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The Guide |
Photos |
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Columns |
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| The owners of BHQ: Mark Balzer, Larry Moss and Sheena Beaverson |
On Sunday, February 2, 1992 Larry Moss made the first post to the ftp email list designed to discuss "Balloon Modeling on the Net." Discussions over the month of February (13 posts!) started with making only dogs, hiding your balloons from kids, freezing balloons to preserve them, working for tips, making swords, and balloon book recommendations. The list stayed pretty quiet after that until May when a rousing debate (8 posts!) covered pumps and mouth inflation. Anyone ready to revive one of those threads, in the spirit of nostalgia?
Things quietly puttered along after that, until November 9, 1993 when Larry put out a request for assistance:
I've been pointing new subscribers to the old balloon mail available for ftp, but almost no one has taken advantage of that. Would someone be willing to put together some basic sort of introduction for the list. I'm hesitant to call it a FAQ since there are few enough postings that we don't really have any questions that are asked frequently.
Soon after, Mark and I began helping out and the Guide to Balloons and Ballooning was created. Guide expansions and photo archives grew steadily over the next few years. We finally got overwhelmed in 1997, and made the tough decision to take the whole thing off-line. Within an hour of announcing this, we acquired our first major sponsor. Formally becoming co-owners of Balloon HQ, LLC, came some time after.
There were many happy times (and growing pains) along the way. We invite you to peruse the full Balloon HQ History to share the memories. Larry, Mark and I are grateful to have so many wonderful friends from all over the world. We also invite you to join us in celebrating our 15th Anniversay by sharing some cake at Twist and Shout 2007 in Nashville, TN USA.
Some major milestones in BHQ history include the debut of our logo in 2001, the release of our major redesign in 2002, the rapid expansion of the photo database since 2003, and the creation of RSS feeds to track activity in 2005. We're excited to announce a new web portal for long-time Balloon HQ visitors that combines all of these attributes, and more, in one convenient location. This is BalloonHQ.net
The BalloonHQ.net portal offers an up-to-date window on activities at BalloonHQ.com. It allows balloon professionals the ability to see the latest news, photos, posts, and classified ads at a glance. It will also, in turn, allow us to begin a redesign of the traditional BalloonHQ.com front page. The redesign will focus on presenting the balloon community to new-comers. Be they potential clients searching for you, the general public ready to be wowed by your photos, or new colleagues wanting to access professional resources. We're excited about all of these changes, and know that you'll love the convenience of the BalloonHQ.net interface.
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| Dancer |
John Barthelmes of West Henrietta, NY is a full time entertainer, decorator, performer and teacher. John helps out with area high school theatre groups and his balloon projects often find their way into his stage productions. He is part of the BHQ team and serves as Administrator of the BHQ Email Forums and monthly columns.
See John Barthelmes' BHQ Portfolio.
