If you’ve been around the Apache Software Foundation for a while, you may have seen this photo:

That’s the Apache httpd developers (most of them) at the first ApacheCon, in 1998.

You may have wondered what happened to that feather.

Well, it went home with Ken Coar (the guy with the CIA hat, over on the right) and hung in one office or another for the next 15 years.

A few weeks ago, Ken moved into a smaller office, where there wasn’t room for the feather, and I received an ENORMOUS box in the mail.

Yes, that’s right, I am now in possession of The Apache Feather.

(More photos here.)

It’s mostly in pretty good shape, although at some point the stem broke off, and has been repaired, and has broken off again. We’re investigating ways to fix it without further damaging it. It’s very cool to have a piece of Internet history, although I expect that now that I’ve told the world where it is, someone on the Trademarks team will say that they should have it. 😉