Thanks to Steve for Clouseau-ing this one together:
Dana Brand has been working on a conference in 2012…
On April 26, 27, and 28, 2012, Hofstra University, with the cooperation of the New York Mets, is going to host a conference, open to the public, to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the team. The conference is being organized by me, Dana Brand, and a colleague of mine at Hofstra, Richard Puerzer. In the next few months, we expect to be sending out a Save the Dates announcement and a Call for Papers Announcement. Other correspondence will follow in the course of 2011.
We are currently assembling mailing lists for the conference. If you would like to receive our announcements, please e-mail me at [email protected]. If you’d like to receive the announcements only by snail mail, please give me your name and address. If you’d only like to receive our announcements by e-mail, please give me your name and e-mail address. If you’d like to receive our announcements by snail mail and by e-mail, please give me both your snail mail and your e-mail addresses.
This is going to be a terrific conference, the first ever to explore ALL ASPECTS of the existence of a major league baseball team. Get on the mailing list, or get the latest information by following the announcements that will appear on my blog.
That I have heard about before and have been excited about for some time. Steve noticed that Dana posted the following in the same message board thread.
The thing is that the Mets, over the years, are not being consistent about when their anniversaries are. The 1986 season was the big deal, as the 25th season. And 2010 will be the 50th season. But right now they prefer to celebrate the 50th anniversary in 2012. At least, that’s what they said to us as we began to initiate the conference.
Old guys like me remember that they celebrated the 25th in 1986….and if you count on your fingers you will find that 1986 was the 25th season much like 2011 will be the 50th season (go ahead and try it 62, 63, 64…)
Cynical guys like me realize that they can celebrate the 25th anniversary of 1986 this season and get some old guys like me to show up (but inly about 35,000 of us based upon 8/1/10) and then celebrate the 50th in 2012 (and then the 30th of the Tuggies in 2013).
Anyways, here’s to hoping that when 50 does happen they TAKE THE EXCUSE to look like this.
..
A few folks have sent in cool things to [email protected]
Keep ’em coming! I will be rolling them out as the days go by. Today I’m trying to not be on the computer all day.
Also, 2012 will be celebrating 14 years of officially having black as a team color (or recognizing that it should have initially been a team color in 1962). Yea! 😉
I’m all for celebrating whenever you can. 🙂
I looked through Bill Henderson’s MLB Game Worn Jerseys Guide…since it shows all patches worn from the early 1970s on, I checked to see if teams typically commemorate by number of season or anniversary. It really showed a mix. I’d say a slight majority go by season…some like the Mets have been inconsistent. When celebrating an event like winning a championship, it is always anniversary. So next year the Mets should celebrate the 25th anniversary of their 1986 team.
I could see either way on the franchise celebration. Since you wear the patch all season, probably makes more sense to commemorate the 50th season.
Thanks for the exposure, Shannon. This helps to explain why I got a sudden surge in the number of requests to be on the mailing list. The save the date card (it’s really pretty and it has the Mets logo and everything, so if people want it in physical form, they should give me a physical address as well) is probably going to be sent out in January and the call for papers will be sent out in March. Right now, the last contracts are being signed with the Mets and me and my co-organizer are hoping that we’ll be able to have an official announcement in the Mets museum at Citi Field this winter to which members of the press and bloggers like yourself will be invited. We had originally asked the Mets if they wanted to celebrate the anniversary in 2011 because the team was named and organized in 1961, but they’ve been consistently asking for 2012 and so it will be. I’m very excited about this, of course. It will mark a whole new era, I hope, in Mets consciousness and I think it is part of a whole new era in which the Mets are committed to being more attentive to the most hardcore elements of their fanbase.