Timebinders - Planning FanHistoriCon VIII - Bucconeer, August 1998

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FanHistoriCon Exhibits

The Fannish Office Throughout the Decades

FanHistoriCon has been given a few hundred square feet of the main exhibit hall for an exhibit. A series of four offices (for 1939, 1959, 1979, and 1999) showing fannish and pop culture paraphanalia for each time, with, perhaps, a representative fan dressed in the attire of the time talking about what was going on in fandom then.

The '30s office features a typewriter, pulp magazines, a hecto (? or ditto ?), slide rules, monster movie posters

Items to borrow for this exhibit:

• momentoes from the 1939 World's fair & first Worldcon
• 1936 train schedule for the New York-Philadelphia corrider
• poster from King Kong & Frankenstein
• enlarged color copies of pulp covers
• Dave Truesdale suggested:
  Tangent #14, Spring 1996, ran one of John L. Coker's "Days of Wonder" columns featuring Forry. John sent me a photo taken by Connie Ruppert that we ran as part of the feature. It shows "Doc" Lowndes smiling at Forry in his futuristic spaceman suit as they walk down the street. The photo is from July, 1939, the first worldcon in New York.

Promised donations:

• two cardboard collars (16.5") (Howard DeVore)
• Tarzan movie posters (Howard DeVore)
• old typewriter (Saul Jaffe)

The '50s office has an upright typewriter, paraphenalia about NASA & Sputnik fanzines, con flyers and program books....

Items to borrow for this exhibit:

• fanzines...
• posters from Forbidden Planet
• a 50s-b/w TV in the background and TV Guides
• Aurora monster models
• large copies of photos from '50s Worldcons
• models of rockets/Sputnik

Promised items

• Detention program book (Howard DeVore)
• enlarged copy of the Tucker hotel map (Laurie Mann)
• Tucker hotel bathrobe (Scott & Jane Dennis)
• Pittsburgh button (Howard DeVore)
• enlarged color copies of F&SF covers (Laurie Mann)
• Groff Conklin anthologies, Ray Bradbury books (Laurie Mann)
• Portable AddressoGraph (Rusty Hevelin)

The '70s office has an IBM selectric, mimeo, Star Wars paraphenalia, lava lamp, Baltimore ray guns

Items to borrow:

• lava lamp
• Special Star Wars poster given out at MidAmeriCon
• IBM Selectric (to be loaned by Donald Eastlake, III)
• '70s momemtoes, big Mac wristband, Star Wars buttons
• mimeo

Promised donations:

• Midamericon stuff (Ken Keller)
• enlarged color copies of Analog and Galileo covers (Laurie Mann)
• assorted books (Laurie Mann)
• bidding gizmos - Screaming Yellow Zonkers, the Balticon "gun"... (Laurie Mann)
• fanzines (Outworlds, Spannish Inquisition....) (Laurie Mann)

The '90s office has a computer, Worldcon bidding sourveniers, zines, science fiction movie posters on the wall...

Items to borrow:

• movie posters (Contact)
• computer and printer (shell acceptable)

Promised donations:

• Tangent (Dave Truesdale)
• bidding sticker collection (very much enlarged and copied)
• Boston/Orlando starfish, Philly postcards
• ribbons
• T-shirts
• fanzines (Mimosa, Idea...)

The idea is to treat this like a "living museum," almost like Plymouth Plantation or Sturbridge Village, and have the exhibit populated by at least a representative fan of the time.

Large color copies of magazine covers are genuinely better than the originals. All exhibit materials will be returned to their owners at the end of the con.

In addition, I'm organizing a Fandom 101 exhibit, and Joe Siclari is putting together a Science Fiction Museum, complete with computers and scanning equipment. He plans to download Web sites (like the FANAC Web site) to a local network and let fans use it.

Fan Programming at Bucconeer

These items will be part of main program.

FanistoriCon 8 Programming

These items will be held in the Convention Center Fan Lounge.

I have left some slots open for impromptu panels, and we plan to have a flip chart on site where people can post discussion announcements. (Milt Rothman's GoH speech has not been counter-programmed.)

Fan Lounge/FanHistoriCon Lounge

We're combining these two area into one for the con. During the day, it'll be over in the Convention Center with all the other events, near the Snack Bar (of course!). The daytime hours are 10-7 most days (noon-7 on Wednesday and 10-3 on Sunday).

At night, it'll be on the second floor of the Hilton Lord Baltimore, just up the stairs from the bar. The Hilton bar has several local microbrews and a fine selection of other beverages. The Fan Lounge/ FanHistoriCon Lounge will provide an excellent array of snacks, soft drinks and juices at night. The Hilton Fan Lounge will be open from 9pm until at least 2am each day.

FanHistoriCon 8 Personal Planner

Old Video Corner

Some old con videos will be there! Look for more details at the con. We're planning to show them informally in the Hilton Fan Lounge at night. If you have videos from cons, fannish plays or other fannish events (like weddings!) please bring them along.

Help Wanted!

As this FanHistoriCon is more complicated than the other ones, Timebinders really needs your help to make this a success. Even if you just have a few hours, we can use your help anytime from Monday August 3 through Monday August 10. Please write to me if you can help out, or if you have interesting items you can loan (or copy!) for the exhibits.

Jobs for FanHistoriCon include:

• Pre-con: Exhibit design. I have some ideas, but I'm not a designer.
• Exhibit set-up, Monday afternoon/Tuesday pre-con; Sunday afternoon teardown.
• Cataloging late items. We'd like to photograph and catalog all loaned items to add to the Web site. I want to do as much of this pre-con as possible, but I'm sure that won't be 100% possible.
• Helping in the Fan Lounge/FanHistoriCon Suite during the con. Days in the convention center, nights on the second floor of the Hilton.

Visit the Bucconeer Home Page for more information about this year's Worldcon.