A special friend of mine and of the insulator hobby passed away this month. Steven Wayne Yvaska was the well-known antiques columnist for the San Jose Mercury Newspaper and had a huge readership in the Mercury's circulation area. I got it in my head that I wanted him to write about insulators, the hobby and our upcoming Regional in San Jose in 2004. So I spent a year and a half before the Regional- writing him letters and leaving him messages on his office phone introducing myself at first, then talking about insulators, their history, their beauty and our upcoming Convention at the Red Lion Hotel. My initial calls and letters were ignored, but I kept at it sending fresh letters every few months. With the Convention approaching, I wrote in despair a newspaper style article about the hobby and the Convention and told him I would do all the work for him if he would just publish my article. Shortly thereafter he called me up and invited me to meet with him at his office. For our meeting I brought some Crown Jewel magazines and several insulators as gifts, including a purple WT #1. At our meeting he told me I was a "reporter's dream" not only offering all the research but also writing the news article for him. He advertised our show but did not visit. I kept in touch and he advertised our show again the following year when I cohosted the 2005 San Jose National. I think he visited the show as he always had a free admission left at the convention door. We kept in touch and he sent a reporter and photographer on Saturday to the 2011 San Jose National. We had a great write up that Sunday morning. I became Steven's insulator expert and appraiser for his readership and following. R.I.P. Steven.