The Internet allowed the rivalries of the disparate parts of the fencing community to expand from local disputes to arguments crossing all national boundaries. At the same time, it also made it easier for fencers, fencing instructors and fencing clubs to find each other. Anyone with a computer and an Internet connection could begin searching for fencing and fencers in different parts of the world. Many fencing organizations, particularly those attached to universities began to set up fencing web sites. Several not only posted their organization’s information, but histories and rules of fencing, links to other groups and lists of fencing organizations in different areas.

In 1997, the Louisiana State University web site maintained a list of as many organizations as it could locate. On the section for Texas, the LSU site displayed information on 22 fencing organizations. Four of those groups were within the Gulf Coast Division’s area: a somewhat dated reference to the University of Houston Fencing Club with Suman Palit as contact; the Clear Lake Fencer’s Club with Michael Mergens; the Spindletop Cavaliers with Hazel Power as their contact in Beaumont; and the Rice University Fencing Club.

In February 1997, the USFA’s site listed seven clubs in the Gulf Coast Division: Bayou City Fencing Academy; Blade Runners; Clear Lake Fencers’ Club; the Rice University Fencing Club; the South Houston High School Fencing Club; the Spindletop Cavaliers and the Texas A & M University Fencing Club. The University of Houston club was not on the USFA list. By July, Blade Runner would also disappear from the USFA’s list, dropping the number of USFA clubs in the Gulf Coast Division to six.

Meanwhile, John Clements and HACA had expanded beyond their private study groups and their Internet presence. Starting in the summer of 1997 he began teaching public courses and private lessons in Houston. Well before any sport or classical fencing groups, Clements associated himself with Leisure Learning Unlimited, a business and organization which brought together sundry "classes" of interest to adults who wished to pursue varied interests. Alongside 2-6 week courses in whitewater rafting, writing poetry, hiking, photography and how to be a private investigator, Clements offered his course in "Renaissance fencing." The Leisure Learning Unlimited courses offered him exposure across the Houston area to a diverse public. It also caught the attention of others in the varied fencing communities on the Texas crescent and piqued their respective curiosities, in part simply because most had never met, or even heard of John Clements or HACA

By July of 1997, even Mauro Hamza had created a sparse Internet presence with a basic personal web page. Under "Fencing" it simply read, "Fencing is my sport and I enjoy myself when I fence or watch my students fence and do well in the tournaments. I hope that fencing is going to be one of the famous sports in the country. Now I have my own club - Bayou City Fencing Academy - to teach fencing as a modern sport."

The web site for the Southwest Section carried a list of six fencing clubs in the Gulf Coast Division and their contacts. They were: the Bayou City Fencing Academy and Mauro Hamza; the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club and Michael Mergens; the Rice University Fencing Club and Tim Miller; the South Houston High School Fencing Club and Jerry Dunaway; the Spindletop Cavaliers and Craig Comisky; and, the Texas A & M University Fencing Club and Bobby Thornton.

Bobby Thornton was the Texas A & M club’s president. The Vice-President was C. Brooks Proffitt. The club seems to have had no secretary or treasurer at this time. While most students would be away for the summer, Shalyn Shourds would serve as its "summer contact."

When one person mentioned they were looking for places to fence in Houston at this time, Chip Jarred, the former Gulf Coast Division Chair summed the situation up like this, "If you plan to compete seriously, especially in foil, I recommend Bayou City Fencing Academy (BCFA). For epee, Rice University is probably the best choice for bouting, though BCFA's coach is good for training. If you just want to do it recreationally, then I recommend either Rice if you're anywhere near that area, or if you're in South Houston, Clear Lake Fencer's Club. There is also a club that has formed in Kingwood [Kingwood Fencing Academy], but it's very new and I don't have any details yet. If you're in the northwestern extremes of the Houston area you may find the Texas A&M club to be a viable choice. Regrettably, nothing in Houston is close to anything else. You might contact the current Chairman of that Division, Mike Mergens."

The newly-formed Kingwood Fencing Academy was founded by William Trapani.

Just as one new club had organized in Kingwood, an existing club had passed away. As a Huntsville area fencer named Byron Ray put it, "Our club at Sam Houston State kinda faded out after those greedy $#@! in athletics got all of our money and our instructor retired."

There were still, however, no fencing clubs in Corpus Christi. Once again a fencer recently transplanted to that city placed messages on rec.sport.fencing, but in the summer of 1997 there were no responses. Perhaps, if, like the Alexander family before them, they had also sought out the SCA, they might have gotten a response.

Indeed, the SCA was also quite active in the Houston area, even when the elements were against them. Joe Wolfe, using the persona Manfred Wolfe, from Loch Soilleir (Clear Lake) had to reschedule their "Loch Guardian," described as, "a good size tourney bestowing 4 titles (Chivalric champion, Rapier champion, A&S, and Bardic)," due to torrential rains in May. The adjusted event was held July 11-13, "among the shady and cool pines of Lake Houston State Park (North of Houston)." Such were the vagaries one had to parry within a tradition of outdoor fencing.

The event featured, "Chivalric and Rapier Swiss-5 tourneys, Title Bard competition, Loch Artisan competition, an Archer's Duel, a themed obstacle course, even boffer dagger-duels by torchlight! Many handcrafted prizes have been commissioned for the title winners. All of this will take place the weekend *AFTER* the 4th of July... a perfect time! The Kingdom calendar reads OPEN."

The Internet contacts and arguments not withstanding, the memberships of these groups existed to fence and their world revolved around tournaments. One of the bigger draws just outside the Gulf Coast Division was the Masters Tournament held each year by the University of Texas, in Austin. In the 1997 mixed foil competition, Mauro Hamza’s students made their presence felt. Jason Perry took 4^th place out of a field of 43. Additionally David and Yale Cohen took 5^th and 7^th places, respectively. Shalyn Shourds from Texas A & M University captured 19^th. Jason Perry also took 18^th place in mixed epee in a field of 32 competitors.

On a more social level, members of the Clear Lake Fencers Club gathered on August 9^th to witness the results of a different form of fencing instruction. Two of the clubs members, David Hochstetler and Scott Brown, had spent the previous eight weeks taking advantage of Richard Alvarez’ background to receive instruction in medieval combat, specifically with lance, broadsword, and mace from horseback. At this "graduation," to display their acquired skills before the assembled CLFC membership, both made the traditional passes at strategically placed melons, with broadswords, while negotiating jumps. Then each faced Alvarez, with lances, on the tournament field. Both were unhorsed by their instructor but duly "knighted" in the end. Serving as squires to the event were Travis Alvarez, Richard Alvarez’ son, and David and Matthew Henderson.

One club member not present, however, was founder Michael Mergens, who was away at USFA Coaches College to receive his Epee I certification under Abdel Monem Salem.

While he was not known to have competed locally, September 18 saw the passing of Alfred Snyder in Houston. Snyder had first taken up fencing while a freshman at Stanford during the 1930-1931 academic year. He became the U. S. Men’s Foil Champion in 1944 and had been on the Olympic team in 1940. He remained an active competitor until the early 1970s. In his later years, Snyder took up competitive sailing on Galveston Bay.

October 1997 also brought back the Texas Renaissance Festival, where a varied fencing experience could usually be found. This was, of course, in part the nature of the show and partly because the artistic director, Jeff Baldwin, was used to performing period fencing as a member of "The Duellists" comedy troupe. Baldwin, who was also the fight director, not only set combat on the various stage productions at the Texas Renaissance Festival, but also set up "street fights" in the pedestrian areas, which were tied in to the overall storyline of the fair.

"At Texas Renn Fest, we have street fights that propels the scenario along, or a set piece developed by committed actors and the fight choreographer," said Stephanie DeWaegeneer. "Besides a scheduled fight rehearsal during the weekend schedule Jeff Baldwin holds a open fight call on Monday nights in Houston. It seems that if you have the inclination and discipline Jeff and Steve Fenley (who choreographs the Chess Match and developed "The Duellists") will help you with a street fight."

"Safety first is rule #1 at TRF. No impromptu fights are allowed, and all requests must be cleared through the Entertainment Director. We make sure there are extra characters for crowd control to keep the circle or playing area clear of patrons."

DeWaegeneer added, "I think people like the bloody thrill of battle. With our Romeo & Juliet/Chivalry and Romance scenario this year, Jeff and Steve have developed some really entertaining fights."

The October 15, 1997 "issue" of a website dubbed "houston.sidewalk" carried in their "Continuing Distractions" column an article on fencing in Houston. Bayou City Fencing Academy founder Louise Lepie was quoted at length, stressing that fencing was accessible to virtually anyone. "No matter what physical condition you’re in, and no matter what age you are, in fencing you can participate immediately." The article noted that BCFA took in students as you as five years of age. "People who have never exercised come here. Parents bring their kids and decide to give it a try themselves," Lepie stated. The article also gave mention to the Clear Lake Fencers Club, noting that the club had a healthy number of high school age fencers, and the Rice University Fencing Club, giving brief note of their annual Van Buskirk tournament.

The local print media also took note of fencing. The Saturday, December 20, 1997 issued of the Galveston Daily News carried a feature article on the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club. The article quoted Michael Mergens as stating that the club had about 30 active members with some students as young as 8 years old. The article made a point of interviewing club members who resided in Galveston County, including John Trojanowski, Emily Cordz, Tom Yoder and Kim Hochstetler.

According to the USFA site, the Gulf Coast Division began the year with six USFA member clubs: Bayou City Fencing Academy; Clear Lake Fencers’ Club; Rice University Fencing Club; South Houston High School Fencing Club and the Spindletop Cavaliers.

The annual Poujardieu Memorial Tournament was held January 31 and February1, 1998. This year it held the added opportunity to face off against members of the Mexican national fencing team. The Gulf Coast Division showed up en mass for the event.

Men’s foil, with 73competitors, was awash with fencers from the Texas crescent:

Mauro Hamza (under the auspices of the Bayou City Fencing Academy) captured 1^st place.

John Monahan (BCFA)…3^rd

Yale Cohen (BCFA)…7^th

David Cohen (BCFA)…9^th

Tristen Ahtone (University of Houston)…26^th

Shalyn Shourds (Texas A & M)…29^th

Robert Thornton (Texas A & M)…30^th

Donald Cravey (CLFC)…32^nd

Scott Brown (South Houston High School Fencing Club)…36^th

Peter Power (Spindletop Cavaliers)…40^th

Jacob Parkins (BCFA)…41^st

Sinclair Oubre (Spindletop Cavaliers)…48^th

Scott Parnell (Texas A & M)…50^th

Michael Galligan (BCFA)…52^nd

Brad Smith (SHHSFC)…54^th

Michael Leang (SHHSFC)…58^th

Lee Kirkland (Spindletop Cavaliers)…59^th

Robert Hawk (Kingwood Fencing Academy)…60^th

Greg Lamarre (Texas A & M)…61^st

Ted Yen (BCFA)…66^th

Matt Arth (Kingwood Fencing Academy)…69^th

Vincent Sumrall (SHHSFC)…72^nd.

Men’s epee fielded 48competitors including the following from the Gulf Coast Division:

Jared Burks (Texas A & M)…18^th

Jesus Puente (University of Houston)…26^th

Michael Mergens (Clear Lake Fencers Club)…37^th

Greg Lamarre (Texas A & M)…48^th.

The men’s sabre event only fielded 24 fencers, but included:

Oliver Diaz (Texas A & M)…2^nd (behind South Texas’ formidable Ray Sexton)

Dan Gorman (Texas A & M)…9^th

Chris Martin (University of Houston)…18^th

Quinton Goodwill (SHHSFC)…21^st.

Women’s epee, with 26 competitors, had a sole Gulf Coast representative:

Liz Gorman (Texas A & M)…3^rd.

In the women’s foil event, with 25 fencers, there were:

My Le (SHHSFC)…18^th

Doreen Badeaux (Spindletop Cavaliers)…21^st.

In women’s sabre, with 12 competitors:

Sara Solomon (now at the University of Houston)…1^st

Thada Ahtone (BCFA)…9^th.

Another tournament held outside the Gulf Coast Division, but attracting a large number of their fencers was the University of Texas’ Masters Open for 1998. Hamza did not, himself, compete in this tournament, but the Bayou City Fencing Academy certainly turned out, including the young man who had become one of his leading students, Yale Cohen. Out of a field of 51 competitors in mixed foil, Cohen captured first place. Other Gulf Coast fencers who faced off in that competition were John Monahan (BCFA-13^th), Scott Parnell (Texas A&M-21^st), Michael Galligan (BCFA-22^nd), Jacob Parkins (BCFA-33^rd), Gregory Lamorre (Texas A&M-38^th), Amy Goedicke (BCFA-44^th), Frederick Haberle (BCFA-45^th) and Vincent Sumrall (South Houston High School-50^th). In the women’s foil category there were only eleven combatants, of which the sole Gulf Coast fencers were Amy Goedicke and Lorebelle Ott, both from the Bayou City Fencing Academy, finishing tenth and eleventh, respectively.

Interestingly, in both the mixed epee and women’s epee, the sole fencer from the Gulf Coast Division was Rice University’s Suzanne Simpson. It is also noteworthy that, as a tournament in the South Texas Division, the epee competitions drew fencers from the formidable US Military Pentathlon Association. In the mixed epee, out of 22 fencers, including one who had to drop out due to an injury, she finished in 15^th place. She also tied for third out of 15 in the women’s event.

Sabre, as usual, drew a smaller turnout. Of the 16 competitors in mixed sabre, 6^th place Gabreil Martinez and 13^th place Frederick Haberle, both from BCFA, were the only fencers from the coast. In women’s sabre, the only fencer from the Texas crescent was BCFA’s Karen Dees, who came in 7^th out of eight.

March 6, 1998 saw a short meeting of the officers of the Gulf Coast Division, to attend to the business of tournaments closer to home. Attending were Dan Gorman (Division Chair), John Monahan (Vice Chair) and Steve Knipp (Secretary). It was announced that Texas A & M University would host the Southwest Sectional tournament and that, in May, the University of Houston would host the Gulf Coast Divisional qualifying tournament. There was also agreement to look into placing advertisements in various newspapers and magazines to promote fencing within the division. The same division officers met on May 11, 1998 in response to a request from the Bayou City Fencing Academy for a grant to help support their summer fencing camp. The vote was unanimous in favor of the grant.

About this same time, the swashbuckling bug first bit another future fencer. Jeremy Cooper, from the Port Arthur area, later recalled, "I first developed my fascination with fencing on March 22, 1998 when I went to the movies to see The Man in the Iron Mask. I really enjoyed the movie that time mainly because I avoided most of the crap it had and enjoyed the atmosphere and the costumes. I had never known anything about the 3 Musketeers until that day. I fell in love with their romantic ideals and character that day."

"The next day, I checked out The Three Musketeers at the high school library. I had it read within a week. I subsequently read all the other books in high school while everyone else socialized. I even attempted to write my own play version of the final story. Sadly, my writing skills weren't terribly refined at the time and it fell flat." Perhaps, but his interest in fencing would continue.

The spring of 1998 also saw the graduation of Rice Fencing Club mainstay, Ryan McMullan. This did not, however terminate his relationship with the club. In fact, as a later biographical sketch of McMullan would later read, "He graduated Rice University in 1998, but hung around with the excuse of running its recycling program. He has been a tree hugger, grows an organic garden, and coaches the Rice fencing team in his abundant spare time when he's not organizing an improvisational theater troupe and making websites for other's mothers."

Further from Texas, Richard Alvarez made an appearance at Adam Crown’s In Ferro Veritas classical fencing academy in Ithaca, New York on July 21^st. Alvarez had made the trip to help Crown and officiate at the "Tournament of Masters" presented as part of the Finger Lakes Wine Festival. Indeed, by this time, thanks to lifetimes personal encounters and shared study, accelerated by contact over the Internet, a number of the leading exponents of classical fencing in the United States had come together. Among the organizing voices was Maitre Crown. Using the World Wide Web, he created an online magazine called the Academy of Arms Online Quarterly. The contributors included several of the most active researchers and practitioners of classical and historical fencing. The actual members of the Academy of Arms were: Adam Crown; William Gaugler; Ramon Martinez; Nick Evangelista; Frank Lurz; John Sullins; J. Christoph Amberger; Patri Pugliese; Albert Peters; and Richard Alvarez.

For aficionados of the sword, this was heady company, indeed.

Crown, based in Ithaca, New York held a Maitre d’Armes d’Escrime from the USFCA and a Maitre de l’Academie d’Armes from the Academie d’Armes Internationale in Paris. He had studied under David Logan and Maitre Jean-Jacques Gillet, from whom he received his Fencing Master Diploma at the American Fencing Academy at Cornell University. At his Ithaca facility, he taught classical foil, duelling sword (epee) and sabre, along with 16^th and 17^th Century rapier and dagger methods and 17^th and 18^th Century smallsword techniques.

William Gaugler had been a student of Maestro Aldo Nadi, one of the finest fencers of the 20^th Century, Maestro Umberto Di Paola and Maestro Giorgio Pessina. Gaugler was admitted to full membership in the Italian Fencing Masters Association and held a fencing master’s diploma from the Accademia Nazionale di Scherma in Naples. The author of several works on the classical Italian school, he was also the founder of the Fencing Masters Program at San Jose State University in California.

Ramon Martinez had studied classical fencing under the late Maitre d’Armes Frederick Rohdes for ten years. AT Rutgers University he delivered several papers covering the Spanish school of fencing, as well as some detailing its relationship to dance of the era. At his school in New York City, he taught classical and historical fencing techniques including rapier in the Spanish and Italian schools, smallsword in the Italian and French school, along with classical foil, epee and sabre.

Nick Evangelista, as mentioned earlier, had studied in Los Angeles under Ralph Faulkner, a classical fencer and Olympian, who also taught competitive fencers and set choreographed swordplay on motion picture actors. Like Maestro Gaugler, Evangelista had also written a number of books on fencing.

Frank Lurz had fenced competitively from 1964 to 1992 and had received his Master of Arms from the Military Masters program at San Jose State University operated by William Gaugler. He had since opened his own salle in California.

John Sullins was another graduate, and teacher, of the Military Master at Arms program. He had also studied under Maitre Daniel Revenu and Maestri Ferenc Marki, Niccolo Perno, Enzo Musumerci Greco, Lucio Nugnes. He had been one of only five San Jose State University teachers chosen to represent the Military Masters Program in a demonstration of fencing pedagogy in Florence, Orvieto and Rome. Sullins was an associate member of the Italian Fencing Masters Association.

J. Christoph Amberger grew up in West Berlin. In college he became a member of the Corps Normannia Berlin and the Corps Hanovera Gottingen, two of the most respected German duelling fraternities. During this time he fought in seven mensuren using the bell-guard and basket hilt schlager from 1985 to 1987. He also served a second in 25 other encounters. A sport fencer as well, he was partial to the sabre. Amberger was a frequent contributor to American Fencing, the magazine of the USFA and to The Sword, the British fencing magazine. He was also the publisher/editor of Hammerterz Forum, a quarterly magazine on the history of fencing, duelling, swordplay and edged combat.

Dr. Patri Pugliese grew up in a fencing environment. His mother, Julia Jones Pugliese had been the first U. S. women’s intercollegiate fencing champion in 1929. She became a professional fencing coach, teaching until the day of her death in 1984. Patri fenced for Harvard and for the Imperial College team in London, but was not interested in competition. Instead he pursued an interest in dance and period dance forms. A member of the SCA, he returned to fencing in a historical context, leading a Boston study group that worked through the classic texts. He also lead workshops in 19^th Century sabre and bayonet techniques. Dr. Pugliese had also amassed a vast library of photocopies of original classic fencing manuals and made copies available to interested students and researchers at minimal prices.

Al Peters and Richard Alvarez have been discussed at some length.

It was not surprising then, to find Alvarez far from tiny Seabrook, Texas, officiating in an event which featured, among other bouts, an encounter between Maitre Crown and Maestro Sullins. The bouts were strictly dry, with no electric scoring and only traditional French and Italian style grips in use. Another facet of the exchange was the reliance on "clean" thrusts, ones producing a clearly notable bend in the blade, to receive a point. Such events would grow over the ensuing years, as historical and classical fencing clubs and instructors would reach out to their brethren, who had become less than enamored of the modern peripherals of the sports fencing milieu.

Later the same month, back in Houston, HACA Director John Clements was involved in a different event. The recent release of the motion picture, The Mask of Zorro, starring Anthony Hopkins and Antonio Banderas, had sparked a certain amount of interest in the general public in fencing and swordplay. As a result the Italian Cultural and Community Center in Houston hosted a program on "Italian Swordsmanship and Our Western Martial Heritage," presented by Clements. The Houston Chronicle, in a brief item on the event, quoted Clements, "Swords and swordsmanship during the 15^th and 16^th century were the only means of war-like action. It was the Italians who first designed, made and used the sword as we know it today."

Clements was building a loyal following of students and fellow enthusiasts. Among those who had discovered John Clements and HACA was the former LSU fencer, Christian Darce.

John Clements, however, was not a person with much use for fencing as envisioned by the USFA. "Around 1998 I had a brief bout with a skeptical epee fencer who was ‘A-rated’ (the highest competitive level). It did not last nearly as long. The fellow was a friend of a friend and stood at a lean six-foot-four. As I recall he had come to Houston that weekend for a competition and was reluctantly talked into coming over to my house to see what my ‘historical’ fencing was like. He had really brought him over purposely for me to prove how I could do. We paired off in the driveway, him condescendingly with his epee and me sneeringly with a stiff schlager blade. We made three passes and on each one I closed instantly. The first two times I just grabbed his blade while jabbing him soundly. He brushed off these hits as luck. But on the third pass I hit against his chest with my shoulder while solidly pommeling his mask. He immediately tore off his mask and indignantly shouted that he didn't ‘need this crap’ and that he had to compete in the morning and couldn’t ‘risk getting hurt.’ I chuckled politely and acknowledged his obvious discomfort. But it was pretty obvious to everyone present he was confoundedly out of his element. I would have been happy to continue for the sheer love of the challenge but it was not to be."

The same newspaper gave rather more attention a few weeks later to the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club. The Houston Chronicle ran a feature article on the club in their August 19, 1998 issue. Founder Michael Mergens was interviewed for the story and his quotes illustrated that the club had continued the format begun in the mid-1990s. Mergens stated that he and South Houston High School fencing Coach Jerry Dunaway taught the beginners classes, while Richard Alvarez taught the advanced classes. Additionally, club fencer Scott Brown was currently going through coach’s training.

There was a lot of steady, unspectacular building at the different clubs during this time. Jana Gauthier and her father, Phil, a detective with the Beaumont Police Department, joined up with the Spindletop Cavaliers in Port Arthur. The move was, partly, inspired by viewing The Mask of Zorro. Detective Gauthier recalled thinking to himself, "That was really neat. Someday we’ve got to try that." Both would become mainstays of the club for the next several years.

The year 1998 was also the year of a critical turn of events.

The Bayou City Fencing Academy had largely been organized around the personalities of Louise Lepie, Mauro Hamza and August Skopik. Early on, however, Skopik had retired from fencing. Hamza continued as BCFA’s primary fencing coach. Among his earliest students were Lepie’s sons, Yale and David Cohen. Somewhere, however, conflicts had arisen and pressures built. Perhaps it was the old story of the coach who leaves his home club to start one of his own. Perhaps there were other issues.

Regardless, the Houston fencing community looked up one day and found that Hamza had not only left BCFA, but formed his own club, Salle Mauro. There were, however, some unique aspects to the manner in which he and his student left BCFA to set off on their own

One member of the Houston fencing community who moved from BCFA to Salle Mauro described the change. "Once at BCFA for a while he broke away to start his own club (I have no problem with that in particular...free enterprise and all). Here is an interesting bit of history though: we got a call one Saturday from Hamza saying that 'the club had moved to a new location', and told us where to go on Monday to fence. We asked where the club owner was on Monday, and he told us 'she was on vacation'. After another week went by, we asked again where Louise was, and got the same lie told to us. Finally the next week, we found out through somebody else that in fact Mauro had left Louise Lepie at BCFA and that we were now going to Mauro's club. We called Ms. Lepie and she confirmed the truth. Louise was very classy and told us she had no coach and understood why we had to continue with Mauro. Just one more chapter in the Hamza story."

By August of 1998, Hamza’s own Salle Mauro website went on line. Year later, an anonymous author with no particular love for either Hamza or Lepie, summed it up like so. "Louise doesn't know a thing about fencing. She is a woman with drive and initiative who when her two sons needed to have a coach, hired Hamza and got fooled by him, like everyone else. Hamza thanked Louise by walking away from BCFA with students and equipment and started his Salle Mauro.

"In Hamza's defense, Louise is a tough woman to work with, and Hamza had all the rights to walk away from BCFA, but he did so in a classless way, if we believe the various reports of this divorce."

Such separations are the warp and woof of fencing as often as not. Fencing coaches would go to work for clubs, build a following and move on, often taking students with them. Sometimes the division is amicable. Sometimes it is not.

For the Gulf Coast Division this developed into a cold war that often played havoc with the hopes and plans of the other, smaller clubs. This rivalry would remain hot for four or five years, generating new animosities and feuds along the way, before the core conflict calmed. New rivalries would develop from old ones. The politics of conflict would essentially shape and govern the Gulf Coast Division’s actions well into the next millenium.

Not that the USFA’s fencers were the only ones who knew how to pick a fight. August 1998 also saw an odd Internet gauntlet thrown down by HACA Director John Clements on the Society for Creative Anachronism’s own newsgroup. Not a reply to an active topic, but an out-of-the-blue pronouncement to all SCA fencers that what they were doing was just plain wrong. His thesis was that SCA "rapier" fencing allowed for thrusts and "cuts," at least "draw cuts," (not unlike sabre bouts). He pronounced that true "rapiers" did not have an effective cutting edge and could only thrust. He drew upon the works of noted researcher and author Ewart Oakeshott to support his claim. It would seem that his outburst was prompted by other discussions, on both SCA and fencing sites, involving criticisms of his book, Renaissance Fencing.

While it is true Oakeshott made a distinction between what he termed "rapiers" (point, no edge) and a "cut-and-thrust sword" (both), these were his own modern categorizations to better organize his discussion of various period sword types and designs. Clements took to the newer categorization with fervor and labeled SCA discussions of "rapier" fencing using both edges and points as erroneous, somewhat ignoring that during the actual Renaissance the term was applied broadly to both types of weapons.

Indeed, he initiated his pronouncement with, "Contrary to what a certain cabal of sport & neo classical fencers and their sycophants keep pushing on us, rapiers are not cutting swords. I challenge anyone to demonstrate significant cutting ability with a true rapier blade. Don't believe what you see in the movies!"

Further down he also wrote, "Today we delude ourselves if we think we can have the same understanding merely by using epees, schlagers, and cheap replicas. Unfortunately, a handful of enthusiasts have misinterpreted the works of Marozzo, Agrippa, and even Saviolo to argue their own limited, illogical views that ‘all’, ‘some,’ or at least ‘a few’ rapiers were somehow used like swords (apparently inspired by sport fencing or based on stage combat)."

It was, to say the least, a fairly inflammatory shot across the SCA’s bow. It probably did not win Clements a lot of converts from the classical, historical, sport or stage fencing milieus, either.

SCA fencer Jay Rudin replied, "First, I suggest that if you wish to convince people to share your views, rampant insult is not the best way to do it." After making some observations to refute Clements, Rudin concluded, "Finally, I ask all those who consider my opinion of value not to answer these insults with return insults. They would be just as inappropriate coming from us as they are coming from him."

One historical fencer admitted being puzzled. "I am curious why John chose here to spread the word. He has made his opinions on what the SCA does very public and I'm rather surprised that he would talk about this here instead of half a dozen more appropriate places."

The Labor Day weekend saws a cadre of HACA members make a pilgrimage to Hank Reinhardt’s "fortress like home," in Georgia. The group consisted of John Clements, Christian Darce, Mark Bertrand, Stephen Bertrand and Todd Palmer. During their visit they made a videotaped interview with Reinhardt, who also allowed them to go through his collection of some 300 weapons. They also did a considerable amount of test cutting, with a number of different swords, on cardboard tubes, "hunks of raw meat and bone." Reinhardt graciously allowed his guests to practice a bit with a few items from among his antique collection. As one of the sojourners recalled, "There is truly nothing like going through your moves and technique with an actual 450 year old sword."

While the trip was undoubtedly, a lot of fun, they had come with some set goals, "…to learn as much as possible about medieval and renaissance swordsmanship; practice through sparring, test cutting and drills; take footage for the commercial sword video; and obtain some new equipment for our training."

Of course the sport fencers back home were far from inactive. In October, Texas A&M’s ubiquitous Shalyn Shourds traveled north to the "Duel in Dallas" tournament and placed third, acquiring his "C" rating.

In November one of Texas A&M’s beginning fencers, Mike MacGuire, went to Austin for a beginner’s tournament and placed a respectable 12^th out of 35.

Mid-November saw the Southwest Intercollegiate Fencing Association (SWIFA) competitions held. Texas A&M placed first in team sabre and second in team epee.

One former Texas A & M fencer could be found just a little "down the road" from Bryan and College Station. In the autumn of 1998, Diana Rae McKinney was now member of the Core Company at the Texas Renaissance Festival. Actress, fencer, "rennie," the former A & M Fencing Club officer and competitor and English major could be found performing as Lady Mercy.

The Texas Renaissance Festival also provided a showcase for the Society for Creative Anachronisms. The SCA held a fencing melee on the Battle Mound at the TRF site. On being asked on the Internet to compare the fencing style of Texas (Ansteorra) fencers to their Mid-West counterparts in 1998, one veteran of both groups observed. "The Middle tends to treat all combat and rapier especially as a sport, where everything is regimented including the manner of facing your opponent on the field. It's a contest not a duel. The spontaneity of the fight is frequently lost (now a days) due to the strict adherence to the letter of the rules instead of the spirit that they were meant to be used. The same follows the code of conduct in the MidRealm, with all the formalized actions. This all threatens to make fencing (not "rapier combat") terribly dull, but incredibly safe and structured. Ansteorra, on the other hand, is terribly freewheeling in the style and manner rapier is handled. From my experience, the rules are interpreted a little looser and the fighting is a little more freewheeling. The fight is the duel not a contest. Because of this, you tend to learn fast and/or die-hard (and often). The down side of this is that things can be too freewheeling… I'd have to say that, Ansteorra, of the two in question, is more fun."

Another observer posted, "Ansteorra is one of the oldest kingdoms (maybe the oldest) which has fencing. Because of that, there is a very established fencing culture and camaraderie there. They are a White Scarf kingdom (which means they give a high- level award for fencing, which is also given in some other kingdoms); the MidRealm is not. Schlager, however, is not their main weapon."

Another SCA fencer, Joseph Bouchard, added, "It is one of the too-few Kingdoms that still allow foils and epee's. Granted, the fencers more concerned about historically accuracy, etc. are gradually moving to schlager but you aren't forced to if you don't want to." Yet another noted, "The structure, style and ability of the Ansteorrans far outweighs the Mids, and the Ansteorran have a much better-run marshalate system."

Chris Zakes added his observations to the discussion. "I live in Ansteorra, and have only fought in the Midrealm a few times, so I can't give a valid comparative evaluation. I will point out a few items, though: 1. If your primary interest is schalger, the Midrealm is a schlager-only kingdom. While schlagers are legal in Ansteorra, they're not very widespread as yet. (As an example, at the kingdom-wide rapier practice last weekend, of the dozen or so people I worked with, only one wanted to fight with schlagers.) 2. Ansteorra has the longest-running rapier program in the SCA (over 20 years), while the Midrealm has only allowed rapier for six or seven years, so you'll generally find fewer fighters there. A big tournament in Ansteorra will have over 100 fighters, a big tournament in the Middle would have (my best guess) 40 or 50."

His old friend from their Rice University days, Jay Rudin, contributed, "The biggest pure fencing difference is emphasized by your final qualification… ‘Particularly with schlager.’ In the Midrealm, schlager is (last I heard) the only legal weapon. In Ansteorra, all SCA-legal weapons are used. If all you want to use is schlager, all Midrealm fighters will accommodate you. In Ansteorra, less than half of the Ansteorrans has schlagers (but the number is growing). Nearly everybody carries epees, and only a few of us still have foils or fiberglass blades."

A final commentator, Ken Mondschein, made this contribution, "In Houston, you could take lessons from Richard Alvarez, Prevost d’armes, who is probably one of the better teachers of historical swordsmanship in this country."

Not far from the Texas Renaissance Festival, in Huntsville, there had once been a viable fencing club at Sam Houston State University. Now, aside from SCA events, the only fencing presence on campus was as a small aspect of a single course: "KIN 112 DEFENSE ARTS (Fencing, Martial Arts, Personal Defense). The fundamental skills of each defense activity are studied through lectures, demonstrations and practice. Credit 1"

On December 5, 1998 a meeting of the Gulf Coast Division was held, for the purposes of electing new officers. Bayou City Fencing Academy founder Louise Lepie opened the meeting. There was some initial discussion regarding the legitimacy of proxy votes held, but this was tabled when it was learned that all of the officers were running unopposed. The meeting ended with Dan Gorman, John Monahan and Steve Knipp remaining as Chair, Vice-Chair and Secretary, respectively. Rob Cooke was Treasurer.

December 7^th saw South Houston High School hold the Junior Olympic Qualifiers. By the end of the event, CLFC fencers Scott Brown and David Hochstetler learned they would be attending their third Junior Olympics tournament, competing in the men’s under-20 foil event. Michael Leang would be going for the first time, as an alternate in the same event. Two other first time competitors en route to the Junior Olympics were South Houston High School fencers Ngoc My Lee in women’s under-20 foil and Vincent Sumrall in men’s under-17 foil.

By the end of 1998, HACA could also show development. In addition to its Houston base, there were now HACA "study groups" in Lake Charles, Louisiana, in Chattanooga, Tennessee and in the Atlanta-Conyers, Georgia region.

By 1999, the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club had added a second venue, fencing on the first Tuesday of each month at the Clear Lake Park building. One of the club’s younger fencers, Scott Brown, was beginning to move into coaching. While a few older fencers had drifted on, some newer members, such as Gil Hillman, Michael Hogan, Candy Torres and Kathryn Morrow had come on board. Otherwise, the club had become static.

Michael Mergens continued the beginners’ classes; with Jerry Dunaway taking on the second level foil instruction. While it increased the number of "veteran" (over-40) fencers, it was beginning to slow its recruitment of young fencers.

More noticeably, Richard Alvarez, who had been the sole club source for classes in epee and sabre, as well as rapier-and-dagger, had reduced his load to stray private lessons as he prepared for a move to the West Coast.

Just south of Houston, during the spring semester of 1999 a fencing class was begun at Brazosport Community College in Lake Jackson. Dana Andersen-Wyman, the campus theatre director had started an introductory foil class on the small campus where, only a few years earlier the short-lived Blade Runners fencing club had operated.

Andersen-Wyman had been a student of fencing for decades. "It was 1972, and I was going to Cabrillo College in California," he later recalled for an interview. "The teacher, I forget her name, was a woman and only had one year of experience in fencing. She gave us one real lesson, and for the rest of the year, we just sparred. I had a hell of a good time, but I picked up some really bad (fencing) habits." The next year he transferred to the University of California at Santa Cruz, where he studied under Maestro Charles Selberg.

Andersen-Wyman later recalled that he went into his first encounter at UCSC extremely overconfident. "I figured I would go in and show them just what a good fencer I was. By the end I was so humiliated I almost quit. I didn’t score one touch. I didn’t go back for six months." Once he did return, he remained under Selberg’s tutelage for 13 years. "I kept going because it was fun, and I just like fencing." He did, however, keep a lighter outlook on his fencing. "I never won any tournaments because I never cared enough to win. It wasn’t about whether I win or lose, I just loved doing it."

In the fall of 1993, Andersen-Wyman found himself, for a time, an adjunct English professor at Tennessee Technical University, where he also taught fencing classes for the F.E.S.S. (Foil Epee and Sabre Society).

Andersen-Wyman, being a theatre major that enjoyed fencing, naturally gravitated to theatrical combat. "I love staged combat, because it’s like fencing… only not." He later noted, "The key to make staged combat work is safety and secondly, you need a good choreographer who knows how to marry staged combat and reality." Ultimately, Andersen-Wyman became experienced at choreographing rapier and dagger, small sword, broadsword, sword and buckler, sword and cape, quarterstaff and unarmed combat styles. While his personal favorite was smallsword, he felt that rapier combat was the most difficult style to choreograph.

Fencing had always drawn many of its recruits from those whose first interest in, or image of, fencing stemmed from swashbuckling films and novels. Despite many a competitive fencer’s or coach’s railing against this archaic and romanticized view of their sport, it was this outlook that most beginning fencers brought with them into the salle. Aaron Martz of the Rice University Fencing Club described the initial frustration and eventual evolution of the beginning fencer; "I picked up the sport knowing little more than a couple Highlander movies and the occasional Zorro. It became very frustrating at times, especially when a group of "real" fencers would get together and talk about strategies and complex rules while I was still trying to stand correctly. These things always improve. Those strange leg muscles that get sore eventually stop bothering you, and you start seeing strategies instead of wild and random attacks. Fencing is an extremely rewarding sport and will always challenge you at any level. Contrary to popular belief, it is also one of the safest sports around."

The Poujardieu Memorial Tournament was held on January 30-31, 1999 in the South Texas Division. Once again led by Mauro Hamza, the Rice University, Texas A&M and the Bayou City Fencing Academy coach, a large contingent of Gulf Coast fencers made the pilgrimage. As always, the largest cadre competed in the mixed foil event. Due to a quirk in USFA rules, one could not change club affiliations in mid-season. Thus Mauro Hamza and several who had joined him at the new Salle Mauro, were listed as fencing for the Bayou City Fencing Academy.

In the mixed foil event, 12 Gulf Coast fencers were part of a field of 66 competitors. Mauro Hamza (BCFA) took the gold medal. John Monahan (BCFA) came in 8th place. Michael Galligan (BCFA) finished in 28th place. Jacob Parkins (BCFA) took 30th. Don Cravey from the non-Hamza coached Clear Lake Fencers’ Club finished in 36th place. John Haberle (BCFA) placed 47th. Gregory Lamarre from Texas A&M University took 55th place. Rachelle Ott (BCFA) finished in 59th. Erik Kosobud from the revived University of Houston Fencing Club was 63rd while Tim Guerinot from the same club finished in 64th place. Dallas Boring of the Spindletop Cavaliers in the Beaumont/Port Arthur area was 65th. Ted Yen (BCFA) finished 66th.

The women’s foil event fielded 15 foilists, but none from the Gulf Coast Division.

The mixed epee event was almost as large, with 57 competitors, several from the US Military Pentathlon Association, but only three from the Gulf Coast. Liz Gorman (Texas A&M University) captured 34th place. Suzanne Simpson (Rice University) took 43rd place. Don Cravey (Clear Lake) came in at 52nd place.

In the women’s epee event, with 25 competitors, Liz Gorman captured 2nd place and Suzanne Simpson took 11th.

The mixed sabre event fielded only 18 fencers. Chris Martin from the University of Houston, the sole sabreur from the Texas crescent, captured a quite respectable 7th place. There was no Gulf Coast entrant among the women’s sabre event’s ten competitors.

The University of Texas’ Masters Open was the other South Texas Division spring event that always drew some fencers from the Gulf Coast Division. As with the "Pouj," Hamza did not fence in the Masters, but his lead student, Yale Cohen did. Four of the 32 competitors came from the Gulf Coast Division and Cohen (BCFA) captured 1st place. Tim Miller from Rice University captured the 12th place spot. BCFA fencer Rachelle Ott came in 19th. Vincent Sumrall, from the South Houston High School Fencing Club came in at 29th place. Of the eight competitors from the women’s foil event, none came from the Gulf Coast Division.

In epee, the division sent only two fencers to the mixed event and none to the women’s. In mixed epee, Rice’s Tim Miller captured 8th place from a field of 26, while Justin Bayne (Texas A&M) placed 25th.

Interestingly, for once the division had more representatives in the sabre competition. Four Gulf Coast fencers competed in the mixed sabre event within a field of 16 sabreurs. Oliver Diaz from Texas A&M took second place. Tim Miller from Rice University made this a three-weapon tournament for himself and took 3rd place. Bill Ashe (BCFA) and Sarah Julicher (Texas A&M) took 7th and 12th places, respectively. The tournament did not hold a women’s sabre event.

The Gulf Coast Divisional Qualifiers were held at the Houston Table Tennis Center on May 15, 1999. The fencing was to be followed that afternoon by a meeting of the membership to elect officers for the 1999-2000 competitive season.

Dan Gorman, who fenced at Texas A & M and with the Bayou City Fencing Academy, was there. "We had 4 people (Mauro Hamza, Louise Lepie, Ted Yen and myself) show up at that time despite having notified all the clubs on the USFA list and felt we should reschedule so that we could get a more representative turnout (Liz and I both fenced for BCFA (which Mauro and Louis were with at the time) in addition to A&M)." The election was postponed.

In 1999, the Bayou City Fencing Academy began to repair the damage from Mauro Hamza’s departure. In a move every bit as fateful as that when Michael Perry and August Skopik brought Hamza to Houston, Louise Lepie retained the services of epeeiste Andrey Geva as head coach.

Geva had fenced in the old USSR and had gone on to become a Israeli national champion from 1990-1993. From 1994-1999 he served as one of the national coaches for the Israeli team. An epeeiste, his arrival represented a fundamental shift in BCFA’s area of focus.

Back at the Clear Lake Fencer’s Club a pair of bittersweet events was held that summer. At one club meeting a special group photograph of virtually the entire membership was made to commemorate the upcoming departure of Richard Alvarez to San Francisco. A few going away tokens were also presented, including a four inch sterling silver figure of Alvarez, which had been created by long-time club member Nicole Trojanowski (nee Dickson).

On May 22, 1999 the club held a going away party at the home of the club’s president, Phil Howard and included a one-touch epee competition on his driveway. Alvarez donated one of his period replica weapons as the prize. Preston Partridge, now also part of the new University of Houston Fencing Club won the prize, with which he was duly "knighted" by Alvarez.

By May of 1999, the active coaching staff of the Clear Lake club had dwindled dramatically. Not only had Richard Alvarez moved away, but Jerry Dunaway had been successful enough at building a fencing program at South Houston High School, that it was, more and more, eating into the time he could spend at Clear Lake. This left much of the burden of instructing new fencers to Scott Brown, who had also taken over for Richard Alvarez in coaching fencing at La Porte High School.

The beginners’ classes had been club founder Michael Mergens personal area of responsibility, but this same May he had become involved in starting up yet another club. After three years of planning and discussion, Mergens and Ken Shelton, along Richard Daniels, had founded the Galveston Fencing Club. Like Shelton, the 74-year-old Daniels had fenced years before. Like Shelton, he had moved to Galveston and decided to return to fencing. Finding no local clubs and searching for fencers nearby, like Shelton, he found Michael Mergens. Mergens put the two together and things began to mesh. The new club began meeting on Tuesday evenings in a gym at the Sacred Heart Cathedral in Galveston. To get the club started off, Mergens contributed a large amount of time to holding introductory foil classes, in order to build membership. This left him little time to spend at the Clear Lake club.

May was also the month when various performers, including stage fencers, auditioned and began the long months of rehearsal and workshops for the Texas Renaissance Festival, which opened in October. Jeff Baldwin continued as the Entertainment Director. One performer said that the, "auditions are first two weekends in May. Interested in joining the TRF Performance Company? It's mega work, but fabulously, fantastically rewarding."

The same performer described the situation like this. "At Scarborough [Faire] and TRF, members of the performance company go through a 7/8-weekend workshop process with in-depth instruction in Improv, Characterization, Stagecraft, History/Customs/Manners, Dialogue, etc. In addition, those cast in the various shows (Dance, Chess Match, Highland Games, etc.) get training in those particular disciplines. It's free and it's mandatory. Yes, you have to devote the 7/8 weekends before Faire opening to workshops and rehearsals, but...as many working professional actors can attest...you're getting training from professional instructors that generally costs mega [dollars] if you look for it on the open market."

"The process works pretty much the same way at both faires. You go to auditions. TRF's auditions are the first two weekends in May by appointment, call Entertainment Director Jeff Baldwin for details/sign up at 281-356-2178, Auditions are a blast! Anyway, you go to auditions, you get cast, you attend the workshops, you do the show). Neither TRF nor Scarborough [has] a Guild set up. You join the Festival's overall Performance Company."

HACA’s John Clements was, by all accounts, no fan of stage fencing. In June of 1999, however, he reportedly put on quite a show of his own, albeit one that generated more than its share of bad press. According to a member of the Chicago Swordplay Guild, Clements visited their group to give instruction on the long sword. In the course of class, several members of their group were invited to fence "Scholar's Privilege" with Clements. While the plan seemed to be to use wooden wasters (sword replicas) at three-quarter speed, his students remained, effectively, strangers to him. He knew nothing of their fighting skills. Later complaints were that several participants were struck in the head and member was bruised on the temple twice during instruction.

The July 8, 1999 issue of the Houston Chronicle carried a brief snippet that Mario Rodriguez had captured 4th place in men’s wheelchair epee at the nationals in Charlotte, North Carolina. It also mentioned that one of Mauro Hamza’s students, Benjamin Parkins from The Woodlands, had taken 7th place in men’s under-10 foil. Its July 11th issue carried a notice that Hamza pupils Michael Galligan and Ben Nichols finished 5th in men’s Youth-14 foil and 6th in men’s Youth-10 epee, respectively.

On July 24, the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club staged a public fencing demonstration at Baybrook Mall, a shopping mall in the Clear Lake area. Such public demonstrations would become more common in CLFC in time.

The newly formed Galveston Fencing Club got some welcome publicity, itself. The August 15, 1999 issue of the Galveston County Daily News ran a feature article on the new club. Reporter Joey Richards interviewed Shelton, Daniels and Mergens for the article. Being focused on Galveston, there were naturally references to the island’s swashbuckling past.

The year 1999 was significant for the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club for yet another reason. On August 28 a tradition began. Over recent years, a "graying" of the club’s membership had begun. The original members had, of course, grown older. More noticeably, the club had begun to attract a number of new members who in their 40s or older. These were primarily people who were either new to fencing or who had not fenced since college and were looking to get back into the game. Because the club had begun to increase its "veteran" (over-40) membership, it determined to institute a tournament just for them. The tournament was dubbed the Fete de Lune because it was designed to coincide with an aviation festival, called the Ballunar Festival, at the nearby Johnson Space Center. This first annual Fete de Lune was held at the posh South Shore Harbor Resort on Clear Lake.

Another sword wielding organization that was alive and healthy was HACA. Despite the nearly constant controversy which surrounded both the group and their founder John Clements, or perhaps because of it, the group thrived. While Clements continued to disparage the SCA and like groups, he was able to draw on some disaffected former "SCAdian" fencers who were searching for a more realistic or "correct" instruction in medieval and renaissance martial arts. Even though Clements held that the sport and classical fencers were irrelevant, he was able to recruit from their ranks as well. He drew in those who, deep down, were more desirous to hold a broadsword or rapier than foil or epee.

Robert Lyle offered an interesting perspective on HACA and SCA. Lyle had been a student of Russell Wieder, the former Texas A&M instructor. Later, Lyle found himself seeking a style of fencing closer to that used in the Middle Ages. He drifted into the SCA, first becoming involved in their heavy weapons combat (PVC ‘boffers"), and then becoming more involved in the swashbuckling lists (foil and epee). Lyle also had his share of encounters with the HACA camp. Having moved around classical fencing, sport fencing, SCA and HACA camps, Lyle had the following observations.

"The SCA developed its styles empirically and started off well. In the last twenty years the styles have become more rigid, optimized for winning tournaments with certain rules, rather than a fight with sharps."

"HACA started by eschewing the artificialities of the SCA rules and making a fetish of research. Unfortunately, they also started out with some peculiar assumptions that has distorted their ‘research.’ Many of their members have an almost messianic respect for their founder, John Clements, but I have found less value in his writings than anywhere else on their web page."

Be that as it may, no doubt a number of fencers from both SCA and HACA would disagree with his assessments. HACA, in fact, had become successful enough of an institution in Houston, that on September 18-19, they hosted the 1999 HACA Swordsmanship Seminar in the city recreation center in Missouri City, a suburb on Houston’s southwest side. The topics featured included "The Medieval Combat and the Long-sword," "Introduction to Schwertnemen and Gioco Stretto," and "Facing Pole-Arms and Facing Shields," among others.

Christian Darce, a former competitive fencer and member of HACA had founded a company called Purpleheart Armory. The company produced wooden wasters (wooden practice versions of swords). For this event, mirroring arrangements at large fencing tournaments, he ran a vendor’s booth set up to sell his wasters to attendees.

However, if HACA was successful and growing by 1999, it was also still squarely in the center of, often rancorous, disputes. Just such an exchange raged throughout much of September and early October of 1999, on a classical fencing Internet mailing list.

It began with a fairly negative review by John Clements of William Gaugler’s recent history of fencing. Apparently not a member of the mailing list, Clements’ remarks were posted on his behalf by a colleague who was a member.

Many leaped to Gaugler’s defense. Some questioned Clements’ perspective. Among the latter was Nick Evangelista, a man not exactly known for mincing words, himself. The two resumed their long-standing conflict that dated to Clements’ 1995 offer to improve Evangelista’s book, The Encyclopedia of the Sword. This led to a second statement by Clements, posted by one Mark Rector, detailing his complaints against Evangelista. Partisans of both sides jumped into the verbal fray, which played out for weeks.

Others tried less head-on ways to deal with HACA and Clements’ disdain for the SCA and role-playing groups. One wrote, "I exchanged some e-mail with the guys at HACA. My opinion of them; they do good work, but they're opinionated hotheads. If you actually try to reason with them, they pretty much hold their position, but they do cool down. Especially Clements. I suggested that maybe they shouldn't rag so hard on fantasy gamers. I've never been involved with role-playing games really, but just on general principle I try not to let the actions of a few buttheads color my opinion of an entire group. I think some of what they do is kinda corny, but some of them are cool. And some of them know some good stuff. I learned to make mail from a friend in the SCA."

Robert Lyle pointed out, however, "Unfortunately there are a lot of HACA members or supporters who say ‘You all have it wrong, and only John Clements has it right.’ "He continued, "You have to shout 'till your blue in the face before someone like Mark [Rector] or Greg asks you what you mean and you can engage in dialog. And I have tried gentle, moderate, academic criticism with the same response: at least if I shout, Mark or Greg eventually takes notice. This behavior is not acceptable in a community of scholars. HACA cannot earn respect while it treats outsiders with contempt, just because they disagree."

Still, HACA filled a void and even their detractors admitted they appreciated the many period fencing texts posted for one and all to read, copy or download off their website. That said, John Clements’ strong opinions with regards to other groups no doubt hurt the organization in some ways. His second book, Medieval Swordsmanship, was better received than his Renaissance tome. Unfortunately, for many he had already poisoned the well.

One issue involved the HACA website and its forum. "What I don't like about HACA is the way they approach the issue. A high ranking HACA official will make some off hand remark or generalization about the 19th century, make comments to the effect of "highly debatable" and then when you try to offer documented information to the contrary your post gets deleted and you get a nasty little e-mail. Free and open academic discussion, uh, right of every free man to speak his mind? That still has a ways to go. I made the mistake of accepting those statements at face value. I won't again… Note that this is most regarding the officials themselves. Individual HACA members/associates I've had no problems with."

Even Robert Lyle noted, "I can say nothing bad about Medieval Swordsmanship. I have glanced through it, but this is not my area of expertise, and I cannot easily check his scholarship. It does look workable: I have never had an empirical problem with Clements’ technique. I just found so many research errors in Renaissance Swordsmanship (and some of his more impassioned essays) that I am unwilling to take him at face value on anything else. Or simply, I have no problem when he says, ‘it is well to do this’. I am suspicious when he says, ‘they used to do this’ and I get angry when his disciples say, ‘You Must Not Disagree’."

One person wrote, "In defense of John Clements, though we got off to a rocky start, he settled down pretty quick, and in fact before we parted ways gave me some words of encouragement I felt were sincere. I can see how he can get on people's nerves, that's kinda why I dropped HACA a line in the first place, but I'm no angel myself..."

Pretty much everyone had an opinion, "My own thoughts about John Clements and the HACA will remain totally private. I will say that I think that they do a good job though I have to, on the whole, agree with everything that has been said about them and the possible consequences of their existence if this all takes off. I will say that even though I find the book a useful resource, I do not agree with the theories of parrying with the flat. I believe archaeological evidence supports this theory, but then again other evidence supports the other side of the coin as well. I think that John is impassioned about this subject but then again aren't we all. I think the danger comes in the statement "HACA Methodology." I do not see how the way that the HACA train is special or how they can claim it as their own when the techniques that are being used and the way they go about their training have been used for centuries. I think that in that respect they are showing a lack of respect to those past practitioners."

Long-time Houston HACA member Jeff Basham reasonably countered, "With regards to the area of focus with the HACA, they cover a time period approx. from the 1000's to the 1600's. That's a very broad time line in which the techniques and styles changed many times over - some similar and some dissimilar. Last time I checked the 19th and 20th centuries weren't included in the renaissance. The HACA members are practitioners of European Medieval and Renaissance Martial Arts who reference their skills to the historical manuals through a scientific process. First - review of the techniques in the manuals. Second - through exercises with wooden wasters the application of the techniques. Third - demonstration to others to see if they can duplicate the same techniques. Fourth - using the techniques in free sparing (with sparing weapons) to see if it can be successfully applied against someone who is actively trying to outfight you.

In addition to that, HACA members also train with steel weapons such as foiled blades to conduct exercises similar to the above mentioned process and sharps for test cutting."

Matt Hauser, another HACA member in Houston, wrote, "Written conversations and statements are notorious for losing subtle shadings of meaning that would be present if we spoke in person. Things tend to sound more absolute and more serious. I think HACA as an organization and our members as individuals sometimes don't guard against this as well as we should. Having said that, I don't think that we are trying to make any special claims that our study method is unique. We call it the HACA study approach to distinguish it from methods used by other organizations -- not to claim we are the only people in history to employ cross-training that includes hands-on practice."

He added, "I think some similar misunderstandings may exist around our sparring rules. We do have some listed on our web site, but I can assure you that our general practice is to go as all-out as possible. No points-based scoring is employed, but certainly we occasionally do count bouts won or lost. The only rules we always enforce are safety limits. Some types of close techniques we do not use in sparring because their conclusions range from dislocations to broken bones to paralysis and/or death. Similarly, we are not always able to target heads because many of our Houston members are fairly new at this and adequate head protection is not always available. Clearly any such limitations hinder our ability to learn effective and representative techniques. We are always actively looking for ways to improve our training to overcome any problems. I don't claim our methods are unique, and I certainly don't have the experience to claim they are the best on the planet. However, I think they are good and we will continue to try to make them better. Observations and suggestions along this line are always listened to and appreciated!"

Some, however, still took the defensive and abrasive mode, "About the HACA’s methodology, it is right in line with the source materials and they spar with blunts and wooden swords, hardly unrealistic --as well as do test cutting. The more information that comes to light the more credible Clements’ renaissance book now is not the less. Those in the sport fencing community and stage combat world who dislike him personally for his brutally dissecting their myths do so for reasons of ego and professional rivalry. It makes no sense that those studying 19th century methods are the first to complain when their views on Medieval or early renaissance fighting are challenged if they are not studying these things themselves! It’s really ironic too given that traditional fencers have for so long held such disdain for all the earlier forms and styles, styles they have done nothing to promote when their own has been historically proven to be far less violent an age with far fewer weapons and armors in use. 19th century styles do not validate medieval and early renaissance war arts! If anything rather the other way around so go study them first or pay greater heed to those who seriously do. While groups like the SCA have been around for over 30 years, stage combat professionals for over 60, and LARP for almost 20 years, its only been in this decade that European martial arts groups like the HACA have done more than pursue choreography, fantasy, or role play. What’s really pitiable are comments from someone who personally doesn’t do a bit of training in the HACA approach but wants recognition and validation from the HACA itself for some minor peripheral interest they have that’s completely outside of the HACA’s stated goals and objectives. And when they don’t get it they go all hostile (especially when it undermines and contradicts the interests of those doing ONLY 19th century styles!). Sound familiar? When these individuals accomplish something comparable to what the HACA has or what Clements has contributed then maybe some of their criticisms and snipping will be taken as more than bitter resentment at other’s success. When some people criticizing the HACA’s findings can first match the HACA’s methods that produced those findings, then their voices will be given more credibility. The proof is in the results, and HACA students perform."

He was quickly taken to task for his remarks by one author, who apologized in advance to the more reasonable Jeff Basham and Matt Hauser. As to sport and theatrical fencers, the author noted "I think those two worlds ripped into him because he was basically so rude about what they are doing - in both cases they are not Martial Artists and have no or little interest in Martial Arts. Sports Fencers are sportsmen and Stage Combatants are there to entertain the crowd NOT to educate." The same author also responded to the negative remarks about SCA, Live-Action Role-Playing groups (LARPs), "So what - these guys were doing it as a hobby - to enjoy themselves - some may have even tried to increase their awareness about techniques and apply them - but this is a difficult task. But in all the time that these SCA's LARPs etc I do not think that at anytime they have claimed to be martial artists. Why - could it be because of the lack of material that has been available? Maybe they do have something to contribute to their own areas of study - I have looked at a lot of the SA stuff online and although I do not necessarily agree with their conclusions they are at least trying."

A more moderate and clear-headed poster wrote, "This is just absurd. You know, John C must be the single most controversial person in the sword community, and for no obvious reason, other than a certain lack of tact on his part, and the thin skins of everyone in this bloody field… John C himself -- he's a big kid, he can defend himself if he chooses to. Personally, John's a friend of mine, and I agree with him on many things, but I think he takes ribbing on the Net far too seriously, and is far too antagonistic to the majority of his audience (which IS the SCA, stage fencers, etc). "

Another observed, "Abrasive and vitriolic do seem to go with the territory when it comes to writing about "my" rather than "their" forms of swordplay. However, it is also an attitude you'll see in any commercial when comparisons are being drawn between the advertised product and its rivals. Maybe it's because I don't have any affinities either way (or axes to grind, either, except for the one in the woodpile), but while I've kept track of this SCA/HACA/Martinez/Crown rivalry, commented on it, and shaken my head over its more extreme manifestations, I don't let any of it ruffle my feathers. I might be missing out on something, because it's certain that what drives everything the above mails have discussed is Enthusiasm, and IMO there's nothing wrong with that. Enthusiasm for the hard-to-understand is what worries people who can't get enthusiastic in the same way, or about the same things, and that's when mud-slinging begins."

In the long run, the arguments would continue with vehement partisans clashing in between sporadic attempts by would-be peacemakers to cool tempers. One author among all the electronic posters put a historical perspective to it all. "But hey, is this any different to the dis[respect] that [Renaissance English swordmaster George]Silver gave to the Italians [DiGrassi, Saviolo]? I do not think so. It all stems from an honest want to give students of the Art and Science the best chance of learning. For that we are all to be commended. Personally, I think that we need to leave all this backbiting behind and work together, that includes Modern Fencers, SCAers, LARP, and re-enactment and stage fighters. There is just so much cross over and things that can be learnt from one another that I think this can be no bad thing."

As Greg Mele of the Chicago Swordplay Guild concluded, "swordsmen of any era have been hotheaded and opinionated, in an era where those skills likely will never be called upon in a real life-and-death manner, so much the more so."

Clements did not just stir up a lot of dust on the worldwide web. His high-profile position certainly made him an obvious spokesman, as well as a lighting rod for controversy. In one instance he was interviewed for, and shown on, a documentary, Axes, Swords, and Knives, run as part of the Modern Marvels series on the History Channel. In the channel’s own description for the video, it described the episode as, "a comprehensive look at the world of edged weapons. Trace their development through the ages by looking at ancient blades recovered at historic sites worldwide. Watch as a craftsman hones swords from scratch using traditional methods. Meet John Clements, whose research into historic combat has shed light on the reasons behind certain designs."

Within his own milieu, Clements was a rock star.

On September 30, 1999, at Salle Mauro, the Gulf Coast Division finally held its long-delayed general membership meeting to elect its officers. The meeting was called to order at 7:25 PM. Despite the fact that the division included many of the fencers in the fourth largest city in America, as well as Galveston, the Beaumont-Port Arthur area and Texas A & M University, only 18 members of the division showed up. A single slate of candidates was nominated and they were unanimously elected. The new officers were Maher "Mauro" Hamza as Chair, Elsayed "Bakoko" Emara as Vice-Chair, Daniel Gorman as Secretary and Oliver Diaz as Treasurer. The first two came from Salle Mauro, the last two from Texas A & M University.

Bayou City fencer Bill Ashe brought up the issue of a Gulf Coast Division or Southwest Section schedule. Daniel Gorman advised that the section was waiting for the Gulf Coast officer to mail its schedule. Hamza said he planned to have a division schedule completed in a few days.

According to the minutes, the "issue of increasing membership involvement was briefly raised and discussed. Meeting adjourned by Daniel Gorman at 7:35 PM."

After a delay of four months, the entire meeting, discussions and elections had taken ten minutes.

If the governing of the division elicited little interest, fencing still did. Tim Guerinot would write, years later, "I started fencing during the fall of 99'. Mauro had a run down club in a seedy part of Houston. The first year I trained at his facility Hamza was a considerate and determined coach out to make a name for himself. When I arrived on the scene Hamza had already established himself as a reputable coach accross the US. I was excited to train and learn from a former Olympian (Bronze medalist). After the introductory class I started taking a few lessons a week and fencing at the club five times a week."

The Clear Lake Fencers’ Club got a bit of local publicity in October 1999. A feature article on the club appeared in a local, Clear Lake publication called the Baycomber, but otherwise, the local media continued to ignore fencing.

The Gulf Coast Division updated its web site to include the new division officers. The page included the minutes of a few recent meetings, the division bylaws and the requirements for participation in a tournament held five months earlier. It also contained a table of fencing clubs in the division and their contacts.

Topping the list was Salle Mauro with Mauro Hamza as the contact, followed by the Bayou City Fencing Academy with Louise Lepie as contact. The Clear Lake Fencers’ Club followed, with the somewhat dated listing of Michael Mergens, Jerry Dunaway and Richard Alvarez as contacts. The new kids on the block, Galveston Fencing Club and Ken Shelton, came next followed by another out of date listing for the old Houston Fencers’ Club with Steven Farid at the West Side YMCA. The table continued to the soon to be renamed Kingwood Fencing Academy and Bill Trapani, followed by the Rice Fencing Club listing Derek Ruths and Rob Purple as contacts. The remaining clubs and contacts listed were: the Spindletop Cavaliers with Hazel and Peter Power; the South Houston High School Fencing Club with Jerry Dunaway; the Texas A & M University Fencing Club with Marlene Fuller; and the newest version of the University of Houston Fencing Club with contact Chris Martin.

Dan Gorman, who organized the list, later remarked, "You'll notice the order is alphabetical with the exception of Salle Mauro. The reason for this is that when Mauro left BCFA and started Salle Mauro, I mistakenly thought it was little more than a name change and just changed the name and left it in place. When I found out that BCFA was still around, I added them back to the table."

One person you would not find on the list was Dana Andersen-Wyman, the theatre director and fencing instructor at Brazosport Community College in Lake Jackson. The November 22 issue of their campus newspaper ran a short feature on fencing and Andersen-Wyman’s class. Andersen-Wyman and one of his students, John Veillon, were interviewed for the article, which also mentioned that they were starting a petition to organize a fencing club so that the students could participate in tournaments.

If the Brazosport College Fencing Club was building up, the more established Spindletop Cavaliers, like the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club, seemed to be slowing down a bit. The club’s primary instructor, Father Sinclair Oubre, was appearing less and less. Father Oubre had to beg off due to increasing diocesan demands on his time. Some in the club feared he was either "burned out" of teaching fencing or, being a classical fencer, overwhelmed by the modern style.

Despite the on-line listings, it was still not that easy for would-be-fencers to locate a place where they could learn fencing. In Port Arthur, the home of the Spindletop Cavaliers, Jeremy Cooper was still very interested in fencing, but had no idea that a long-established fencing club existed right nearby. With no instruction to channel it, his interest sought other ways of expressing itself. "A couple of years before I started fencing, my best friend and I would rig "rapiers" together and fight. We also used his kendo swords and even the toy "light-sabers" that come out every three years. I found out quickly that none of what I had done really gave me an advantage against anyone else. The only difference was that I was deeply in love with the sword and more than willing to take on the drudgery of learning its proper use."

The first part of the year always brought out the traditional tournaments. The Poujardieu Memorial held in San Marcos was on January 29th and 30th. A few Gulf Coast fencers made the pilgrimage.

In the mixed epee event, the University of Houston’s Preston Partridge (previously with CLFC) captured 9th place from a field of 81 duellists. Jeff Smith, another CLFC fencer now with the U of H club, took 34th place. The Clear Lake Fencers’ Club’s Thomas Dyson came in 52nd place. His father, Thornton "Ted" Dyson, also a CLFC fencer took 56th place. Rice University’s Ryan McMullan placed 69th. Texas A & M University’s Eban Files came in at 73rd place.

In women’s epee, A & M’s Liz Gorman placed 10th in a field of 29 fencers.

Rice University’s Harold Van Buskirk Memorial tournament for 2000, often noted as VB 2K, was held February 12 and 13. The local fencers from the Gulf Coast Division faced very strong opposition by fencers from the South Texas and North Texas Divisions.

Nonetheless, Mauro Hamza’s star pupil Steve Gerberman handily captured first place in mixed foil out of a field of 30. Another Hamza pupil, Michael Galligan tied for third. One ex-Gulf Coast fencer, Chip Jarred, now at the Baton Rouge Fencing Club, finished in 11th place. Eryck Kratville, from Bill Trapani’s Kingwood Fencing Academy came behind him in 12th place. One time South Houston fencer, Vincent Sumrall, now fencing for Salle Mauro, placed 15th. He was followed in 16th by Don Cravey from the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club. Salle Mauro’s Benjamin Parkins was 19th, while Rice’s Reuven Lax took 20th place. Benjamin Fasenfest, fencing for the University of Houston placed 21st. Another CLFC fencer, Michael Hogan took 23rd, ahead of Salle Mauro’s Peter Wells in 24th place. Rice’s Wally Upp took 25th. The sole visitor from Texas A & M University, Cale Harfoush, placed 26th. Amy Goedicke, fencing for Salle Mauro, came in 27. Two fencers from South Houston High School, Damian Berntsen and Franklin Cantrell, placed 28th and 29th, respectively. 30th place went to the CLFC’s Thornton "Ted" Dyson.

In the women’s foil event, there were eight competitors, five from the Gulf Coast Division. Unfortunately, they also took the bottom five slots. Julia Pike from Salle Mauro tied for third. Rice’s Anna Gardberg took 5th place. Positions 6-8 went to Alyssa Green (Salle Mauro), Amy Goedicke (Salle Mauro) and Alexa Plunkett (Rice University), respectively.

The mixed epee event featured equally difficult competition from a field of 37. Chip Jarred, the ex-patriate Houstonian captured the second place spot. Not far behind two CLFC fencers, Preston Partridge (also a student at the University of Houston) and Siegfried Hanicke placed 5th and 6th, respectively. Texas A & M’s redoubtable Liz Gorman took 9th place. Interestingly, Rice fencer Suzanne Simpson competed and took 26th while fencing for the South Texas Division’s Salle Poujardieu. The CLFC’s Don Cravey came in 11th. Rice’s own Aaron Martz came in a respectable 15th place. Another CLFC fencer, Phil Howard took 18th. Timothy Guerinot from the U of H club placed 22nd. A string of the home (Rice University) fencers followed with Robert Purple, Cameron Cooper, and Daniel Ma finishing 23rd, 28th and 29th, respectively. Salle Mauro’s Phillip Mitchell came in 30th, while a visitor from Texas A & M, Eben Files, placed 32nd. The remaining competitors from the Gulf Coast were three from the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club. Michael Hogan, Thomas Dyson and Daniel Landwehr finished 33rd, 34th and 35th, respectively.

The women’s epee event fielded only 5 fencers. Liz Gorman was the sole Gulf Coast Division fencer in the bunch, taking 2nd place, fencing under the auspices of Texas A & M and Salle Mauro.

The mixed sabre competition saw 19 competitors. Texas A & M had been the strongest source for sabre fencing in the Gulf Coast Division for the last few decades, so it was not surprising that the highest placement for a Gulf Coast fencer went to Salle Mauro/Texas A & M’ fencer Daniel Gorman. Another Salle Mauro competitor, Ian Wells, took 7th place, just ahead of the University of Houston’s Tim Guerinot in 8th. 12th place went to former A & M sabreur David Sierra, now at the North Texas Division’s Fencing Institute of Texas. Zachary Perkins with Salle Mauro took 14th place. Another Texas A & M representative, Marlene Fuller came in 16th. 18th place went to another Salle Mauro competitor, Joseph Wysocki.

There was no women’s sabre event, but a team sabre competition arranged. Eight teams were engaged. The South Texas Division’s Aslanian Academy from San Marcos was able to field two teams. There were also two teams under the combined Texas A & M University/Salle Mauro auspices. As usual with such events, the team names ran heavily into whimsy. First place was claimed by the A & M/Salle Mauro Beefcakes. Rice University’s Lords of Chaos placed 3rd, just ahead of the U of H Sausage Party’s 4th place. Nearer the bottom, the A & M/Salle Mauro Radishes came in at 7th place.

The Masters Tournament at UT in the South Texas Division was held February 26-27.

The faraway conflicts in the Balkan States drew Michael Mergens away in February. A lieutenant colonel in the Army National Guard, Mergens was reactivated and shipped off to Eagle Base in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Not surprisingly, however, when Lt. Col. Michael Mergens came to Eagle Base, along with his flak vest and helmet, he packed his fencing gear. Even though he would be busy as the chief of strategic plans at the base, he hoped to keep his fencing skills sharp.

This not only deprived the fledgling Galveston Fencing Club of its primary coach, but also placed further burden for all coaching at the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club on Scott Brown. Jerry Dunaway, the South Houston High School coach assisted when and where he could, but family and school obligations of his own would restrict his involvement at Clear Lake for the next year or so. In the meantime, Scott Brown was still teaching at the La Porte High School Fencing Club.

During this period, Rod Fleming, a fencer with the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club had stepped in to fill a void at the Galveston Fencing Club. The GFC had become a sponsor of an introductory fencing class taught by Michael Mergens at the University of Texas Medical Branch on Galveston Island. At Mergens’ request, Fleming stepped in to see that the lessons continued.

By March, Lt. Col. Mergens, the constant club generator, was teaching fencing classes in Bosnia.

Mergens was not the only local fencer moving on. David Burns moved to Charlotte in early 2000. "I left the southwest section not to pursue any pro fencing league but for new life opportunities. When I was in Houston there was one club and I was not welcome there. Had I been welcome there I would not have left Houston. It's a long story but when Louise and Mauro were working together they had an assistant coach that for whatever reason didn't like me and I had no where to fence. I moved to Charlotte to fence and start a new life."

Some clubs did seem to take it upon themselves to dictate much more than lessons to their pupils. One parent of fencers in this era recalled, "When our kiddos started fencing, we were at a club where we were discouraged NOT to attend tournaments other than the ones our club sponsored. Unless our club had 'friendly' relations with another club we were not informed of the tournaments or TOLD not to go. This hurt our kids fencing no doubt."

The media spotlight fell on John Clements, with the March 2-8 issue of the Houston Press, a weekly newspaper. Many people who were involved in historical fencing, but had not made it to Houston to view Clements’ work with HACA, remained curious. The curiosity was fueled in part by the controversies that had swirled around him. Even so, HACA members did travel across the country and to Europe, partly to demonstrate their program and partly for their own research.

In one of their trips they had visited noted sword authority Ewart Oakeshott. As a result of his scholarly standing in the sword community, in March of 2000, Oakeshott was asked by a correspondent, "I was wondering what you thought of John Clements and the HACA group that visited you recently. I have been rather curious about their methods of training and the results thereof, but have never been able to see them in person. If you could share your impression of them, I would be most grateful!" Oakeshott responded, "I watched them for about an hour and a half - and found them quite impressive. They were really demonstrating, not their training, but the result of their training. But they are very talented. I enjoyed their stay."

Clements remained controversial, although his second book, Medieval Swordsmanship, was better received than his earlier, Renaissance Swordsmanship. Still, even among his supporters, there were those who wished he had toned things down a bit. As one such supporter wrote, "I could wish for a second edition of Medieval Swordsmanship, heavily edited to remove Clements' tiresomely repetitive disparagement of the forms of combat practiced by some re-enactment groups, principally the SCA. My view is, "John, you said it once, I got it then, so don't keep saying it..." He's apparently a nice enough person in the flesh, but in print he sometimes comes over as arrogant, abrasive and righteous."

For others, John Clements and HACA were just what they were looking for. In 2006 Stacy Clifford observed, "When I was in college I did a little sport fencing for a couple of years. In 2000 I decided I wanted to get back into it after a few years away because it was fun, and I started looking for fencing clubs in Houston. I stumbled across what was then HACA in the Leisure Learning catalog offering a class in Medieval Swordsmanship. I thinks to myself ‘swords and history, can't beat that,’ so I looked them up on the internet and found out when class times were so I could go check it out.

"I could immediately see in my first class that John Clements was a teacher who was confident and knowledgeable in his subject and not afraid to demonstrate how things worked. We did some sparring with padded weapons that same day and before I knew it I was standing there with a weapon in my hand and JC taking shots at both sides of my head. I had loved the athleticism of sport fencing, and this quickly convinced me I'd find what I was looking for in HACA as well. By the second week I went home with nicely bruised knuckles and a growing desire to get good at this. I've never looked back."

Clifford did note at another time, "I took sport fencing in college before I ever heard of ARMA, and although it took me a while to modify my footwork to where I could do a proper traverse later on, I still use the footwork skills I first learned in sport fencing all the time as a subset of the larger body of historical footwork. Sport fencing also helps you develop a great sense of timing and distance in a high-speed situation (and it's a lot of fun). The hard part will be learning to compartmentalize the skills you can and can't use when switching back and forth between disciplines."

South Houston High School hosted a mixed open foil tournament on March 24th. John Veillon from the newly formed Brazosport College Fencing Club was among the competitors.

The Brazosport College Fencing Club then scheduled a "dry" foil tournament for Saturday, April 15th. Six current and former students participated. First place went to Timothy Marsh, second to Ian Mackechney and third to Shanel Stone. John Veillon, Christine Tankersley and Michelle Bradley also participated. The campus newspaper covered the event and quoted the sponsor, Dana Andersen-Wyman as saying, "I want to do this at least once a year, and hopefully next year we will have electrical equipment, which makes the game faster and we can compete so that students can get national rankings."

The fencers at the University of Houston also drew some attention. Local television station KHOU- Channel 11, the local CBS affiliate, ran a short piece on the fencing talent at U of H. Justin Phillips and Preston Partridge, members of the U of H fencing team, were interviewed. The next day, a story was carried on the Texas Cable News Network in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. The story was summed up as, "The UH fencing club is the best team sport on campus that nobody has heard of. Team members were interviewed about the sport. They beat Texas A&M University and the University of Texas on the same weekend."

By May of 2000, even in exile in distant Bosnia, Michael Mergens was organizing fencing classes on his base, with an eye to a small tournament near the end of his tour. Strapped for equipment, he had his wife ship his personal gear to Bosnia. Fellow CLFC members John and Nicole Trojanowski also shipped him some of their spare equipment. Mergens’ fencing club in exile sometimes took on an international quality. As he put it in a letter, "I'm expecting a Dutchman, Italian, Bosnian and possibly a Russian to start showing up. Also had a ringer come in last week. I started off the class thinking this kid was a beginner, and finally realized (as he does a perfect lunge on the first go around) that he had done this before, so I asked him. "Oh, yes sir, I started when I was 8 and quit about two years ago when I was 17." Seems he wants to relearn because he had developed some bad habits he wants to try and get rid of. Life remains interesting."

The "ringer," Sgt. Tommy Sirico, chose to come to Eagle Base because he heard about Mergens’ classes. "I pick duty stations where they have fencing. I heard that the colonel had a club Web site, and teaches in Texas. That’s why I came here." Sirico had started fencing while attending college at the University of Texas-El Paso. He had won championships in Texas, Georgia, Connecticut and New York and competed on the World Military Fencing team. Arriving at Eagle Base in May, Sirico helped Mergens teach classes twice a week. They also found time to practice daily. "Everyone knows fencing isn’t a very popular sport. When you consider the amount of people supporting us here, and the great job Col. Mergens is doing, we have a really good thing going," Sirico said.

Back in Houston, the city and HACA served as host for the Swordplay Symposium International inaugural conference May 27-29 at the Clarion Hotel. The event was intended as "the first bi-annual Symposium of the leading voices in Historical European Swordsmanship and the Western Martial Arts."

Among those giving lectures, demonstrations and workshops were John Clements, Stephen Hand, Steve Hick, Ramon Martinez, Brian Price, Hank Reinhardt, and Andrea Lupo Sinclair.

Salle Mauro hosted the Regional Youth Circuit #5 event on June 10-11. Hamza’s organization had truly come into its own and carved a more than healthy niche for itself. Geographically, the only other fencing organizations based near Salle Mauro were the Rice Fencing Club and the Bayou City Fencing Academy. Hamza was still the fencing coach for Rice University and had previously coached at BCFA before forming his own club. Of course, now he did have his own club, with students, coaches, a website and promotional literature.

Some of that selfsame promotional literature was, however, unfortunately worded. Salle Mauro’s fliers and website read, in part, "Founded by the Egyptian Fencing Master Mauro Hamza, Salle Mauro

(formerly the Bayou City Fencing Association) has introduced fencing to thousands of adults and children in the Houston area." Such phrasing would leave the casual reader no doubt that Salle Mauro was BCFA under a new name and not a separate entity. It might all have come to no real notice, but that the phrasing would remain in place and be repeated for at least two more years. This was not the sort of thing to mend the fences between Hamza and BCFA’s Louise Lepie.

Michael Mergens reappeared while on leave from Bosnia, but only made brief appearances here and there among his fencing colleagues before vanishing again.

Something else appeared in 2000. The "Rice Fencing Academy" was founded by Coach Mauro Hamza. According to the literature its purpose was to provide an outlet for competitive women's fencing at Rice University. This was to be part of plan toward the ultimate goal of achieving NCAA status for women’s fencing at Rice.

Hamza also taught fencing as a Rice University course, but his term as coach to the Rice Fencing Club had come to an end. Several RFC members felt Hamza was matriculating talented fencers from his Rice class to Salle Mauro, bypassing the campus organization altogether. As a result, the coaching of the Rice club had since fallen to musician and former Rice student, Ryan McMullan, who had graduated in 1998, and another grad student, Tim Miller.

On the other side of local fencing, HACA founder John Clements registered on an Internet site called NetSword on July 19th. That same day he made a cryptic announcement on their bulletin board, "I can't talk about details yet, but a major cable network involved in this very thing [sword documentary] is actually coming to Houston at the end of next month to film some footage with us and gather some interview clips for a special program. I also will be spending the day with them conceptualizing the program. I can't say any more than the obvious that Medieval & Renaissance Masters of Defence and their swords is our subject of specialty."

In July, to the east in the Beaumont and Port Arthur area, Father Sinclair Oubre made a brief, four-month return to teaching and fencing with the Spindletop Cavaliers. Unfortunately, by late November he had ceased appearing again.

Another absentee Gulf Coast fencing coach, Michael Mergens, managed to find some enjoyable distractions while in exile in southeast Europe. Near the end of August he got to see some old colleagues. As he wrote in an email message, "Went to Budapest this past weekend on a four-day pass. Neat city, but the communists nearly destroyed it through neglect. There is a massive restoration effort going on throughout the city. Also went to the World Veteran's Championships just outside the city for a day. Got to see Ray [Sexton] and Dianne [Kallus] and Earl Robinson, Don Benge, etc. Dianne got silver in womens’ 50 to 59 Epee. Was a little disappointed in the venue. It was held at the Hungarian equivalent of A&M, but the buildings and facilities were definitely communist era and in pretty bad shape. Had copper and metal strips, though. There was only one vendor there, Hungarian, so I had to get a saber."

Always organizing, he added, "We are going to have the First Bosnian Fencing Championships this next weekend. Not expecting much, but the guys are excited. They are making T-shirts and giving us trophy's etc. Your tax dollars at work!"

Back at Mergen’s alma mater, the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club took advantage of the opening of the motion picture Highlander: Endgame, starring Christopher Lambert and Adrian Paul to mount a public fencing demonstration at a local AMC multiplex. In addition to CLFC fencers Nicole Trojanowski, Debbie McBride, Phil Howard, Don Cravey, Bill Satterwhite, Matt Delavouryas and Ted Dyson, U of H fencers Preston Partridge and Jeff Smith participated. The fencing was held in a large, sunken circular area in front of the building on opening night. In an eerie parallel to the film and television series, a spectacular electrical storm moved into the area. While there was no significant rain and no power losses occurred, the image was hauntingly close to the phenomena called the "quickening" as depicted in the film.

Michael Mergens mini-tournament in Bosnia was held in early September. During the six months he had been instructing at Eagle Base, his class enrollment has fluctuated between a half-dozen to a dozen students. "That’s fine. People rotate in and out or they just lose interest. My goal is to expose the sport to as many people as I can."

"Our tournament was a bit of a success. We had a total of four fencers, but we could have eight except for mission requirements, people going home (imagine, going home after seven months here instead of fencing!), etc. We had more spectators than fencers, what with all the media that showed up. Stars and Stripes (the military leftist rag they call a newspaper) was there with two reporters/photographers and the guys from the, appropriately enough, Combat Camera section. We had one kid that fenced that had only been coming to class for three weeks and surprised the hell out of all of them! He's going to be a good one. I have two folks that will be here for a while when I'm gone to carry on for a while, so hopefully there will be more. Had lots of extra T-shirts, so I'm bringing some home for folks that have kept in contact and helped me out."

"I always wanted to fence, but I never had time," said one of Mergens’ students, Cpl. David Osgood. When he heard about the free classes, he jumped in with both feet. "There is so much art to every movement and tactic. You can’t be sloppy and be a good fencer." His fencers put on a good show, Mergens said. "I love watching someone grab on to the sport with a passion," Mergens was quoted in Stars and Stripes. "You can play for life. My worst defeat came at the hand of a guy who was 70 years old. I was 42 at the time. Your game adjusts and changes when your body and your mind change. When I’m in my seventies or eighties, I’ll still be fencing."

A very different Houston fencing instructor was also out of town this September. John Clements, along with Jeff Basham, had traveled to Ashokan, a field campus of the State University of New York in the Catskill Mountains for a demonstration. Clements continued to be generally well received in his travels. This visit, as well, included another of the minor accidents that seemed the haunt so many of his practices and demonstrations.

One attendee from Pennsylvania later recalled the incident. "[T]he fellow that was putting on the display was quite the hot fellow, very big on himself, he damaged his partners mouth during a warmup, they were off to the side on the dirt road that went up the hill while the Japanese swords were being talked about, suddenly we heard a Nasty word yelled out and as you noted a beautiful day it was, there was his partner bent over spewing blood out his mouth, seems that wooden sword was swung just a wee bit too close and caught his friends mouth quite hard, several stitches later that night. The guy was a trooper though; he still went on through the demonstrations with that smashed mouth! while the MAIN guy was mucking it through. It was interesting and I'm sure the fellow knows his stuff, he surely told everyone he did..."

The same witness did add, however, that Clements, "was very quick witted and pretty fast on his feet."

As to Basham’s injury, the onlooker noted, "The accident was, I think, bringing the sword up from ground level and struck that poor fellow straight in the front of his mouth, he did go to the hospital after the demos, kept a cold press against his mouth when John was talking, but did the sparring like I said, as a trooper! Don't remember his name, tall fellow, quiet and soft spoken, seemed to know his stuff, I think the accident was just too much of a hurry getting ready for the event. The sunlight was streaming down through the trees onto the road where they were fighting, quite a neat scene actually. It was a BIG thick wooden sword!"

Back on the Gulf Coast, on September 23rd, the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club, assisted by fencers from South Houston High School, mounted another public demonstration. This time the event was held in more relative comfort in the Pasadena Town Square shopping mall.

By October 7th, after many long months in the Balkans, Michael Mergens returned home.

The Longhorn Open was held October 14 and 15 in Austin. The tournament was the first event in the Southwest Section Circuit Cup, which featured tournaments in each of the six divisions that made up the Southwest Section of the USFA. As former Texas A&M fencer David Sierra, now Commissioner of the SSCC stated in his announcement, "This year once again the Southwest Section will conduct the Southwest
Sectional Circuit Cup (SSCC). The six divisions of the Southwest Section have each designated a tournament. Points will be awarded according to the point schedule for a Div I NAC tournament and some great prizes will be awarded to at least the top three places in all six weapons."

A little further down her added, "As a reminder to all Divisions in the Southwest Section. The first
tournament of the SSCC is barely a month away. Don't forget you have pledged to supply one (competent) director per day and one set of (WORKING!!!) box and reels. Make sure you contact the UT Austin folks and tell them who your director(s) are."

The Clear Lake Fencers’ Club was able to extend their autumn series of public demonstrations when they were invited to participate in NASA’s Safety and Total Health Day on October 18, at the Johnson Space Center. The inclusion was not surprising since a fair number of the club’s fencers were engineers and technicians from NASA and various aerospace contracting firms in the area. They were able to participate largely through the efforts of CLFC fencer Candy Torres, who rounded up her fellow NASA fencers for the event.

November 1st saw a friendly competition between members of the Rice Fencing Club and the Spindletop Cavaliers.

Three days later, on Saturday the 4th, the Clear Lake Fencers’ Club wrapped their fall series of public demonstrations with a "demo" closer to home at Baybrook Mall. This was their second event at that location and it was becoming an annual feature for the club.

Such attempts to get fencing in the public eye, however, absolutely paled when compared to John Clements’ work getting HACA and himself noticed. On November 6th the media spotlight sweep across John Clements again. He, HACA and other historical fencing groups were featured on a History Channel episode of the documentary series Modern Marvels titled, Combat Training.

He also kept busy with classes. As HACA member Jeffrey S. Basham wrote, "HACA has its primary school in Houston, Texas. We are thus fortunate to have the expert instruction of John Clements himself. Our official classes are held on Wednesday nights and we get together on few weekend days each month as well." He added, "There is now a HACA Austin, TX study group." HACA also had at least one affiliated member closer to home in the form of Daniel Hinson of Orange, Texas, near Beaumont and Port Arthur.

The SSCC continued on November 4-5 with the Wilson-Silvia Memorial Tournament in Dallas (North Texas Division).

The South Houston High School club closed out the competitive fencing year by hosting an "E and Under" foil tournament on December 9th.

As a young man in the 1970s he studied under Charles Selberg. He relocated to Lake Jackson as the theatre instructor from Brazosport College. He also taught foil and, occasionally, sabre, albeit a more classical, less contemporary USFA style. He also taught stage combat and period fencing.