I was vaguely ashamed of my disappointment with the conference.  I  
found one speaker simply too young and too inexperienced to have any  
idea of the sophistication of the audience.  Another made me angry  
because he was presenting a project that was nearly a repeat of one  
done very well about 15 years ago... only this one was done poorly,  
without benefit of research, with no understanding of preservation  
concepts and no respect for the safety of the work force.

But, it WAS a good conference.  I had several fine conversations and  
a late dinner with Ilene.  I met Mike.  I made new friends and spent  
time with old friends.  I encouraged some youngsters and discovered  
that somewhere along the line I have become a "character".   
Apparently everyone else has known this all along, but it took me by  
surprise.  Apparently I've also passed beyond middle age... I hope  
that doesn't mean I have to stop learning new stuff, or be mature.

Ah, but Mike, you will hurt Jim Houston's feelings if you insist that  
there were no craftsmen present.  Jim's a superb carpenter, and  
preservationist.  (We do need to get him to inject his talk with a  
little more vocal enthusiasm... for those who down share his and my  
passion for all the wonderous variety of problems and applications  
for wood roofing.)

When I first began attending APT conferences, great firms like WJE,  
Milner and Quinn-Evans would take the stage with great clients like  
NPS, the National Trust and various States.  They would bring along  
their consultants and the trades people and the projects were  
presented with depth and complexity and humanity.  It was okay if one  
member of the team was less adept at public speaking than another,  
because they were a team and they all had a stake in each other's  
work and reputation.  I know I'm just an old softy with a head full  
of mush, but those conferences are at the heart of the preservation  
person I became.  I miss that.  I may even miss it enough to speak  
up, take responsibility and try to get such presentations presented  
next year.

(Yes, I know there is a warm welcome awaiting me from my friends and  
kindred spirits at PTN... but I'm feeling cranky... I think I can  
handle one more fight.)



On Sep 18, 2006, at 9:24 AM, edison wrote:

> I dropped in for a day or so and have mixed feelings about the  
> conference too.
> Sorry I missed Py and Ilene.
>
> I do think that there is a tremendous amount of valuable  
> information exchanged
> in some of the conference sessions. On the other hand, some of these
> presenters can really get much too full of themselves. I took  
> particular
> exception to one presenter who ridiculed a contractor to make  
> himself look
> good. The presenter's position was that he should specify means,  
> methods and
> everything else, that he should be paid to train all the workers  
> and check all
> their work, and that nobody else should have anything to say about how
> anything would be done.
>
> The presenter has a project in which an 800,000 sq. ft. building is  
> to be
> repointed. His mortar removal method was hand-sawing with a Sawzall  
> blade.
> This is a public project. The contractor that he ridiculed is a well-
> established company that has worked on the most sensitive historic  
> projects of
> this scale for decades. They ended up bidding the job on the basis  
> that they
> would provide the required finished project, but that there would  
> be no hand-
> sawing with Sawzall blades, no training from someone who knew less  
> about
> repointing than they did, and no use of the historically-incorrect  
> mortar
> specified.
>
> It is inherently wrong that presenters use their command of the  
> group's
> attention as a weapon to settle personal scores. And that's where  
> APT has a
> problem. They are too insular, too incestuous. That session would  
> have been
> far more illuminating if they put the contractor on the panel to  
> make his case
> as to why he thinks this presenter is full of crap.
>
> Mike E.
>
> --
> To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
> uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
> <http://listserv.icors.org/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>

--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
<http://listserv.icors.org/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>