President
John Noack
Hi all - well I’m back, putting my hat in the ring for candidacy as your President. As the longest serving member of our Executive Board, I have seen (and in some cases, led) many of the updates to how IPMS operates. Mike Oberholtzer, our Treasurer, led the charge to put Wild Apricot in place when we determined during my prior presidency that a commercially supported membership system was necessary. The addition of a Director of Social Media, ably managed by Eugenie Taylor Ray, our DSM, was another initiative. I’m proud to have helped bring many current and past Board members into the fold as well.
If elected, my goals for this Board will be to continue to develop and execute strategic goals for myself and each Board member. I’m also convinced that the key to membership growth is at the Chapter level and I want to explore more ways to motivate our local Chapter leaders and members to engage new and potential National members. We need to build and reinforce the bigger picture that compels a modeler to invest in the organization and I would work closely with our DLC and Recruitment/ Retention officer to find ways to do so. I’m also passionate about our “Models for Vets” program, having now built a number of kits for those who served and protected us.
On the personal side, I’m a retired, widowed aerospace engineering VP, and my happy place (when I am not playing guitar in one of my bands) is the National Museum of the United States Air Force, where I serve as a Docent, Education Volunteer, and Vice Chair of the Volunteer Leadership committee. I hope you’ll give me your support, but regardless, please, please make your voice heard in this upcoming election.
1st Vice President
Dave Morrissette
Hello everyone, my name is Dave Morrissette and I am running for First Vice President of IPMS USA. I have been a member of IPMS since 1994 and have held several positions with the E-board in the past as well as RC4 and was part of IPMS John Glenn in Cleveland for many years until my job took me all over the United States. As far as modeling, I build anything that interests me from planes to figures to submarines. By the time the election is over, I will be retired from a plant management position and would love to use that time to give back to IPMS.
I would like your vote for First Vice President. My goal is really two-fold. The first is to keep the IPMS USA web site the premier review site on the internet by keeping it flowing with reviews of current products while embracing the large number of changes occurring in things like 3D printing that are occurring. This will also help supply articles to the Journal and the IPMS YouTube site. I will do this by leveraging the new and upcoming manufacturers as well as supporting the long-term suppliers out there.
Secondly, I will continue the works of the previous First VP’s and improve even further the interface between those manufacturers to try and leverage our IPMS members knowledge and support. This can occur as research for a kit or building demo models for the nationals and more things that we can help them with to make them be more successful and modelers even happier.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and please vote!
2nd Vice President
Scott Hackney
I’m Scott Hackney. I am running for a second tour as Second Vice President. I assumed the duties of Second Vice President when the previous 2VP resigned last year. I am a retired RC-135 Electronic Warfare Officer with over 5,000 hours and 450 Operational Missions. I have been building models as long as I can remember and a member of IPMS since 1982. I was chairman of the national conventions in 2011, 2017, and 2022. I believe this makes me the only threetime convention chairman and uniquely qualified to be Second Vice President. In the past year we have rewritten all the rules governing the national contest. The national convention website is now managed by IPMS. No longer does each convention host have to create their own website. For 2025 we have reworked the contest categories and are bringing back traditional Out of the Box. Also, back for 2025 is Make-N-take. I look forward to continuing to update and improve the processes and products of our national convention and we work to create a better convention experience for every IPMS member.
Goals:
- There is a lot of work to do to build the IPMS/USA National Convention into a can’t miss event that every member of IPMS wants to attend. For too long the convention has existed on inertia with each host chapter having to relearn how to plan and execute.
- Now we attend Zoom Meetings, provide guidance, After Action Reports, and help the host throughout planning and execution. It is not enough. The host needs to be able to envision the path ahead and we’ll get there.
- Better documentation for the IPMS National Convention. I started with the National Contest Rules and documentation. The revised rules are simpler and easy to understand. The 2024 contest was much smoother than 2023.
- Next is new guidance for the convention itself. How to plan and execute an IPMS National Convention. Current guidance is nonexistent or ten years old.
- Rework the Awards show. The current show is way too long. The 2025 show will be much shorter and better organized. It will be a work in progress as we look at new ways to recognize our winners while keeping the show on time!
Each convention gets better, we are creating new documentation and better tools all the time. What the current team has to work with is light years ahead of what I had as Convention Chairman in 2011, 2017, and 2022. My goal is 2026 will be better yet and 2027 will have everything they need to be successful.
Secretary
Chris King
Chris King is the current founder and President of the Shenandoah Valley Modelers, one of Region II’s newest chapters. He is married with one son attending the Virginia Military Institute. With much glee, Chris is happily retired from federal service. He first served as a Naval Flight Officer in the USN flying the E-2C aircraft. After the Navy, Chris served in the US State Department where he retired as a senior officer.
Chris has been in the hobby since middle school. He first built military aircraft models but is now a jack of several trades but is mostly working on figures. No matter what he works on, his time per day is limited as one of his eight Shetland Sheepdogs will stare at him signifying the model building time is up for the day.
Secretary
Joe Terry
As someone who has been building scale models off and on for the past 28 years, I am excited for the opportunity to continue to serve IPMS/USA as Secretary. I started building scale models on the back patio of my home in Texas, graduated high school, and joined the Army. Over the next 12 years, I continued building even when I was stationed in Germany and South Korea. I have served as Secretary for local and statewide volunteer organizations as well as serving on my City’s Board of Appeals for the last several years. I am currently employed as a Records Analyst for the SC Department of Archives and History. Through my civil and military careers, I have developed the leadership and administrative skills necessary for the position. In my free time (what little there is), I continue to build with a focus on Cold War Aircraft, which is why I recently created the Cold War Aircraft SIG. In addition, I enjoy coaching my daughter’s Little League and Travel Softball teams, reading history books, and continuing to work on my Master’s Degree in History.
If elected, it is my goal to continue to refine the role of Secretary in a manner that increases efficient and timely communication. As the youngest and newest member of the E-Board, I will continue to bring a fresh set of eyes and generational perspective to the position which I will use in an effort to increase membership and help guide IPMS/USA. I want to continue working with SIG creators to further establish SIGs as a great part of the IPMS/USA. I will continue working with the Director of Social Media, and ensure that all Executive Board actions and decisions are quickly and correctly flowed to our website and other sites as appropriate. Most importantly, I will continue to build models and enjoy being a part of this great community. As Secretary and a member of the E-Board I am here to serve you, the members, and I take great pride in being able to do so.
Director of Local Chapters
Bob Delaney
I first joined IPMS/USA in 1982 and at that time joined IPMS/Gateway Chapter in St. Louis, Missouri. Except for the period 1999 to 2006 when I lived in Dallas, Texas and was a member of IPMS/North Central Texas, I have always been a member of Gateway. In that chapter, I have served various times in all elected positions. Currently, I am serving as Director of Local Chapters. Additionally, I currently edit the member newsletter, The Arch Scaler News, and serve as the chapter’s public relations and social media contact. My work editing the newsletter was recognized with regional newsletter editor awards in 2019 and 2021.
I served as public relations contact for the 1991 IPMS/USA National Convention in St. Louis. My outreach efforts for the convention, including a live appearance on a local radio show and a newspaper article about the first day of the convention, increased the event’s visibility. Over 1500 visitors came to the convention in three days.
In July of 2019, I was appointed the first Regional Coordinator for IPMS/USA Region 14 (Mid Central). This Region was spun off from Region 5 (Midwest). As of 27 November 2024, this Region consists of 20 chapters in the states of Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Kansas, and Nebraska. Since Region 14 stood up, I helped welcome three new chapters: Ad Astra Modeling Club, Blackhawk Model Builders Society, and Riverside Scale Modelers. I have maintained frequent contact with the chapters in this region and have traveled to many of the region’s shows. In 2021, I was honored by IPMS/USA as the Regional Coordinator of the Year. I am running for Director of Local Chapters because I feel my skills and experience in communication and organization can benefit IPMS/USA and its chapters. Having participated in the Regional Coordinator breakfast meetings and sat in on the Business Meetings at recent IPMS/USA National Conventions, I feel most comfortable in taking on such an active role with the Society.
As Director of Local Chapters, my goals will include increasing our Society’s number of chapters. There is plenty of room for growth with areas in this country that are not served by IPMS/USA chapters. I will also seek to increase participation by chapters in the National Achievement Awards, which can use some improvement in the number of nominees at the Regional level. I will also maintain regular contact with the IPMS/USA e-board, the Regional Coordinators, and the chapter contacts. Additionally, I would seek to improve the charter renewal turnaround time, so more chapters renew sooner in the process. This is my first attempt to get a national office with IPMS/USA, but I have every confidence that I will perform the duties of Director of Local Chapters with success.
Currently, I am employed as an Automotive Detailer for Enterprise Rent-a-Car in Ballwin, Missouri. Additionally, I am a freelance editor and writer, with over 25 years’ experience in the communications field. I also referee youth soccer in Metro St. Louis, which I have done for 40 years. I am in a relationship and have no children.
Historian/Publications Director
Ro Annis
I am a member of the IPMS Chicago Sprue Stretchers and my journey as a volunteer began when I became the club’s treasurer in 2013. In 2019 I took on the role as the advertising Manager for the IPMS/USA Journal and later became the IPMS/USA Historian/Publications Director.
A lot has happened during my tenure as the Publications Director and I believe that my contribution has had a positive effect for the IPMS/USA. One of the more important things I helped with was the transition of our society’s paper based membership system to the digital one we have now (Wild Apricot).
By far the most important contribution I have made (and which is still ongoing) is the creation of a new production process for putting the IPMS/USA Journal together. In the past the magazine was the product of a single designer and editor. When those volunteers left earlier last year, I created an editorial and design team who would use a cloud-based workspace for collaboration with digital storage. This allows the work to be distributed among the teams, thus preventing overload and burnout and allows the workload to be managed in a flexible manner, allowing volunteers time off in order to deal with real life issues. It also means that new volunteers can be added at any time, allowing them to gradually learn our process and procedures. As I have said before, everyone is doing a fantastic job, and I hope you will please consider acknowledging them for their hard work!
In addition to this, I manage all the other various tasks for the IPMS/USA Journal, ranging from managing communications with advertisers and clubs, sending out invoices, making sure event ads get placed in the right issue, and pestering members to contribute articles. As Historian, I send out PDFs to folks who request them from the archive. I also create graphics as needed for the organization and assemble all the individual articles produced by the teams into the finished digital file that gets sent to the printer. In between all of this I somehow manage to play table-top role playing games, listen to Aespa and build a model or two.
My background is essentially a creative one, I graduated with a Fine Arts degree and recently retired from inventing and designing mass market toys and games. I am fluent in both 2D and 3D design. I work closely with the magazine production volunteers to make sure the IPMS/USA Journal reaches your mailbox in a timely manner. Speaking of which, with all the new processes in place, I am very confident that the Journal will reach your mailbox consistently on time starting in early 2025. In addition to being on schedule, the magazine will be adding more features and improved content. I hope you will consider voting for me to be the Publications Director/Historian for another term.
Historian/Publications Director
Chris Bucholtz
I’m Chris Bucholtz, and I’m running for Historian/Publications Director. You may already know me as a past editor of the IPMS/USA Journal — I edited 108 issues over 18 years, and my goofy mug was on the editor’s message in each of them. I worked for many years as a journalist and magazine editor, and today I work as a content marketer for software companies. I’ve had a parallel career as an aviation author, writing five books about WWII aviation for Osprey and Casemate publishing and many articles for magazines like Flight Journal, Air Enthusiast and Warbird Digest. Before all that, I served six years as a boatswain’s mate in the Navy.
I’ve been a proud member of IPMS/USA since 1995. Since then, I’ve held many titles in my local club, Silicon Valley Scale Modelers. I was the chairman of the 1997 IPMS/USA Nationals, and I’ve been the regional coordinator for Region 9 since 2001. I also find time to build models once in a while — I focus on 1:72 aircraft and 1:20 prehistoric mammals. Often, my models depict the planes flown by the veterans I’ve interviewed for my books. (Sadly, I have yet to be able to interview a prehistoric mammal.)
I live in Alameda, California, with my wife Elizabeth and my 11-year-old daughter Amelia, who I am proud to report won Best of Show, Junior at the IPMS/Fresno Scale Modelers contest last year! The Journal is a unique asset to modelers. It allows us to take time to tell the story of a model — successes and failures, inspirations and techniques. In doing so, it allows us to get to know our fellow modelers better. Commercial magazines are constrained for space; we can run longer pieces. We must also cater to all parts of our membership, and that means a variety of subjects. That also means we get a chance to share techniques between people who build different subjects.
Keeping a balance in the Journal while hitting deadlines is a matter of coordination. It’s a project and people management exercise. I’ve done that, starting in the Navy and continuing through my professional career. I would relish the opportunity to serve as an executive editor for the Journal, assisting our volunteers to produce a great magazine while also looking for new opportunities to use our content for outreach to new members. Thank you for all the support I received over the years as editor, and thank you for considering my candidacy.
Goals and objectives:
- Create workflows to coordinate Journal volunteers’ efforts and get the magazine back on schedule.
- Create a style guide to ensure consistency in the Journal’s copy and design.
- Revert to “IPMS/USA Journal” as title of the magazine to regain brand identity.
- Collaborate with IPMS website to post additional material for some articles and drive website views.
- Invigorate ad sales efforts.
- Build program to promote the Journal in conjunction with the society’s social media efforts.
Retention and Recruitment Secretary
Tim Kirkland
I am a native of Spartanburg, South Carolina, and have been an active member of the International Plastic Modeling Society for well over 34 years. Beyond that, I’ve spent over fifty years of my life involved in plastic modeling, building my very first kit when I was only nine. I first joined a modeling club in 1984, and founded the first IPMS chapter in Spartanburg in 1991. I’ve been the chapter president of the Spartanburg Scale modelers for 31 of its 33 years of existence. Spartanburg Scale Modelers has hosted regional IPMS conventions seven times so far, and has won IPMS Regional Chapter of the Year nine times as well as serving nationally in the same role twice. Last year Model Car magazine published an article highlighting how to host a model car contest and I was on the panel representing IPMS USA along with David Lockhart.
As well as handling my duties as chapter president, I have served as IPMS Junior Activities Coordinator and was also the IPMS Nationals Automotive judge five times. I have also served as head judge for regional and local conventions 22 times. I have served as the Region 12 Region Coordinator of the Carolinas since 2021.
My continued passion for the hobby is best expressed by such programs as the Make-N-Take for juniors, which has been quite a success among our junior members, serving over 2,500 children over 30 years. This has led to seven Junior national award winners up to now, and has sparked the love of the hobby in countless others. I have encouraged such participation by working with state representatives, senators and the governor of South Carolina to see to it that these junior modelers are recognized on the state level for their achievements at the IPMS National contests.
My main goal in serving as Recruiting and Retention Secretary will be to move IPMS/USA out of “survival mode” by finding better and more effective ways to recruit and retain juniors and others new to the hobby as well as assisting the Director of Local Chapters in creating additional new chapters throughout the country. I will be utilizing new avenues of social media to do this along with other tried and true techniques, and the combination should prove extremely effective. I would like to work with our advertising members to see where we’re coming up short, and communicate more effectively with both regular members and chapter heads to find out where their concerns lie. Getting our message out is absolutely key, and there are a number of unexplored avenues to do just that.
Thank you for considering me for this vitally important post, and if elected, I will do everything possible to promote the ideals and goals of this fine institution.
Retention and Recruitment Secretary
David Knights
I am a 63 year old lawyer. I’ve been the retention and recruitment secretary for IPMS since the position was created in 2017. At that time membership had fallen to a low of approximately 3500 members. We are currently at 5200 members and I am running for one more term in order to get us to 6000 members, which I believe we can achieve. I have been an IPMS/USA member since 1982/1983. I currently cohost the Plastic Model Mojo modeling podcast which I use to help promote the society. I would welcome your vote for one final term.
Retention and Recruitment Secretary
Mike McFadden
Hi,
I’m Mike McFadden and I’m running for the office of the Director of Recruitment and Retention. I joined IPMS towards the end of my education residency in 1987. I was sort of ‘adopted’ by IPMS Orange County/SoCal and had a good membership experience right off the bat.
I feel I can do a great job with the position as I’ve experienced my membership from two very different perspectives. First as a lone member without a local club. I lived in a nonmetro/rural area where I was the only member for 50 miles. More recently, I moved to the metro Phoenix area and am a member of my local Craig Hewitt/ Phx club. I feel IPMS can be vital to both these very different modelers.
I also feel I’m a good fit for this position as I come in with no agenda other than assisting our membership.
My goals:
- Be in communication with local chapters and provide them with promotional materials.
- Oversee production of promotional materials to be used in recruitment.
- Gather information of the membership as to concerns and desires they have and to help the eboard with actionable information.
- Work to get IPMS membership/promotional materials to other events/shows of other modeling genres- for example- AMPS, WonderCon and scale model car show events.
- Work to advertise and promote membership during local, regional and national IPMS events.
- Work with fellow board members to provide great service to present and future IPMS members.
- Utilize IPMS social outlets to inform members and attract new genres to our membership.
My modeling interests include small scale amour, dioramas, specifically shadowboxes, and more recently, all things RedNeck. I live in Scottsdale, AZ. Other interests include- figure painting, history and triathlons.