Lotovention 2007: The Government and Media Take Note - Part 3

By Arthur Rein, #635

While visiting his local lottery office, Thomas Brock did a little searching out behind the back in the trash and uncovered lots of sample void books for this game ensuring that collectors would be able to have this ticket in some form. He gave me several of these books to distribute its tickets as well as include some as raffle prizes.

Upon scratching two of these tickets the numbers under the latex of both tickets read "0000000" so I'm assuming that is what is listed under the latex on all the voided tickets.

This convention will also be remembered for tying the record number of "Bobs" present at a Lotovention. With Bob Heskett, Bob Schoenberger, Bob Abbott, and Bob Dressel present, the record of four "Bobs" was equaled to what we had in Chattanooga, Tennessee in 2004 when Bob Heskett, Bob Schoengerger, Bob Spoerl, and Geri McMillan's husband, Bob was present.

In the early afternoon most of us broke for lunch and walked over to the Applebee's restaurant.

Upon our return from lunch the club held its annual business meeting in which such topics as the future of the newsletter, publicity of the club and next year's Lotovention location were discussed. These topics, and more, will be discussed in more detail elsewhere in this newsletter.

After the business meeting, it was time for the raffle in which there were many lottery related items up for grabs such as sample void tickets, mint tickets, tee shirts, hats, mugs, pens, and pins, just to name a few items. After the raffle it was time for the group photo which was followed by more trading.

The Radio Press Gets Into The Act

After having the Lotovention listed in many newspapers and on television, a radio crew from CBS radio affiliate KYW news radio 1060, was sent to the hotel to cover our convention. Both Bill and Stephen spoke with the reporter about the Lotovention, the club and the hobby. Oddly enough, the reporter recognized Bill as being his teacher many years ago.

The report was scheduled to air at least once every hour beginning on Sunday morning.

Later that night some of us broke for dinner at the Old Country Buffet. Although this was the second night in a row Cyrella and I had eaten there it is a favorite place of ours and since there aren't any restaurants in our home area eating there was a novelty.

Afterwards some of us went to the casino at Philadelphia Race Track, which was located right behind the hotel. After applying for a slot club card and giving a small donation we walked around the casino in search of other slot club cards that may have been left behind for these types of collectors in the club. Since it was approaching midnight we decided to go back to the hotel but the convention room had been locked for the evening. Fortunately, there were many lotologists hanging out in the hotel lobby.

Stephen Gilbert's wife went online on one of the hotel's computers for guest use and pulled up some information about the Lotovention on the KYW radio web site which included a link to our club's web site. By the way, the Lotovention information was listed above the Star Trek convention information that was being held a few miles away in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.

Unable to stay awake much longer I finally retired to bed at about 12:30am.

Sunday, July 22

With the Lotovention almost over I wanted to get as much time as possible in the room before everything shut down but the room wasn't open until 8am. So I went to the hotel restaurant and had breakfast with a few of my lotologist friends.

Eventually the room did open and the one thing I noticed was how many people had stayed around for the Sunday activities. Normally most people get up early and leave for their long drive back home but a lot more people stayed around than usually do.

This also meant a lot more tickets had stayed around for the taking. I was still finding tickets I thought I had needed and my individual folders that Pat Fowler had given me just two days earlier were bursting at their seams.

During mid morning, Stephen Gilbert's daughter again telephoned him but this time to say that she heard the KYW 1060 news radio report about the convention.

With so many people still hanging around, the cleanup of the room was very easy as club members helped to load up and eventually carry away many boxes.

It probably took no more than an hour to pile away all the tickets that were on all the tables so we sat at the tables and talked.

Television Press Covers Lotovention

It was late morning when several of us saw a camera crew pull up to the hotel and wondered whether they were coming to cover us.

A few seconds later we were embarrassed to learn they were coming to film us since we had just put everything away. The news reporter was Leslie Van Arsdall from the CBS affiliate KYW channel 3 news and she was with a cameraman.

What ensued was the fastest set up of a Lotovention room in history as box loads of tickets were again dumped on the tables in an effort to capture what had transpired this weekend.

Stephen Gilbert was the first to be interviewed and was followed by Bill Pasquino. Then I was asked a few questions and Stephen Tuday also gave some input.

The reporter stayed for about a half hour and everything was edited down to about a minute and a half and the final product was shown that night on both the 6pm and 11pm newscasts.

For any one connected to the Internet, you can probably still see that broadcast.

Thanks to Stephen Gilbert and Bill Pasquino this Lotovention will go down in history as being one of the most publicized and best Lotoventions ever.