“Colorado and Wyoming are home of the organizations who make the annual R2-KT Auction, benefitting Make-A-Wish Colorado, a reality. The Mountain Garrison, Mountain Base, Cerar Clan, and Rocky Mountain Fan Force all pull together every year to put on the auction at the largest pop culture convention in the Denver area.
This auction means a lot to our Colorado and Wyoming Star Wars community, but we have not had a KT unit, until now. To understand the background of this droid, we go back to 2020, at the very start of the pandemic. That year, the hearts of our Star Wars community were broken with the passing of Mountain Garrison’s own brain cancer warrior, Melissa Magerfleisch, on March 9th, 2020.
The year 2021 saw the departure of the auction’s previous steward, Jennifer “Zoo” Peterson, to the green hills of North Carolina. Lorri Gurnett – CO of Mountain Garrison – stepped in to coordinate the auction after Zoo’s relocation.
Due to the pandemic, the R2-KT Auction would not be held again until Fan Expo Denver 2022, the first to be organized by Lorri, with Zoo’s invaluable help from afar. Lorri, Zoo, and Lorri’s grown offspring Skylar spent several late nights leading up to Fan Expo Denver, making sure the details for the auction were in place.
Mere weeks before Fan Expo Denver 2022, the alor’ad (leader) of Cerar Clan, Sam Wybenga, was diagnosed with a glioblastoma. This rocked our community to the core just as much as Melissa’s death had two years prior. Sam and his wife Elizabeth are extremely dedicated volunteers for the auction, as is Scott Magerfleisch, who serves as our auctioneer every year.
The atmosphere at the 2022 auction was both electric and sobering – the excitement of the first auction since the COVID pandemic, mixed with the loss of Scott’s late wife, were keenly felt. That auction was a record-setting one, and we all felt very proud to be a part of it.
Lorri had always wanted an R2-KT AmbassaDroid, but there were always so many projects on her and Skylar’s plates. But after that auction, and the emotions it stirred, given the circumstances with our community’s recent heartbreaking experiences with brain cancer, Skylar took it as a sign that building a KT unit should be a priority. They began to peruse the astromech.net forums, and engaged the members of the Denver Astromech Builders Club, to help start the project. As luck would have it, Steve Malson, Squad Leader of the Western Reaches Squad, had a droid that was already assembled, but would need a few parts and a new paint job. Lorri purchased the droid and Steve brought her to the house in early 2023.
After this year’s super-successful R2-KT Auction on July 1st, Skylar and their father Chris finished assembly of the new droid on July 18th, 2023. She was welcomed into the AmbassaDroid Corps as KT-23 shortly thereafter.
Today, KT-23 made her first appearance as an official AmbassaDroid – alongside her friends from Cerar Clan, Mountain Base, and Mountain Garrison – at the Make-A-Wish Colorado office. She delivered the check for proceeds raised from the R2-KT Auction, as well as Fan Expo Denver convention hall donations, totaling $19,001.95.
The average Wish runs $7500, so the power of this little droid helped grant two whole wishes, and then some. This is just the beginning of KT-23’s journey to support the Colorado and Wyoming Star Wars groups’ charity efforts, to bring hope to children and adults alike along the Front Range and beyond.”
Build team:
Leaders: Skylar Gurnett and Lorri Gurnett
Christopher Gurnett
Lynelle Phillips
Retta Gamboe
Steven Malson
2023 Check from R2-KT Auction to Colorado chapter of Make-A-Wish
KT-23 Build Pics
