Band founder Don Wilson credits fellow musician Owen and the Washington State Senate for being instrumental with helping them achieve the honor they had been eligible to receive for 22 years.  Wilson called Owen shortly after getting the news himself. 

“He took us before the Senate and they passed a resolution that was sent on to the Hall of Fame,” Wilson said. Wilson now attributes the 2005 resolution that was forwarded to the Cleveland-based organization as being “a big part of us getting in.”

The Ventures recorded more than 3000 songs and released 250 albums since being founded nearly 50 years ago. Hits include "Walk Don’t Run,” "Perfidia,” “Diamond Head,” and the theme song from the "Hawaii Five-0" police series on television from 1968 to 1980.

Wilson said the lieutenant governor’s relationship with the Ventures goes back 15 years, when then-Senator Owen’s own band served as the warm-up band for the popular Northwest group at a series of gigs on the West Coast to raise funds for local firefighter and police associations.

"We’ve been friends ever since,” Wilson said.

Owen said he was "absolutely thrilled” to learn The Ventures will be finally inducted into the Hall of Fame at a ceremony Monday night in New York. 

"The Ventures have richly deserved this distinction for years,” the lieutenant governor said. “If the resolution at all accelerated the timing of this great honor then I am pleased we might have had at least a small degree of influence.” 

Owen and his staff also conferred with Gov. Christine Gregoire and her staff on a proclamation proclaiming March 10, 2008 as “The Ventures Day” in Washington state. 

"I urge all citizens to gather their 45s, 8-tracks, cassettes, CDs and iPods and play The Ventures music on this special observance,” the governor’s proclamation states.

The Ventures will be the second band from Washington state to be inducted to the Hall of Fame, the other being the Jimi Hendrix Experience in 1992. Other groups to be inducted this year include Leonard Cohen, The Dave Clark Five, Madonna, John Mellencamp, Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff and Little Walter.

Owen noted that Seattle radio station KBSG 97.3 and deejay Mark Christopher also worked extensively on behalf of The Ventures to “lobby” the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for The Ventures’ induction. The station will host a free screening party of the 8:30 p.m. Monday ceremony in New York City at the Liberty Theater in Puyallup, with the doors opening at 7 p.m.

The ceremony is expected to last for two hours and the screening is open to the public on a first-come, first seated basis. Christopher will emcee the event, which the lieutenant governor will attend.
 
                                                                 ###