No subject

[Nancy Bradford-Reid]

>
>
>  My Fellow Pennsic goers,
>
>        It has recentlycome to light that the Coopers (the family that
>owns and
>runs the mundane operations of the Pennsic Wars) have made a policy change
>which I feel is unfair, unreasonable and in its most basic form, greedy.

        Greed has nothing to do with it.  There are hug logistical
problems associated with providing the services for 9,000+ people (yes,
9,000+ was the final count last year, this year it might even go over
10,000).  Every time the SCA has made a request or Pennsic has grown, the
Coopers have graciosly complied, even to the extent of acquiring new land
in order to accommodate our needs.
        The Cooper Lake site is not perfect, but it is as close to perfect
as we are likely to find in an imperfect world.  The Coopers and their
staff are gracious, friendly,helpful, long-suffering and patient.  They,
too, have lives to get back to after Pennsic.  Yes, we generate a lot of
money for the area, but one more or less day for 1,000 people does not make
that big a difference.  It seems to me that this is te first big thing
that the Coopers, after years of accommodating us, have asked us to do.  My
suggestion is:  move the war weekend bakc by one day, so that if you want
to fight in or observe the major battles and still have an extra day to get
your act together, youwill.  And, by the way, trailers and trucks are
available on Saturday, plus they are cheaper if you keep them round trip
from whence you came (most areas, at any rate).
        My husband fights in the battles and sells armor (which means we
hav two campsites to pack up and usually stuff we are carrying for others)
and we have had not problem getting off the site by dark on Sunday.  And we
have a drive of 1500 miles in front of us!  Perhaps the individual should
look at his or her own resources and make therealistic decision that if
you don't have enough money to stop at a cheap motel for a good night's
rest, maybe you cannot really afford to go to Pennsic, no matter how much
fun it is.  If we did not sell armor, we couldn't afford to go and thisyear, for that very reason, we are not able to go--and we're not a big
operation, either.
        If one ulterior motive behind the curfew happens to be a desire to
reduce the overall size of Pennsic, I personally cannot blame the Coopers
one bit.  Their staff, as I sid, have lives to get back to, kids to get
back in school, and some, the temporary people, even have their jobs to get
back to.  It is not unreasonable for them to request less than 24 hours of
our time to help those who have been so helpful t us for so long, nor are
we "pushovers" for agreeing to the request.



Nan Bradford-Reid        |HL Catherine Harwell, CIM, AST
The Department of English|Barony of Bryn Gwlad, Kingdom of Ansteorra
The University of Texas  |~Simplicitas sum Venustas~
512-471-4991            |Argent, on a fret vert, a rose gules,
n.b-reid at mail.utexas.edu |barbed and seeded or.