Bill Budenholzer inquired as to the status of Paul Eakins' Gay 90's
Museum in Sikestown, MO.  Unfortunately, the museum no longer exists.
After Paul's death, the instruments were sold off and many of them went
to the Disney collection in Orlando, FL.  Then the Disney collection
was sold off and most instruments are in private hands.

As of about a year or two ago, Mrs. Eakins was still alive and living
in Sikestown.  I corresponded with her several times but she did not
return my last letter.  She was getting quite elderly and I really
don't know whether she is still alive.  She apparently has quite a bit
of memorabilia including pictures of the Eakins Special on "What's My
Line" and "I've Got a Secret".  However, I was never able to get her to
part with anything so that I could make a copy.  She also had a small
business going selling tape recordings of some of the old instruments.

Ron Bopp wrote a very good article about Paul Eakins several years ago
for the MBSI publication.  You may want to contact him for a copy of
the article because it will give you a lot of information.

If Bill or anyone else has an interest in further documenting the
history of the Museum, I would suggest that you make a trip to
Sikestown to visit with Mrs. Eakins or her sons who live in the town
also.  (I live in Rhode Island so Sikestown is a little out of the way
for me!)  It would be terrific if someone could look at her photographs
and take them to a camera store so that they could be placed on disk.
It would be fun to have the pictures in the MMD archives and it would
document an important part of history.

So..., what do you say, Bill?   Want to head to Sikestown?

Gerry Bay