during the conference
- Seattle, 1997 - Bill Gates keynotes & Microsoft librarians have a booth in the exhibit hall
- Minneapolis, 1999 - tornadoes (Europeans were quite excited!)
- Los Angeles, 2002- Lakers won the NBA championship on the last night of the conference. Although the game was not played in LA, helicopters were overhead waiting for riots and pandemonium.
- Nashville, 2004 - The first IT Dance Party was in Nashville. I was the division Chair, but Heather Hlava deserves all the credit for coming up with the idea and making it happen. She had arranged to have someone teach line dancing, but after about half an hour, the whole thing evolved into a wild dance party, and the rest is history!
- San Francisco, 1971 - To this day I tell people what I learned at the San Francisco SLA meeting in 1971. Can you believe anyone remembers that far back? It might have been the first national meeting I attended. What I learned: the NORMAL, EXPECTED result of communication is confusion and misunderstanding. When this happens, don't get upset or try to place blame, but accept that fact and try communicating more clearly. I'm sorry I can't find a record of the speaker's name; it was a memorable lesson for library work but also for life in general.
- San Antonio, 2001 - The year we had both Molly Ivins and Dave Barry as keynote speakers was a fabulous one! San Antonio, 2001. It was just great. Both of them lauded librarians in the best way, and you've never heard such laughter!! I had people begging me to sneak them into either session.
- Nashville, 2004 - Watching the transit of Venus across the sun in Tennessee (2004) was very, very cool. Somewhere I have photos of everyone who came wearing their solar glasses.
- Seattle, 2008 - Seeing SLA President and President-Elect taking over the dance floor at the IT/LMD/PAM Dance Party.
- Indianapolis, 1998 - Finishing my term as Chair of PAM and then celebrating with my "team" and other SLA folks at the Slippery Noodle, Indiana's oldest continually-operated bar.
- Meetings were never dull: chlorine gas leak (Atlanta? missed that) ; tornado (Denver) ; sand storm (Winnipeg) ; tornado warnings or was it hurricane? (Indiannapolis) ; hotel evacuations /fires (thank heaven no one was hurt)
- New York, 2003 - David McCullough and Madeline Albright as dynamic, engaging keynote speakers (The Good)
- Atlanta, 1981 - Chlorine spill, Denver, 1988 - Tornadoes, Montreal, 1995 - Hotel fire (The Bad)
- New York, 1989 - Crossing a picket line to attend a reception at Tavern on the Green (The Ugly)
- New Orleans, 1983 - Dancing in a chorus line in a French Quarter bar with a bunch of news librarians while the bartender poured free beer. Oh, and the conference (my first) pretty much taught me how to do my job.
- New Orleans, 1983 - after 2 days of preconference workshops that taught me so much that my head almost exploded, dancing as a chorus line in a French Quarter bar with a group of news librarians while the bartender poured free beer
- Denver, 1988 - Tornadoes (5 of them) storming through Denver
- Montreal, 1995 - Fire in a downtown hotel (as in Cincinatti, 1993)
- Atlanta, 1981 - Chemical spill in an Atlanta hotel
- Los Angeles, 1968 - The tragedy of Bobby Kennedy's assassination in the SLA conference hotel 1968. I was not there, but colleagues tell me that several news librarians stepped in to cover the event for their newspapers back home.
- San Francisco, 1992 - Astonishingly, I was appointed SLA planning chair for the conference that year. What impressed me most was discovering the quality of talent and amount of effort supporting that planning effort BEFORE the conference! Oh, and I got to wear my first "ribbon" on my conference badge.
- Montreal, 1995 - I was selected to be a SLA Fellow. A great group of fine folks!
- Minneapolis, 1999 - Conference where fellow Fellow Doris Helfer, enlightened me that Mimi, Didi, and Kitty were NOT the Dixie Chicks, but were in fact SLA presidents! They were also my friends. The things one learns at conferences boggles the mind.
- XXXX - My favorite conference is ALWAYS the current one. I renew friendships with long-time colleagues, meet budding professionals, discover new products, connect with veteran vendors, learn what's new, who knows, and have more fun than I thought possible. You're on your way to creating your own conference lore. Keep the faith and keep a good record.
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