Hi Kevin.
The museum in the St. Louis area, is run by my friend Tom Gasko.
Tom and I go back to 1993, which was a major turning point for the V.C.C.C. and for me. After both John Lucia and I busted our buns my for many years trying to get the membership to contribute, I finally, gave up, and aside from doing the newsletter, tabled the club. Charles Richard Lester contacted me during this period and asked me to please keep it alive. On his suggestion I did, and shortly after that I got a call from Tom who knew of several people into vacuum cleaners, and that was the shot in the arm we needed.
In May of 93, Tom and his friends drove to my house with a van loaded with vacuum cleaners, and that was the turning point. From there, we had people who helped write stories, researched material, and got us noticed. Please understand, this was before the internet. There were no chat rooms, no eBay, nothing but word of mouth. The only publication was the V.D.T.A. Vacuum Dealers Trade Assoc., so we were still barely cutting the mustard.
It wasn't till I retired from the club in 95, to live my own life, that the changes happened, and when I returned in 04, WOW! there were over 100 members, and Charles had his Cyber museum up and running. If I remember correctly, Charles also ran our website, but I'll leave the history of that to him. As for Tom's museum, I've not been there, but plan to in the near future, from what I hear it's fantastic.
