Events For 1982

     I became engaged in 1982, therefore, I was trying to save some money, and one of the ways was to cut down on the science fiction conventions (SF cons). In addition, I also planned to go to London that year, and we moved from Collingswood, NJ, to another apartment in Lindenwold, NJ. Again, like in 1981, I did do the usual day and weekend trips to NYC, Philly, DC, and within NJ.

     Anyway, in August, I attended a Creation Con, in Philadelphia, at the Sheraton hotel on JFK Blvd. in Center City. The first thing I noticed was that this hotel started looking shabbier compared to when I was here for Philcon 1980 and ’81. The con was also a surprise to me. This was a professional con trying to make a profit—and I’m sure they did. Now there wasn’t anything wrong with that. Infact, a professional conference organizer ran the early Star Trek (ST) cons that I attended in the 1970s, and I had fun at them. At most professional cons they sell “tickets,” while fan-run cons sell “memberships.” With a ticket, it’s “let us entertain you,” but with a “membership,” the con committee encourages you to take an active part in the con activities—if you want. Most professional SF cons are usually media-SF cons. (However, there are some fan-run media-SF cons.) Philly Creation Con 1982 was a two-day professional media-SF con that had a few actors from ST as guests. I saw one of them the day I was there, Grace Lee Whitney (Yeoman Rand from ST’s first season and Lt. Rand, transporter operator in ST: The Motion Picture). She was her usual friendly and witty self as she talked about her acting career and her interests. Other guests who were not actors talked about TV and film production, ST trivia, and costuming. I don’t remember much else because the con mostly comprised two rooms: the main ballroom and the dealers’ room. Thus, I noticed that about three-quarters of the dealers sold reading materials, especially comic books. I mainly remember seeing some of my friends there and having lunch at a nearby restaurant with them. I mentioned that I’m looking forward to Philcon, and somebody nearby replied that he is with the Philcon Committee, and they lost the original con hotel. Because they only had a few months to find another hotel to fit Philcon’s budget and needs, they had to have the 1982 Philcon in January 1983, and they planned to call it Philcon 1982.1. As for my impression of Creation Con, it was an OK con for the average person to get an idea about SF cons, but “rough idea” would be a more accurate word. Afterward, that average person would do much better attending either a general-SF con like Philcon or a fan-run media-SF con like Shore Leave or both—then go on to the world science fiction convention (worldcon).

     My other big event happened in December when I spent a week in London. My fiancee traveled with me, and I re-visited some sights and saw some other sights for the first time. In addition to the major sights in the City section of London, Westminster, Bloomsbury, Kensington, Chelsea, Knightsbridge, Mayfair, and Windsor Castle outside of London, I also saw for the first time the Victoria & Albert Museum, Hampton Court Palace, Canterbury Cathedral and other places in Canterbury. I also went to a West End play, The Pirates of Penzance at the Drury Lane Theatre and some pubs. We both had such a good time that we told our friends, “The honeymoon went so well that we decided to get married.”

     Even though this event took place in January 1983, I’ll still count Philcon ’82.1 as a 1982 event. Like the last Philcon, the day I was there, this time at the Franklin Plaza hotel near the Ben Franklin Parkway, Center City, I visited the dealers’ room, art show, and con suite, as well as listening to some panels covering subjects from SF writing, art, and costuming to science. Again, I was starting to like general-SF cons over media-SF cons, especially more so than Creation Con!