Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 1999 - 79

many showed up. But let's hear the story in the words of
one who was there ...
Charles Williams was the founding chair of the
Northern Califol1lia Section and chaired the 19 2 San
Francisco conference. Later, in addition to numerous offices on the Executive Committee and the Board of Directors, he served as the ninth president of the Institute,
from 1977-1980. AFellow of the Institute, he continues
to serve today as chair of the By-Laws Commillee.
Charles Williams: ... I discovered [in 1970] that I
had been elected to the Board of Directors. And
Tom [DeGaetani] approached me and said, "How
would you like to host the conference?" And we
said, "Oh, great. When?" He said, "Well, we are going to Dallas next year [1971] and we are going to
Atlanta after that, so it would be 1973." That would
be when San Francisco would be on the schedule. 1
remember at the Board of Directors meeting inviting
everyone to San Francisco in 19 3. Between then
and, oh, I guess it was sometime in the early fall rof
19 I] that I got a phone call from Tom. He said,
"Atlanta has crashed. They are not going to do it.
Can you move it up a year?"
Interviewer: That would be in 19 2?
CW: Yes, 1972. So, we began to put the conference togetller. Given the fact that Dallas had been a total
disaster in 1971...
Interviewer: We will want to talk about that.
CW: Yes, we'll need to go back and talk about that for a
second. Yes, 197 I was really a disaster, financially.
Only about 60-65 people allended or something like
that. I mean, the Board of Directors consisted of 45.
So there was practically no one but the Board of
Directors there. It was really disastrous. I remember
sitting in a Board of Directors meeting in 197 I in
Dallas, and the t1Jen treasurer saying, "I don't have
the foggiest idea what our financial situation is."
And we appointed a committee that consisted of Ed
Kook, Biff [Walter] Dewey, and AI Cohen ...
Interviewer: Who later became treasurer?
CW: ... who later became treasurer... to get a handle on
it. By t1Je last meeting of t1Je Board before we left
Dallas, J remember AI saying, "In order to keep the
IRS off our backs, should tlley find out we are insolvent, it is going to take about $200 per Board member to get us to the break even point.
Interviewer: $200 times 45 Board members?
CW: Yes, that's how far under we were at that point. So
that was Dallas. That was tile bottom.
Interviewer: So everybody dug into their pocket?
CW: Well, we didn't have to fortunately. But we were all
facing the possibility that if the IRS discovered that

we were insolvent, that we might very well have to.
Interviewer: Do you remember why you didn't have to?
CW: Well, they instituted a drastic canlpaign to curb
expenses and to recruit new members.
Interviewer: Now, the lore and the legend is that Eddie
Kook in 19 1 dug down and wrote a check to balance the books.
CW: Yes, I think he did. I think Eddie wrote a check and
gave it to AI Cohen, but I'm not sure that AI ever had
to deposit it.
Interviewer: But it was there.
CW: Yes, it was there. If someone said, "You have to
have money." AI could say, "We've got the money."
So, when the Atlanta conference went under, it became imperative that the San Francisco conference
break even. We felt we had to do something to make
the conference more allractive. They had 200 and
some odd, as I recall Burt telling me, at the L.A.
conference, 200 plus attendees. To make the conference allractive, we needed something more than a
few sessions. We needed sometlJing to pull people
in. We felt that adding tile two things that we did, the
Design Exhibit and the Manufacturer's Exhibit,
would give us some additional draw. And we did ...
Interviewer: AStage Expo?
CW: The earliest version of Stage Expo. That is where
Stage Expo dates from officially, I think. There had
been an unofficial one in Los Angeles two to three
years before...
Interviewer: In 1969?
CW: ... Yes. And at Dallas in 1971 Kliegl had shown the
QFile Control System, but it had been in a private
room and there was nothing else. So we had an official, advertised Stage Expo; we didn't call it that but
that is what it was. So that Stage Expo dates from
San Francisco in 19 2. And a Design Exhibit that
dates from then as well. We had a wonderful Design
Exhibit. So we had those two major things.
Interviewer: So things looked good going into the conference?
CW: Actually, there was considerable worry coming in. I
remember talking, that first day, to Ron Olson. He
had Oown out, I guess, with Walt [Walters president
at that time], on the sanJe plane, and they had
talked. And they were worried. We all were worried.
We had very sketchy information. We had very few
pre-registrations.
Interviewer: Eve1)/body registered at the conference?
CW: Most people did, yes.
Interviewer: So going in you had no idea what the attendance might be?
CW: We had no idea.
Interviewer: It could have been 60 people like Dallas?
T Z>&T

MER

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 1999