Jake Norwood of Maryland KDF hosted an event of 30 or so attendees this past weekend. The primary goal of his was to get the groups from the Mid-Atlantic area together, since there seem to be so many of us within a short distance of each other, yet we so rarely meet up. (For anyone who has ever spent time in this area, you'll know that the primary reason is traffic, which can turn a 10 mile distance into a two hour drive!)

The event was organized so that there was an instructor from most of the major groups in the area: Larry Tom of MASHS taught an intro to German longsword; Cory Winslow of MEMAG taught a class on the zwerchhau of the Liechtenauer tradition; Steve Reich of the Order of the Seven Hearts taught a class on provocations with the sword and buckler in the Bolognese tradition; Bob Charette taught a class on the dagger of Fiore; Jake Norwood taught a class on the langes messer; and I taught a class on Italian rapier.

After a full day of mixed classes, there was also quite a bit of bouting. Jake wanted to hold a test tournament, where we didn't have an official winner, but plenty of fencing was done to test out tournament rules. One of the highlights of the day for me was getting a chance to fence longsword with Jake, who is a fantastic fencer and highly accomplished martial artist. I hadn't met Jake previously, and I was very impressed with his skill with the sword (as well as him being a heck of a good guy). I believe there will be videos of some of the bouts that will being going public at some point (at least, I hope so!)

Naturally there was also plenty of time afterwards to talk shop and socialize. Probably the most important part of this event, though, was a strengthening of the community in this general location. I like to think I get around and meet up with most of the groups on occassion, but even still, I don't do it often enough, and this event was a wonderful opportunity to strengthen those ties. I think all of us were inspired by Jake's entusiasm for this community outreach, and there's a lot of talk of getting us all together much, much more often!

Thanks to Jake and the crew of Maryland KDF for this!

Oh, and anyone who was present who has any photos or vids, please feel free to link them to this thread!

Bill,

Now that's the way to grow the Historical European Martial Arts. Thanks to you guys (Bill Grandy, Jake Norwood, Steven Reich, Larry Tom, Cory Winslow and Bob Charette) Western Martial Arts took a step forward.

It just proves that we need more face to face time and less cyber face time.

Allen
HEMA Alliance
http://hemaalliance.com/

To Jake and the crew of Maryland KDF,

A job well done! I had a great time meeting new people, experiencing different styles and weapons outside of my normal area of study. The sign of a good event is walking away feeling like you are a better swordsman and this was one of those events!
I can't wait until next time.

Chuck