History of East Bay Angler Winter programs:

The first East Bay Angler off-season show held in 1985 was performed in its regular club house: the Riverside Sportsman's Club on Mohawk Drive.  In promoting the show we neglected to specify if it was a fresh or salt water show. The response was overwhelming. We had to send people up to the entrance to Mohawk Drive to stop cars from coming down. The next year the show was moved to the Barrington Middle School -- and we made sure to announce it was salt water show.

We started with nine-projector multi-image slide shows, performed with rear-projection on a home-made screen of translucent architect' vellum. Full-house audiences ended sitting up on the stage (vellum is viewable from both sides),  and in the aisles. Soon video appeared. On November 10, 1990, Tom Meade published a feature in the Journal about Will Barbeau's comical efforts to shoot a video of Frank Daignault catching bass at the Charlestown Breachway. The effort was failing because the fish were not responding to cue. This article attracted the interest of Mike Laptew who had been shooting underwater videos as a hobby.  Mike called Will: "Perhaps I can help?" The rest is history.

It was in these early years that many great local speakers found their voices -- often at EBA shows. David Pickering, Mike Laptew, Charley Soares and others helped build the reputation of the EBA events. Many of the speakers quickly perceived the demographic we had discovered, and launched competitive shows. Being first of the season became a desired goal, so we played hop-scotch backward, moving the shows from April back toward January. Technology evolved quickly. From slides to video. From VHF to DVD. From analog to digital. Finally high-def made its first appearance at the 2008 show. Mike Laptew never looked back. He quit his career selling Pitney-Bowes equipment and became a producer of professional videos and web sites for fishing camps and other facilities.

Show promotion has also evolved. Starting with 'general admission', we switched to advance ticket sales so that attendees could come from beyond 75 miles and have seats. The 2009 show was the first to sell tickets with the aid of web sites.  Evolution continues.