Dear Mr Callomon,

I am so pleased to see that the Philadelphia Shell Club is paying honour &
tribute to Neil Hepler. I had the pleasure of meeting him at the Naples
Shell Show in 1983. He had of course stolen the show with one of his
beautiful exhibits.

I told him that I was working on an exhibit of Aequipecten opercularis for
the London Shell Show, and when I arrived back home here in Northern
Ireland, he had sent me a proposed layout for my exhibit. I followed his
suggestions to the letter, and paid particular attention to the details he
paid to all his titles. I won the COA award with this exhibit in 1986. Sadly
Neil had passed away, but he certainly inspired me and the COA shield came
my way on 4 further occasions.

The first time that Peter Dance saw one of my exhibits he exclaimed " Neil
Hepler is not dead".  I was flattered of course but I knew in my heart that
none of my exhibits ever reached Neil's high standards.

One of my fondest memories. When he sent me the layout for my exhibit, he
also sent me a lovely little collection of Florida shells for my young
daughter Laura, together with stand up labels so that she could show the
shells in school.  This illustrates the generosity of the man.  I had only
spent a short time with him at the Naples Show and yet he was prepared to
share his knowledge and shells with me - a complete stranger.

I will always regret that I only shared his friendship in his twilight
years, but he gave my hobby purpose, and I shall always be indebted to him.

Stanley Francis.
Belfast,
Northern Ireland.

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