concepts · updated 2026-07-19
Barry Hickman
confidence: low volatility: cold verified: 2026-07-19fresh
Co-founder of Zomeworks Corporation with Steve Baer and Ed Heinz, c.1969-70. Co-organized the 1969 Alloy Conference with Steve and Holly Baer, the event that directly preceded Zomeworks' founding. No independent public record exists beyond Baer's own writing and interviews.
Co-founder of Zomeworks Corporation with Steve Baer and Ed Heinz, c.1969-70 (sources vary between “1969” and “around 1970”). Named in the Zome Primer (1970) for contributions to rectangular trusses and the plastic ball joint used in early zome construction. Baer’s Dome Cookbook (1968) records him “planning a 26’ dome built with only one kind of panel and one size dihedral angle at Manera Nueva” and notes he “discovered covering one dome stiffened neighbors.”
The Alloy Conference
A Mother Earth News interview quotes Baer directly: “Then, in the spring of ‘69, Barry Hickman and Holly and I organized the Alloy Conference in Alamogordo and we invited people who were working on all kinds of things… After that conference we started Zomeworks. Barry Hickman and Ed Heinz and I issued stock like a corporation and got a lawyer and all of that.” This places Hickman as a co-organizer, with Steve and Holly Baer, of the event that directly preceded Zomeworks’ formation. Flag: other general counterculture-history sources place “the Alloy Conference” near Drop City in Coyote/Gardner, Colorado, in March 1969 — a location discrepancy with Baer’s “Alamogordo” recollection that has not been resolved.
No independent record
Also spelled “Berry Hickman” in some sources — the Dome Cookbook era predates consistent record-keeping. A 2026-07-19 research pass (genealogy sites, patent databases, obituary indexes, NM architecture archives, current Zomeworks/Zometool corporate materials) found no independent biography, obituary, or later-career record for this Barry Hickman. He exists in the historical record only through Steve Baer’s own writing and interviews. His later role at Zomeworks, beyond the founding period, is not documented anywhere found.