What has now become a major event in the British "military hobbies" calendar, the annual Model Engineering Exhibition, took place in London from the January 5 to 14. This was the exhibition's second year at the new Wembley Conference Centre in north-west London, and also the first in which it has been open on a Sunday; thus greatly increasing the public attendance. Indeed, the total attendance for the exhibition during its ten days, was over the 78,000 mark. Although as the name indicates, it is by no means solely a military affair, more and more of our hobbies attention is being focused on it each year. Many of the familiar names in figure and war games paraphenalia were represented, including Miniature Figurines, Historex, Skytrex, Nav-War, and Heroics, not to mention numerous retail outlets for these and many more. A splendid stand by the British Model Soldier Society caught the eye, and I understand from John Sanders and Don Disley of B.M.S., they were more than pleased with the results. In addition to their stand, they also arranged with M.A.P. (the organizors of the Battle magazines) for a series of painting competitions ranging from individual figures and military vehicles up to fair sized dioramas. Again, the standard generally was very high, and these models received a good deal of public attention. One particularly disappointing aspect of presentation was the demonstration war gaming. I have always had misgivings about this type of affair since it is only too obvious that war gaming is not basically a spectator sport, and careful planning as well as clever presentation is required to hold the attention of the on-looker, not to mention his interest. I feel that the war gamers present were already at a disadvantage in that the space available was, to say the least, inadequate. However, the poor presentation and lack of information available to the would-be enthusiast were extremely self-evident. I was manning the Napoleonic Association stand along with many other N/A members, and had the opportunity of observing not only the stands, but also the public. Most pleasing to me was the large number of visitors from outside the United Kingdom. I spoke at length to two gentlemen from the Brigade of the American Revolution; both members of a Virginia line regiment as I remember, and also had a most interesting conversation on "butternut brown" with an enthusiast from Charleston. The Napoleonic-Association was able to gain several new members and a provisional invitation to do a battle in Lille, France. This international aspect of the exhibition is perhaps its most important. All things considered, the forty-seventh Model Engineering Exhibition was a definite success. As I mentioned in my last report, the war games world is undergoing a subtle, but definite change in the U.K. The larger blocks and agglomerates are gradually disappearing, and the National Wargames Convention itself is losing prominence, in definite contrast to the more general affairs, such as the Model Engineer, and the ever successful Fall convention in Manchester. In many ways, this is a reaction to the idea of competition war gaming, which has been extremely over-publicized in years past. War gaming is, arguably, by definition a hobby with a myriad spectrum of interests. Perhaps unconsciously, those in the larger sphere of organizing such competitions have become identified with stolid rigidity of attitude -- for example the oft-repeated aspiration of a universal set of rules for specific periods of war gaming. A measure of the lack of support for the N.W.C. could be taken from the fact that several months ago, the club from the north of England, which had won the entitlement to organize the 1978 convention, placed notices in the modelling press offering to "give" 'the convention to any club in southern England in an attempt to build up interest in that part of the country! It is fairly apparent that, since these functions totally depend on war gamer's attendance, something must be done to change the trend. On present evidence, it would seem that the day of the solely competition convention is over -- certainly not a bad thing. Back to Empire, Eagles, & Lions Table of Contents Vol. 1 No. 24 Back to EEL List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1978 by Jean Lochet This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com