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concepts · updated 2026-08-10

Alloy Conference

confidence: medium volatility: cold verified: 2026-08-10fresh

Spring 1969 gathering organized by Barry Hickman with Steve and Holly Baer that directly preceded Zomeworks' founding. Baer recalled Alamogordo, but multiple independent sources confirm it was held near Drop City in southeastern Colorado, March 1969. ~150 attendees including J. Baldwin, Lloyd Kahn, and Stewart Brand.

Spring 1969 gathering organized by Barry Hickman with Steve Baer and Holly Baer, the event that directly preceded the founding of Zomeworks Corporation. The archive’s only substantive account is Baer’s own recollection in a Mother Earth News interview: “Then, in the spring of ‘69, Barry Hickman and Holly and I organized the Alloy Conference in Alamogordo and we invited people who were working on all kinds of things… After that conference we started Zomeworks. Barry Hickman and Ed Heinz and I issued stock like a corporation and got a lawyer and all of that.”

Location

Multiple independent sources — the “Alloy” page at the Environmental Corruption archive (usenv.weebly.com), the academic paper Drop City Revisited, and Spatial Agency’s Drop City entry — all place the Alloy Conference near Drop City in southeastern Colorado, March 1969. Approximately 150 people attended from across the United States and Canada. Notable attendees included J. Baldwin, Lloyd Kahn, and Stewart Brand; Baldwin recalled it as “the first get-together and recognizing that we were a ‘we’ of counterculture builders.” Baer’s own Mother Earth News interview places it in Alamogordo, but no other source corroborates this — it appears to be a misrecollection. A 2026-08-10 research pass confirmed the Colorado location across all accessible sources.

Role in the Zomeworks founding sequence

Per Baer’s account, the conference is the hinge between the informal Drop City/Manera Nueva era and Zomeworks as a business: after it, Baer, Hickman, and Ed Heinz incorporated, issued stock, and hired a lawyer. Baer added that “organizing what we had been doing for fun and excitement into a business put a hell of a lot of strain on all of us at the beginning.” Stewart Brand recalled 150 in attendance; J. Baldwin and Lloyd Kahn are named in the Drop City Revisited academic account. No formal attendee list has surfaced.

See also