15 Jul 2014

 

inkblots-b-620x2502

 

Silver Inkwells

As I do every year, in my live ceremony speech at Heroes Con I present the Special Recognition Awards for members of the Inkwell team who are leaving the core committee after having served on good standing for at least a year and to those who have made an exceptional accomplishment. Below is an excerpt from my speech which rewards three outstanding team members for their service and contributions to our advocacy:

“We have three Special Recognition awards to announce. It’s very challenging to get volunteers every year for our separate and independent Nomination Committee, so we added an incentive in 2012. For those members serving for five years, we offer one of our special silver inkwell trophies. Our 2014 recipient of the silver inkwell for five years of NomCom service is Marvel Universe handbook writer Mike Hoskin!  He’s not here today but I will be sure to ship his trophy to him.  Hopefully in one piece.

The other recipient was a former contributor for two months in 2011 and core committee member of our team from 2011 until 2013.  Sarah L. Covert was incidentally the first and only member to request membership via LinkedIn instead of being sought out. While she handled our social networks and other duties for a time, she will most-notably be remembered for her work as our self-labeled ‘Techno-Queen’.  After our new WordPress site was established and left incomplete by a former committee member who soon departed, Sarah helped me turn that basic template into something to be proud of.  So like the many core committee members before her who retired on good standing, we present the silver inkwell to her and her exceptional performance. <Sarah got up to the podium to speak. This will be shown once the ceremony video is posted at the site soon>

Our third and final recipient was the last active founding member other than myself to remain on the team until last summer, a total of six seasons.  After I wrote an article in my Inkblots column in Sketch magazine about a hypothetical Inking Awards event in 2007 it was on Jim Tournas’ Inkwell Yahoo group mailing list that I decided to follow-up and open discussion amongst my fellow inking peers about making this a reality.  I formed my original core committee with members from that list such as inker Tim Townsend, writer Daniel Best, my Sketch magazine editor Bill Nichols, and rounding off the team with inker Jim Tournas himself.  At one point or another Jim’s duties included almost everything but a couple of highlight examples include setting up the original website with Danny Best in the winter of 2008 and he was involved with convention fundraising.  In 2010 he asked me to handle the duties of book production after Bob Shaw had created our first fundraising sketchbook the year before. With me he set up the annual Donations and Results book for five issues, the last with a variant edition, and two Joe Sinnott Inking Challenge collections, eight books in all!  He’s also the guy who sets up the online ballot at our website every year and still does in his representative role of senior contributor….when ink flows through your veins it’s hard to kick us to the curb! I present the final version of the original silver inkwell designed trophy to Jimmy Tournas!  Of course, for the first time in years he didn’t make it to this convention so I will be sure to bring it back with me to Massachusetts.”

Congratulations to all and thank you for all you’ve done and continue to do! The full video for the live ceremony speech from June 21 will be posted this summer on our 2014 Award Recipients page.