2^nd OFFICIAL MEETING OF

WORLD LEADERS AUTOGRAPH SOCIETY

Oslo, Norway

2^nd August 2014

hosted by: Jan Syvertsen and Rune Moe from Norway

written by: Rune Moe from Norway

participants: Jan Syvertsen from Norway

                                                                            Rune Moe from Norway

                                             Christer Danielsson from Sweden

                                             Heinz-Ulrich Kammeier from Germany

                                             Günter from Germany

                                             Ralf from Germany

                                             Karl from Austria

                                             Dag from Norway

                                             Kjell Hofstad from Norway

                                                                            Lars Olav Karlsen from Norway

The rainy day started after breakfast when we went with the ferry out to Bygdøy. We visited Roald Amundsen’s famous ship Fram, which reached the South Pole in 1911. It is possible to walk on the ship and see it inside. There you could watch the cabins of the crew and other interesting items from the famous expedition.

Later we went back with the ferry to Oslo and walked to the Royal Castle to attend the change of guards. The sun was shining and hundreds of tourists watched the show.

At 3pm we attended the guided tour at the Noble Peace Prize center. We had also a special permission to have a look at the Nobel Peace Center’s guestbook, which was very interesting for us! You can read more about this in an own article.

In the evening, the official meeting was held at conference room number 404 at the Best Western Karl Johan Hotel, In the centrum of Oslo. 10 collectors and 2 wives from 4 different countries attended this meeting. Countries represented was Norway, Sweden, Germany and Austria. Everyone had something interesting to show or trade and the meeting became very interesting.

The introduction was about World Leaders Autograph Society (WLAS) and how it became an association. It started as a Facebook group a couple of years ago, and the idea of a meeting came up. This was arranged in Krakow, Poland in 2013. Jan and Rune talked about how they would like to gather collectors of world leaders and historical autographs. The idea is to share experiences and how to make it easier to receive autographs.

After the introduction, all the attending collectors talked a little about themselves and their collection. It was very interesting to find out that the 10 collectors had collected autographs for totally 350 years!

Next point was about the 2013 meeting in Krakow. Jan and Rune talked about the meeting with Slovak collector Michal Dominik and Polish collector Maciej Olbert. We had a great time sharing experiences and also exchanging some autographs. Olbert, the host, also made an agenda where we visited the city of Wroclaw and Auschwitz museum.

We then discussed the future of WLAS, how we could build friendship and future meetings.  We discussed and asked if anyone would attend a board. So far the board will include member from Germany, Jan Syvertsen from Norway, Rune Moe from Norway, member from Norway and Michal Dominik from Slovakia.

Then we discussed the cooperation with the German Autograph Club, Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Autographensammler (AdA). The president of Ada talked about the German club and also agreed to cooperate with WLAS. WLAS will have some pages in the AdA magazine in English language in its own section. We encourage the members to write articles for the magazine. We also elected member from Norway as the WLAS contact with the AdA magazine.

The next WLAS meeting is not decided yet. We have thougt about having the meeting in different countries each year, and Bratislava, Slovakia has been one suggestion. Another suggestion is to have the meeting together with the AdA meeting in Leipzig, Germany, 30 May 2015. This will be decided later by the board.

After the official meeting, we had lectures from member from Norway and member from Germany.

Member from Norway talked about his passion of autographs and historical documents. Member from Germany showed us some of his early autographs and talked about how he started and the development of the collection.

After the lectures all members had a good time to the late night exchanging and trading autographs, and an evening dinner.

We hope this meeting will connect collectors of world leaders autographs.