At BucConeer, when the Orlando bidders finally said "Turn out the lights, the party's over," they weren't talking about just a paltry few dozen yards of ceiling lights as I reported last issue.
     Chip Hitchcock writes that the decorations of the Boston for Orlando in 2001 party included almost half a mile of lights on the ceiling. "We found a party-supply chain that was going out of business and bought the entire stock of lights at several stores.
     "We had over 3000 watts of lights -- since they were spread all over the ceiling, they were enough to light the room without any of the built-in lights."
     Since I didn't smell any frying insulation, I wondered if they made special arrangements to power so many lights?
     Chip answered, "It turns out those little lights don't draw very much; a digital ammeter reported ~250/amp.
     "The hotel was supposed to provide us with extra circuits for margin, but it turned out their electrician didn't understand the concept of providing circuits even though there was at least one heavy-duty socket in the room. With careful division we got almost everything on the two circuits built into our half of the room, and the hotel ran a cord into the other half for our last few lights. (I did build some distribution lines because the lights themselves were on very lightweight wire that allowed only a few strings to be chained together.)"

Fred Patten agrees, "Yes, I am writing a history of furry fandom, and Joe Rosales is also planning a 'Brian Aldiss' history of furry/talking animals in popular culture." But he feels that Taral's comments about these projects, quoted in File 770:125, while accurate in general are erroneous in detail.
     Neither Patten nor Rosales feel their books are "revisionist" views of the same topic, any more than one would claim that Aldiss' The Billion-Year Spree is a revisionist view of Harry Warner's All Our Yesterdays. Rosales will focus on literature and popular culture, and Patten will chronicle furry fandom.
     Patten will only supply a broad overview of the history before moving on to his main topic, furry fandom:
     "There is an Egyptian tomb painting ca. 1500 B.C. of a lion and a gazelle playing whatever the Egyptian equivalent of checkers was. This is a bit more indisputably 'funny animal' than animal-headed gods, or neolithic cave paintings of what might have been anthropomorphized animals but could equally well have been tribal shamans dressed in animal skins. Parables featuring talking animals can be traced from the tales of Aesop and Terence through the Medieval ballads of Reynard the Fox to the refined literary fantasies of the 18th century French Court and the 'Uncle Remus' Afro-American folk tales of the 19th century. (And don't forget the Monkey King tales in the Orient.)
     "Anthropomorphics have especially proliferated during the most recent 200 years, with the popularization of talking animals in children's' literature (Lewis Carroll, etc.); talking animals in political cartoons (which predate Thomas Nast's Democratic donkey and Republican elephant); advertising mascots like Tony the Tiger and the Trix rabbit; movie and newspaper funny-animal stars like Krazy Kat, Mickey Mouse and Pogo Possum; and so on. I will summarize all this in a very broad overview as the Introduction to my history of organized furry fandom. Rosales will concentrate entirely on the history of talking animals through 5,000 years or more of popular culture.
     "My thesis is that furry fandom coalesced out of sf fandom and comics fandom, blending elements from both of them and achieving its own critical mass in 1983/1984. The first clear signs of the independent furry fandom were the creation of its first apa, Rowrbrazzle, and the decision by some fans to self-publish furry comic books because there seemed to be enough fans of stories with talking animals to support them (as distinct from earlier attempts to self-publish comics which had to hope for sufficient sales from the general public alone.) Some key titles in this evolution of 'furrydom' were Cutey Bunny (which first appeared in October 1982 but attracted attention during 1983), Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger novels starting in mid-'83 (influential in establishing funny animals as respectable reading for adults), and the Rowrbrazzle apa and the comics Albedo, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Usagi Yojimbo all during 1984. Critters and Captain Jack weren't until 1986.
     "Rowrbrazzle started in February 1984. Since it was specifically an apa for writing and drawing funny animals as a genre and discussing the new fandom that was forming about them, it is a handy landmark to say that 'furry fandom existed at this time.' I do not claim, as Taral implies, that furry fandom was started by the birth of Rowrbrazzle. But I have asked whether anyone can supply an earlier date that can be clearly identified as belonging to furry fandom, as distinct from being an isolated furry event within sf fandom (such as the preview of the Watership Down movie at the 1978 Worldcon) or comics fandom (such as R. Crumb's Fritz the Cat in 1968 or Marvel Comics Howard the Duck in 1976; and so far nobody has.
     "Considering that the worthwhile histories of fandom such as Sam Moskowitz's The Immortal Storm and Harry Warner's All Our Yesterdays and A Wealth of Fable have each taken about a decade to write, I will be very surprised if my book (working title: Animal Masks) is ready for publication as soon as next year."

Ian Gunn's long struggle with cancer came to an end on November 9. Karen Pender-Gunn e-mailed fan's on Ian's support list:
     "Yesterday, we were married in the Box Hill Hospital chapel with about 50 friends wishing us the best. Ian lasted out the party until about 1:30 in the afternoon then returned to his room. Later in the night his condition deteriorated and this morning the registrar said we should call in family and friends. Ian was surrounded the entire day by friends and family who I am sure helped him to a peaceful and pain-free death. I have never seen anyone die and I am still in shock. I have sleeping pills to take tonight as I have not slept in three days. I have been supported by friends and family for the past few days and it has been the most enormous help to me in this time of my grief. The tears haven't started for real for me yet."
     A funeral in the chapel of John Allison Monkhouse of Springvale, followed by a committal service at the Springvale Crematorium, was held November 16. The celebrant wrote to the list, "Gunny requested that no one wear black. He wanted everyone to dress in colorful clothing, and for it to be seen as a real celebration and not a morbid situation."
     According to Australian SF Bullsheet #110, this was observed. "While there was sadness, there was a celebration of Ian's life and his humor. The music for the funeral was the Frasier Chorus ambient version of 'Anarchy in the U.K.', the Bonzo Dog DooDah Band's 'Jollity Farm' and 'Kiss' by The Art of Noise with Tom Jones. There were fans from Perth, Adelaide and Sydney there, along with people from Ian's work, the hospital and Ian's Scout Group."

Harry Warner Jr.

The envelope that obviously contained an issue of File 770 arrived here on Friday, August 8. I was stunned because I assumed instantly that you had been so Up To Date that you'd published a special issue dealing solely with the first day of the Worldcon. Then I felt the thickness of the envelope and decided it couldn't be that, because nobody could write that much about just one day of the event. Then I remembered Evelyn Leeper. Finally I opened the envelope and found pre-con fannish news and so, a couple of days after the Worldcon, I still haven't heard anything about what went on there but am cheered by the fact that nothing so terrible happened that it made the national television newscasts or the main wire of the Associated Press.
     [[Didn't they even report Straczynski's cold on CNN?]]
     It's been only a year or a little more since I felt great relief when I learned that reports of Robert W. Lowndes' death were false. Now I must accept the bad news which you seem to have received from irrefutable sources. He was probably the gentlest and calmest of the Futurians and as a fan he did some pioneering things. He published nearly forty issues of Le Vombiteur over a two-year period, and it was perhaps the first of the very small, frequently appearing, and mostly give-away fanzines, whose contents were frequently similar to today's perzines. Its title inspired Bob Tucker to name a similar publication Le Zombie. As a pro, he was the first to buy one of my science fiction stories and pay me for it (previously, a Mexican prozine had lifted one of my stories from a fanzine, translated it, published it, and paid me only in a free copy of the issue in which it appeared.) Lowndes achieved a great deal of success on a very small budget with the prozines he edited. It's too bad he hadn't been remembered as well as the more combative Futurians.
     I gather that dogs in your part of California are allowed outdoors only on leashes. A somewhat more enlightened rule prevails in Hagerstown: if the dog is trained to obey its master and stays close to him, it can be granted outdoor privileges. A surprising number of local canines are adhering to this sort of freedom, I've found in my yard sale rounds. They like to mingle with potential customers and go no further from their homes than the sidewalk and the edges of the lawns with no need to be yelled at frequently by their owners. Maybe California could create a park of obedient dogs without leashes.
     Sourdough's letter really deserved the status of an article with a title and everything. It says a great many wise things about hobbying and its problems. When I read about the riots in Reno the other day, I thought about big science fiction conventions and the danger that something of the sort might happen to some of them, if far-out individuals continue to attend them en masse. So far these non-fans seem to have confined most of the bad behavior indoors, but it could conceivably spill over into the outdoors where it would be seized upon by the media and involve law enforcement authorities, now that the biggest cons usually involve walks between buildings and sometimes groups of fans wandering the streets in search of cheap eating places. Reno's trouble seems to have been caused by very small minorities of those who came to town for rock and partying.
     Since writing that letter you published in this issue, I've come across a newspaper article about the longevity of computerized stuff. It came from the Knight-Ridder syndicate. It quotes the National Media Laboratory, a research organization, as estimating that data on a CD-ROM will be safe only ten years under normal storage, fifty years under ideal conditions. Material recorded magnetically may have a life of only five years, this group claims. The change in hardware, this article says, has made material stored in the 1980s on eight-inch floppy disks "out of reach." Jeff Rothenberg of Rand, a research organization in Santa Monica, is quoted as saying, "The record of the entire present period of history is in jeopardy."
     It was surprising that George Flynn failed to dodge just one auto. He is much younger and should be more agile than me, and I somehow escaped crossing a downtown street the other day while five autos were running a red light. I had no trouble evading four of them, but the fifth very nearly got me. Then last week I scared myself to death by suffering a heavy fall in my home. I just topped sideways when I got up from a chair for no apparent reason. I don't think I busted anything although there was considerable rib pain when I breathed for several days. I'm proud of myself for having the courage to continue this activity instead of yielding to the temptation to avoid the pain.

Lan Laskowski

Thanks for the latest issue of File 770 with such good articles about fanclubs and news of fandom. The news that Poul Anderson received the Nebula Grand Master ward will hopefully urge fans and authors to contribute something to my efforts in honoring Poul for his 50+ years of writing SF/F and entertaining fans for all that time. Although I've set a deadline for submissions on Labor Day, I am willing to accept articles, anecdotes, art, etc. until the end of September.
     Sorry to hear that Teddy Harvia has dropped from the DUFF race for this year, but I think his decision is wise, considering the work it takes to run a Worldcon bid. I trust his plans to run in a later year will come to pass after he knows if Cancun in 2003 wins or not.
     I hope that George Flynn is recovering well from his accident.
     The "Fanivore" section was most intriguing. Sourdough Jackson's commentary was a good kick-off about fan clubs. He is absolutely right about a club being a community. Long after regular meetings for a club have vanished, the members continue to interact on the social level, something borne out in the Detroit area fandoms. The difference between the Phoenix and Denver fan groups for running their respective Worldcons is definitely the fact that people got along well socially in Denver while much the opposite was true in Phoenix. Additionally, Denver had an edge. There was a most respected fan leader around whom the fans could rally: the late Don C. Thompson. His charisma and easy-going manner helped make Denvention II a success, and the club-damage minimal. With his presence the recovery period for the group was short.

Buck Coulson

A bat in the bedroom? Nothing to get excited about; we've had that right here in Indiana. We encourage bats in the barn, since they're insect-eaters and make some inroads on the mosquitoes around here, but prefer to keep them out of the house.
     I wouldn't call Wiscon fabulous and I don't see any reason for strolling in downtown Madison when the con is indoors along with the people I want to talk to, but I agree that it was a pleasant con.
     A lot of Jackson's comments on Denver fandom would seem to apply to the old Indianapolis club that Juanita and I belonged to, and in part at least to the Columbus, OH club that our son Bruce belongs to. I assume it would apply to most fan clubs, despite reports of feuding here and there. If members don't like each other, what's the point of having a club? Otherwise, I'm fully agreed.
     Closest I ever came to a tornado was when Juanita and I were guests at a con in Birmingham a good many years ago. A funnel was sighted, the filkers were in the basement anyway and considered themselves as safe as possible, and the rest of us kept on with what we were doing. As I recall, the tornado did some damage in the northern suburbs but missed the hotel entirely.
     Otherwise, the hole in my ankle has closed, the specialist gave me up as a good job, and I'm out of the wheelchair and working to get rid of the cane. Still need it for support while traversing long hotel hallways at cons, and for getting up and down stairs at home, but the legs are strengthening.

Mike Glicksohn

My abysmal memory (which has been shot to pieces during the war with the Scotch) won't allow me to regale you with the tale of how the Ontario Science Fiction Club (OSFiC) -- which I helped form in 1966 and which was the core for the 1973 Worldcon -- came to its unlamented end but perhaps Taral has already taken care of that. It is telling, I think, that Toronto appears to be one of the very few major North American cities involved in bidding for a worldcon that doesn't have a central SF club. But so it goes.
     Everything I read about Gary Anderson makes me regret that I never knew him, or even knew of him. He seems to have been a remarkably fine person and it's a damn shame that fandom is so diffuse nowadays that our paths never crossed.

Garth Spencer

R. Graeme Cameron is within his rights to limit the Canadian Unity Fan Fund to fanzine fans. It may be right or wrong, but at least it's a decision. Mansfield can attack this decision if he wants, but he doesn't seem to attack it on its merits and demerits, or refrain from personal attacks. Much of the verbiage is beside the point, anyway; Cameron, and other CUFF administrators, are actually struggling with the massive apathy of Canadian fandom, they're not faced with gaming and comics and anime and furry and costuming fans clamoring to participate. Would that they were.

Lenore Jean Jones

I was just reading File 770:125 -- nice to get a copy hand-delivered! I'm always delighted when I receive a copy, and usually read it cover-to-cover the same day. (Since it's Worldcon, I got distracted and waited two days.) I especially enjoy con/trip reports, and I agree that obits and health updates should remain in your 'zine.
     Sourdough Jackson writes, among other things, about the situation at Disclave last year. Although I agree with much of the letter, I fear Sourdough, and many others, are making the same mistake others make about us -- assuming we're all the same. The presence of one fool in a group does not mean all members of that group are fools. Furthermore, I'm puzzled by the reference to inviting unrelated groups. Don't we usually define a fan as anyone who calls her/him-self a fan? If that's the definition, these people met it. I get real nervous when we start deriding any group as too far out or not serious. We got called that too often when we were younger, and sometimes still do, but yet I keep hearing sneers about "Goths", media fans, etc. Let's face it, folks, they're no more far out than we are --just different!
     I think the proper issues to consider are (1) helping new fans to understand the etiquette of fandom and conventions, and (2) keeping the attendance at a con a community. Sourdough is right in putting an emphasis on community. If you can do that, over-enthusiastic young people/newbies will be restrained by the older or more experienced crowd. I don't think the problem is substantially different from that of the last big Boskone, where we ended up demonizing 16-year-olds. Let's address the community problem without throwing out all those fans whose special interest is shared with a couple of fools.

Robert Lichtman

Congratulations on your purchase of a new home! Even though a fixer-upper, it must feel good to have you and your collection ensconced somewhere more or less permanent. Of course, now you will get to experience the Joys of Home Ownership that are absent from rental dwelling: the cost of those wonderful sudden repairs, etc.
     The new issue of File 770 made enjoyable reading -- yours is the first reportage I've seen on the recent Worldcon -- and as is usual when I encounter an issue that's entirely convention reportage I didn't have my usual pencil with me to make marginal checkmarks and notations. So when I came to the commentary on the "Introduction to Fanzines" panel I wasn't prepared for the mention of myself and the annual tally of fanzines fanzines received I publish as a running feature in Trap Door. There, Mike Glicksohn is quoted as being of the opinion that few of the fanzines I receive are by new fans, and here I would hasten to disagree. Now, of course, one's definition of "new fan" is subject to, er, interpretation, since in these halcyon days a new fan may have been active in some other part of the vastness of modern-day fandom for years, even decades, before surfacing in the fanzine arena. However, that said, I would say that in recent years I've enjoyed publications from people that I consider to be new fans: Ulrika O'Brien, Claire Brialey, Mark Plummer, "E. B. Frohvet," Ken & Aileen Forman, Tom Springer, Ben & Cathi Wilson, Bridget Bradshaw, Steve Davies, Tommy Ferguson, Debbie Kerr and Alison Scott.

Lloyd Penney

You've been there before several times now, but Worldcon for me was mostly sitting at the bid tables and helping with the bid parties. Not enough fanzine activity, but several opportunities to go and explore the con and environs. The impromptu fannish feud [[a program item]] on the last day was a laugh, and I brought back a handful of doubloons and a lot of good memories. Those memories largely consist of people, like Olexandr Vasilkivsky from Ukraine, who co-edited Chernobylization some years ago with Boris Sidyuk, Leonid Kouritz, one of the Kiev SMOFs, Al du Pisani and the other South African fans who made it to Worldcon for the first time, and Neyir Cenk Gökçe, the only active Turkish fan, who, I found out, now lives in Ottawa!
     Bad enough that the fannish death toll continues to rise...now there are reports of fannish retirements. Steve and Sue Francis have worked hard on the Rivercons, but they can't do it forever. Yvonne and myself have semi-retired from convention running after 16 years, but are doing so to concentrate on the Toronto in 2003 Worldcon bid. Is there a next generation behind us ready to pick up the reins and ride on, staging more conventions? Doesn't look like it. More and more, it looks like we shall gather electronically in an Internet chat room and reminisce.
     Sourdough Jackson sums it up...a club provides community. Man is a social animal, and needs to gather from time to time. A club provides the company, community and physical touch we all need, and often must do without, to our detriment. The Internet provides some social contact, but not the company or touch. A recent report said that many go to the Internet to relieve loneliness, but the Net actually aggravates the situation, and people feel more lonely than ever. That's why fandom needs the club...we need the company. The everyday world may think we're a little mad, but when we gather regularly and form our communities, I honestly believe we're among the sanest people on the planet. We must fight to keep that community, and our conventions and clubs serve our purposes...with death and retirements, are those cons and clubs in danger? Yes, they are. What do we do? Support our clubs, look for more members, value our friends that much more. Tell them how you feel; we're adult enough not to be embarrassed.
     Joe Mayhew adds to it with his essay on the Disclave problems. I know that Joe suffered a myocardial infarction because of the stress he endured; I hope winning a silver rocket at BucConeer has helped Joe's recovery. Lee Gilliland expressed the same sentiments in Baltimore...it's deserved and long overdue.
     The one thing fans do best, and sometimes most viciously, too... correct another fan, as if the most irritating thing you could do is be mistaken. How many of them growled at you in anger, and demanded that you "Get it RIGHT!" They take a perverse joy in correcting others, putting other down and somehow extracting a little egoboo for themselves.

Teddy Harvia

Your street name made me wonder, is the view from the bottom or top of the valley? [[Neither -- our street is one in a series. It falls between Ocean View and Mountain View.]]
     I applaud your selection of Steve Stiles for the Rotsler Award. I like his style. I hadn't realized he started back in 1959. We chatted in Baltimore and he hardly seemed old enough to be that old.
     We just put stairs into our attic. Now all those boxes of fanzines cluttering the floor of the garage will have a new home. Those of File 770s were heat-treated to 140 degrees, right?
     [[Readers have treated some issues to 451 degrees, so I hear.]]

Roger Wells

I have a few comments on your "Westercon Editorial" in File 770:125. I have observed more of a Washington state Westercon following that you indicate -- not as large as might be desired, perhaps -- but it is there and growing slowly. My impression of the Spokane Westercon group is that they are quite competent, although young and with somewhat limited experience -- similar in many ways to Portland fandom in the early 1980s when they first started bidding on Westercons. I have urged them to attend the Southern Zone Westercons; the typical response is that they would like to, but cannot afford it. Give them a few years, a bit more experience, and higher income brackets and I suspect we will be more of a regular Westercon following from Spokane.
     There are several factors that have hurt the Bay Area's ability to bid for Westercons. One such factor, I would suggest, is the current North/South rotation, which places the Bay Area in the Northern Zone. Although much closer to Los Angeles and San Diego, it is bidding in the same zone as Portland and Seattle, roughly 660 and 832 miles away. The Bay Area has not won a Westercon since the current rotation scheme was adopted.

Bjo Trimble: You sure got around at Bucky. I enjoyed it, but will certainly rent a scooter for the first day, next time I can afford a Worldcon. I didn't make it to any of the parties, except the Costumer's Guild ones in the Hilton, and the bid parties on the ground floor of...what? But the elevators in all the hotels were so bad, I had lots of company in the lobby!
     Jim Young: Weighing in on the side of obits/appreciations, whether we like it or not, they are news for the stf community. Besides, they have been some of your best writing over the years. You most likely don't like having to do them, but you rise to the occasion.
     Franz Zrilich: Have File 770:124. Good work. Am on Chap 4 of 25 of A Nantucket Blast Furnace in Pharaoh Ramses II's Court, or Nantucket Time Ride, my response to S.M. Stirling's Island in the Sea of Time.
     Joy V. Smith: What a great, fun cover on File 770:126.
     I'm glad you're moved into your new house; it does take time to find the right home. Sounds like it has a lot of potential; and that lovely, tree-shaded patio sounds so inviting. (It's still hot here.) And what a nifty zip code!
     Excellent WorldCon report, and I loved your title. I also liked your closing paragraph. There will be problems, and from everything I've read, the BucConeer committee did a fantastic job of dealing with them.