Early "Bonsai on the Internet" history-- posted in celebration of the
IBC Gallery forum reaching 1000 topics:

The alt.bonsai newsgroup is referenced as beginning in August 1992, but
the earliest posts readily located are by Richard K. ("Hud") Nordin in
September 1992.

On April 1, 1993, news.announce.newgroups reported,
rec.arts.bonsai is an unmoderated newsgroup which passed its vote for creation by 189:22

Mike Bartolone posted a proposal for establishment of the r.a.b group
on February 1, 1993, and noted,
Currently, discussion of the art of bonsai is carried out in the BONSAI mailing list, AND in
alt.bonsai. This group has, in the 6 months since its creation, been a forum for the
discussion of the joys and woes, the art and techniques of growing and maintaining the
beautiful dwarfed trees known as bonsai.

Perhaps the earliest reference"Internet Bonsai Club" was in a message
on the r.a.b. newsgroup from Mike Bartolone on Dec. 13, 1994 wishing
everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. On July 24, 1995,
Geoline Havener noted,
... The Internet Bonsai Club is really just a nifty label Dan Cwiertnewitz started on the
bonsai web page site at WSU for lack of nothing else to call the W3 site and this
newsgroup. But when enough people take a label like the 'Internet Bonsai Club' seriously
and even publish it in good ole fashioned paper form in order to give none computer bonsai-
ers a more tangible concept to grasp...the idea kind of sticks around. I don't see any
reason why the Internet Bonsai Club can't still grow in free form. Other Bonsai web sites
are starting to sprout. Perhaps even BCI and ABS will have homepages of their own in the
future and hence become part of the Internet Bonsai Club just by existing on the Internet.

Topics such as the "tipped tree logo", squirrel stew recipes & the
Haikumatic recall a warm community where the bonsai was the glue but
not always the most vivid recollection.

IBC administrator Jim Lewis is one of the earliest contributors to
posts of the IBC-- reaching back to May 1994. Thanks to Jim dogged
determination, IBC survived to become what exists today-- a growing
contributor to the world bonsai community.

We should locate the history of another huge contributor to early
bonsai discussion, the bonsai links (URL) list created by Craig Hunt of
Vancouver BC Canada. This site was often identified among the top 5%
of sites visited on the Internet as enthusiasts went through Craig's
links to find bonsai, viewing stone & Asian garden websites elsewhere
on the web. Craig generously moved his links the the National Bonsai
Foundation website when he became its webmaster.

The r.a.b. newsgroup which once mirrored the IBC discussion mail list
is approaching 40,000 posts. For more detail of early history see the
thread (which notes Craig Cowings contribution this summary):
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.a...browse_thread/
thread/42bd66a32227471e/dc79d9746123f74b?lk=st&q=
rec.arts.bonsai+1992&rnum=6#dc79d9746123f74b

See Jim Lewis's "Brief & imprecise History of IBC" on this site:
http://internetbonsaiclub.org/index....n=com_content&
task=view&id=146&Itemid=50

I'll get around to finding the info' on Craig Hunt's site,
eventually... but perhaps other Internet oldtimers (who aren't so old!)
know the story as well or better.