I am with Larry on this one.  Somebody needs to explain the math as to how we have a loss on the cost of the replicas and the repair of Number 3.  I f you can trust the homepage there are only 3 replicas left.  So if 997 have been sold at $125 the gross should be $124,625 which should cover the expenses of $107,402.34 that are in the minutes.  It will be interesting to see what happened.

The minutes also state that the HPOCA would like to advise the Smithsonian the club lost money on the project and is closing the books on the project.  Under new business Terry proposed that the club help the Floyd County Museum get #3 after the loan to I&amp;I expires.  I basically don't care if it is at Charles City or at Penfield.  Either one is better than having it go back to a warehouse in Wash DC.  However, if I was associated with the Floyd County Musuem I'd think twice about accepting any offer of "help" from a group that went back to the owner of the tractor "whining" that they lost money on the restoration of such a great old machine. 

Spending less than $30,000 to get #3 running was not much in my eyes. Heck, my brothers and I have more than that in a 1650, 1750 and 1850 and I doubt if we'll ever get our money out of them, but we will get our moneys worth!! 

I lived in DC for 30 plus years and I can't tell you how many hours we  spent in the various Smithsonians during that time.  It is probably the greatest group of museums in the world and they have exhibits that are outstanding.  But I will tell you that when I was at Penfield for the 2003 show and they started #3 and drove it around the grounds and in the parade it was without a doubt the best Smithsonian exhibit I have ever seen.  They have IMAX movies on flight, they have recordings of steam engines moving down the track, but #3 is the only thing they have that I have heard sound just like she would have when she went out to the field to be put to work.  The HPOCA played a big part in getting that to happen and I'm proud to be a member of the club for that reason alone.   Now I just wish our board could see it the same way.  


Bill Brandt