Children's Cancer Center Annual Carnival

Troop #34

My mom is the bomb. She works for an insurance company that places non-profit organizations with appropriate insurance providers. One of her customers, the Children's Cancer Center of Tampa, Florida was very excited to hear about the 501st Legion and our charity works. After a few months of negotiated a proper venue for out group to participate in. The CCC has an annual carnival that provides the families from the center a place for outdoor activities, games, and just general carnival fun.

We lucked out by being able to have an entire sleeping dorm to ourselves for changing and staging our members. We also got to take over the library at the camp ground where it was being hosted. Members brought toys, action figures, sticker, temp tattoos, and props for a display table. We also had an authentic Star Wars backdrop inside the library so the children and families could take photos with our costumed members.

This was our first troop (let alone the first troop I have setup for our group) with the CCC and they were more than impressed. Our members showed up in force for a total of 24 costumed characters, some driving almost two hours just to be there. It opened the door to many more events for the 501st and the CCC to form a partnership to better the lives of children.

Relay For Life

Troop #33

The Relay For Life is an 18 hour event that raises money for the American Cancer Society. Our members are spread all throughout the state for these events. Our local group was invited to the one hosted by Newsome High School just outside Brandon. The point is to have a constantly moving team of sponsored individuals or teams in order to raise money for the ACS.

The 501st was invited there to have participants and guests take photos for an optional donation. It was mad windy out and made for very uncomfortable settings. Changing in the bathroom didn't help matters either...

Walk Now For Autism

Troop #32

Total Donations : $144,508

On March 28th, despite over 40 mile an hour winds, over 2800 people walked at MOSI in Tampa for the 2009 Tampa Bay Walk Now for Autism, the kick-off party to the 2009 Autism Speaks Tampa Bay Annual Fundraising Campaign. The walkers from more than 210 teams, raised over $140,000. We are now over half way to our $250,000 goal!

We would like to thank Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio for presenting a proclamation declaring March 28th Autism Awareness Day in Tampa. A very special thanks to the Tampa Bay 501st Legion for bringing their amazing Star Wars characters to the walk. Thank you to DJ Elvis for always keeping the music playing and Keith Connors from The New Magic 94.9 for welcoming our guests. Thank you to David Glickman for MCing the stage program. Thank you to the 49 resource fair vendors and to all of the companies who donated snack and drinks. A VERY special thank you to our sponsors. Thank you to Tammy Berk from Berk Photography and Troy Salisbury from Photographic Memories for donating their time and talents.

Thank you to the 2009 Tampa Bay Planning Committee for their hard work and dedication to making the event a success. They are the true heroes.

Tampa Toy & Comic Show

Troop #31

Hosted at a new locale in Largo. The event itself is cool, but the venue it is hosted in was very shitty and cramped. Our table location was inside the cafeteria leaving no room to look at our display booth and props. I hope they move it to another venue (being that it's called the Tampa T & CB Show, after all).

Armor Party

Troop #30

Armor repairs, cookout, introducing my friend Cindy into the majority of the TBS members. We also got rid of Tony Greco. Phew! Took us long enough! I'm kidding dude. Miss ya already. :D

Tiffany Erwin Fundrasier

Troop #29

Tiffany Erwin is a 13 year old Seffner Florida resident that has recently been diagnosed with brain stem Glioma, an inoperable and terminal brain cancer. On Sunday March 1st a group of 501st members participated in an event in efforts to raise money for the family. The family was thrilled to have us there and our group got to meet Tiffany in person. We also met the parents of Tiffany and found ourselves holding back our emotions as we learned that this is the second child that the family is dealing with losing.

This fundraiser personally left me with a bitter taste in my mouth as this event fell on the same day as another event, which raises no money whatsoever, but allows members to get together and get shit face drunk and square off against ego's. The other event drew a total of 73 501st from around the state of Florida. This fundraiser brought 7. The 7 of us who did show earned our title while the other 73 members from around the state spent their weekend doing absolutely nothing but drinking, choosing cliques, and laying out the direction of the Florida Garrison for the upcoming year. As the 501st Legion is a member group made of all volunteers it cannot be mandated to attend important events over "look at how awesome we are" events. My vitriolic view was only further highlighted after finding out that no leaders were willing to make a statement - leading by example. But I digress...

After the event I put up 78 Star Wars action figures (out of my personal collection) on the 501st Legion Florida & main Legion boards in an effort to raise as much money as possible. The auction ran for three weeks and had not a single bidder or participant. During the three weeks that the auction was up and open for bidding there was a total of $2,718 spent by Florida members on new costumes, upgrades to their current costumes, shirts, stickers, etc. Again...I digress...

Unlocking Autism

Troop #28

A newer member (Jim aka HKiller) did this troop alone in Springhill. It would have been a good fundraiser had any more than two of our nearly 150 members in the state of Florida come out for it. Oh...that's right, Saturday was too important to do charity; there was a convention drink fest planned instead.

Oh, and Jim forgot his helmet for his TK. So we winged it: he was now Han in the trash compactor for the event.

Geek Fest @ Hard Knocks

Troop #27

There is match.com and eharmony.com out there. And yes, they serve some purpose. However they entirely ignore a very large demographic of single people: nerds. Taking this niche to a new level is sweetongeeks.com and they are doing very, very well.

A place out in Oviedo Florida called Hard Knocks hosted the event. Basically it was setup for nerds to gather together in a nerdy setting, doing nerdy things, and be socially inept together for a bigger purpose than leveling their level 78 Necromancer. It sounds good on paper and a lot of work was put into this by the lovely owner of sweetongeeks.com. However the stuffy all-young-plastic-hot-female staff was barely beyond tolerable and acted with complete disinterest towards the event goals and the 501st Legion members who were attending.

No photography was allowed inside the building so no photos were taken. Again, really hostile hosts. We did entertain the crowd of 25-50 people for a few rounds of Rock Band in costume before the staff decided it was drawing too much attention away from their egos.

Highlight of the night: seeing somebody I miss very, very much at Broadways Pizza near UCF.

Family Fun Night

Troop #26

Hosted by Gulf Middle School (where one of our local Squad members is a teacher) - this annual event brings the families of the children who attend the school together to meet and greet with teachers and staff. Food, activities, and so on are provided. This marks the second year the 501st Legion has been invited out. We were a big hit with the children and adults alike.

Pinellas Park Parade

Troop #25

The 36th Annual Pinellas Park Parade brought out about 30 members from the local 501st Legion. A 2.3 mile walk in full armor is more than taxing on your body but well worth it. Seeing the families reaction as we came walking down Park Blvd. was an astounding feeling and at times made you forget that you lost feeling in your legs long ago. We had a good respresentation of all Star Wars characters from Storm Troopers to Vader himself. We also had a competition show truck decorated with our banner. Awesome troop & I cannot wait until next year to do it again!


That Guy Brian (our local Vader) hosted a pre-parade BBQ for the troops. This was especially cool because it marked the first appearence of another member of ours, Shadow Scar (Robert) who had previously broken his leg in three places at another event November 2008. Shadow Scar's costume is of a Black Hole trooper, or Shadow Trooper which is basically an all black Storm Trooper. So...with plenty of time on my hands I found an action figure of his character, got some white athletic tape, Elmer's glue, and went to work on a special gift to show our appreciation for his dedication to trooping. That Guy Brain helped removing it from the package carefully so we could operate on the figure and return it to the package without notice. Below are the pictures of Robert and his new gift. He was still in his wheelchair at this event and his spirits were quite down due to his injury preventing him from being able to work. And to speak even further to Robert's love and dedication to trooping, he suited up in his costume sans the legs, got into his wheelchair, and strapped it into the back of the truck so he could do his part in the parade. Bravo Robert.