Will Rogers Ranch Hosted Special Event for L.A. Conference

The buzz is on for next year’s conference. It started right after this year’s star-studded Hollywood extravaganza in Los Angeles. Jennifer Rogers-Etcheverry was among a swarm of conference attendees responding enthusiastically to the announcement that the 2017 meeting will be held at Manchester, New Hampshire next June 8-11.

“I am soooo excited!” she said. “I am going to plan on it. I want to make it a vacation.”

NSNC President Lisa Molinari and Vice President Mike Morin are already far along in planning a schedule of top-notch speakers, panels and fun-filled activities for the 41st annual get-together.

The great grand-daughter of Will Rogers has attended the past three NSNC conferences as presenter of the Will Rogers Humanitarian Award. This year she hosted a special event at the Will Rogers Ranch in the outskirts of  LA. On a perfect summer evening, writers enjoyed a tour of the house and grounds where Rogers lived with his family in the late 1920s and 1930s, followed by a bountiful barbecue in the famous stables and barn Rogers built to keep his polo ponies and riding horses.

Pasadena columnist/blogger George Waters became the 18th recipient of the award, established in 1999 to recognize writers whose work has positively affected lives and produced benefits for his or her community.

The theme of the 2016 conference was “Hooray for Hollywood” and the dinner guests felt a connection with the industry through the presence of Wyatt McCrea, grandson of actor Joel McCrea, a contemporary of Will Rogers, and W. Bruce Cameron and Cathryn Michon.

McCrea shared stories about the relationship between his grandfather and Rogers, the highest paid movie actor of his time.

Cameron, a longtime NSNC member, is a best-selling author whose book, “A Dog’s Purpose”, was made into a movie by Steven Spielberg’s DreamWorks Pictures. The film, starring Bradley Cooper and Dennis Quaid, is scheduled for release in January 2017. You can watch the trailer HERE.Cameron and his wife, Cathryn Michon, co-wrote the screenplay for “Muffin Top: A Love Story.” Michon directed and starred in the 2014 independent production, which was released by Netflix in August 2015. Watch that Trailer HERE.

The tour and dinner was sponsored by the Will Rogers Ranch Foundation and the Will Rogers Memorial Foundation in Oklahoma.

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Thanks to Robert Haught for capturing the details of this great event. This first appeared in our September, 2016 member newsletter.