Reply #13: I did too. Went to his house in Los Angeles.

[onager]

He used to do personally conducted tours of his collection on Saturday mornings. You just had to call and make a reservation.

One item displayed was a letter saying, "I'm 10 years old and want to write horror stories when I grow up." It was signed: Stephen King.

Forry also had the original "Maria" robot from Metropolis and thousands of other weird/wonderful things.

Among many great stories, Forry said the Bradbury Building in downtown Los Angeles was designed by his grandfather, Mark Wyman.

The Bradbury Building, built in 1893, has been featured in several sci-fi movies, most famously "Blade Runner."

But that's not the only sci-fi connection. With its exposed elevator mechanisms and other "futuristic" touches, the Bradbury Building was inspired by one of the first sci-fi novels, Looking Backward (From The Year 2000) by Edward Bellamy. He was a socialist, like his cousin Francis Bellamy, who wrote the Pledge of Allegiance.

(The Bradbury Building has no connection with Ray Bradbury, other than the obvious--he and Ackerman were great friends.)