AFP Unveils Exhibit Hall At Annual Conference

Workmen wearing kneepads rolled out carpeting while young women set up vendor booths and technicians installed lighting in a convention center hall large enough to comfortably park several aircraft, with room to spare.

Hours before the Association for Financial Professionals (AFP) unveiled the exhibit hall of its annual conference in San Antonio, Association members attended educational sessions before a keynote speech by former Secretary of State Gen. Colin Powell (Ret.), followed by an evening “hoe-down” featuring country music singer Jodi Messina.

While many of the more than 6,000 AFP members attending the conference attended educational sessions before the exhibit hall opening, others enjoyed the small-town feel of San Antonio by ambling along the downtown “river walk” and visiting the—what’s it called?—Alamo.

Some members returned to the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center with conflicting emotions about newfound knowledge regarding American history. According to one Alamo tour guide with an unusual sense of narrative, Davy Crocket—Kentucky native and “king of the wild frontier”—had joined others in renouncing his U.S. citizenship to purchase land in Texas, then Mexico, for approximately eight cents per acre, converting to Catholicism and becoming “American-Mexicans.”

Only later, the guide said, did the U.S. military bother to “rescue” American-Mexicans who had defied the Mexican government by refusing to pay taxes that weren’t part of the original agreement. The news, one said, was like finding out Dick Cheney was Canadian. Now, they will never forget the Alamo.

Though Association members say they are enjoying San Antonio, many say they are already looking forward to next year’s conference in Las Vegas.