I had tables at a small show at Lake Livingston this weekend as a warmup to the somewhat larger show in Conroe where I always display...The promoter, whom I've known for a long time, told me after I set up that he spent the week getting threatening emails and phone calls from enraged "activists" who told him it was disrespectful to the grieving families of dead children to have a gun show where even more crazed lunatics could arm themselves and then go out and massacre the populace...Joe said two of them even threatened his life, so he filed a report with the local Sheriff's Office who investigated further...He was told one of them was in Oregon from a known nutcase with a long history of such behavior...The other originated in Virginia from another unstable source...Obviously these people just go through the Gun Show Trader publication and threaten all the promoters...
Joe said he's used to having people steal his signs overnight directing people to the shows, so he now puts them out only on show mornings and takes them up after hours...It was a little different at the show this weekend as a group of about half a dozen gathered at the entrance near the roadway yesterday morning, marching up and down chanting with their signs against all the baby-killers arming themselves for more carnage...Joe let them stew in the sun for a couple of hours to see what else they had planned, and then walked out to talk to them...He's a real jovial, friendly guy anyway, so when he confronted them he just thanked them for being there, and drawing attention to his show, and waving people in to the right driveway with their bright colored signs...
He told them he normally has to pay people $15 an hour to do what they were doing for free...By the time he walked back up to the door, they had folded their tents, got in their Prius hybrids and quietly left...Crowds were pretty good at the show that morning...
...Ben
Joe said he's used to having people steal his signs overnight directing people to the shows, so he now puts them out only on show mornings and takes them up after hours...It was a little different at the show this weekend as a group of about half a dozen gathered at the entrance near the roadway yesterday morning, marching up and down chanting with their signs against all the baby-killers arming themselves for more carnage...Joe let them stew in the sun for a couple of hours to see what else they had planned, and then walked out to talk to them...He's a real jovial, friendly guy anyway, so when he confronted them he just thanked them for being there, and drawing attention to his show, and waving people in to the right driveway with their bright colored signs...
He told them he normally has to pay people $15 an hour to do what they were doing for free...By the time he walked back up to the door, they had folded their tents, got in their Prius hybrids and quietly left...Crowds were pretty good at the show that morning...
...Ben
