Title: Out of This World Convention
Author: Ackerman, Forrest J., 1916-2008
Language: English
As this book started as an ASCII text book there are no pictures available.
Copyright Status: Not copyrighted in the United States. If you live elsewhere check the laws of your country before downloading this ebook. See comments about copyright issues at end of book.

*** Start of this Doctrine Publishing Corporation Digital Book "Out of This World Convention" ***

This book is indexed by ISYS Web Indexing system to allow the reader find any word or number within the document.



    _Forrest J. Ackerman, prominent Los Angeles agent and Science
    Fiction enthusiast, reports on the recent World Convention in New
    York. Mr. Ackerman, who attended the first World Convention
    seventeen years ago, has been prominent in SF circles since the
    early thirties._


        out
         of
       this
      world
 convention

 _by FORREST J. ACKERMAN_


 An eye-witness account of the 14th World
 Science Fiction Convention in session.


I was a spy for the FBI--the Fantasy Bureau of Investigation! Learning
of a monster meeting of science fiction "fen" in New York, I teleported
myself 3,000 miles from the Pacificoast to check the facts on the
monsters. And it was true--the 14th World SciFi Con was tremonstrous.

       *       *       *       *       *

In all seriousness, the _Newyorcon_ was one of the greatest aggregations
of s.f. enthusiasts I have ever seen. A far cry from the _Nycon_, the
_first_ "world" s.f. con of 17 years before, when the turnout of 125 was
considered colossal. Now more than twelve hundred fans, authors,
editors, artists, publishers, agents, anthologists, reviewers and
readers of science fiction and fantasy registered for the Labor Day
Weekend gathering of the clans, a conclave of the slans.

From 37 of the 48 states they came. And from Canada, Cuba, England,
Germany, India, Israel and the West Indies. The roll call of celebrities
read like the Who's Who of S.F. Prodom: Theodore Sturgeon, Isaac Asimov,
Fritz Leiber, Willy Ley, Nelson Bond, John W. Campbell Jr., L. Sprague
de Camp, James Blish, Judith Merril, "Ted" Carnell (Editor of New
Worlds), Kelly Freas, Edmond Hamilton, Leigh Brackett, Anthony Boucher,
William Tenn, James E. Gunn, Frank Belknap Long Jr., and numerous
others, including Guest of Honor Arthur C. Clarke.

A standing ovation was given Arthur Clarke before and after his speech
at the Banquet, a serious address that lasted forty-five minutes and
covered many philosophical facets of the s.f. field. Especially rousing
hands were given two of the real old-timers present, artist Frank R.
Paul (Guest of Honor of the first Convention), and--out of the Ark--the
man who once was an assistant to Thomas Alva Edison, the pioneer
novelist of scientific romances and the man who discovered the Golden
Atom--Ray Cummings. World famous cartoonist Al Capp gave a hilarious
speech at the Banquet Sunday night, other large laughs being garnered on
the occasion by Isaac Asimov and Anthony Boucher, Robert Bloch again
proving that he has no peer as a Master of Ceremonies.

The Masquerade Ball was filmed for televising, and was a sight for
bugging eyes. Extraterrestrial glamour girls came in spectrumatic
colors: one, Ruth Landis of Venus (formerly Nuyok), was a verdant
beauty, fresh as a breath of chlorophyll; while tall Tam Otteson, a
recent import from England, had the judges agreeing that just looking at
her was an education. Olga Ley won for the Most Beautiful costume, and
Jos Christoff--a survivor from the first convention of them all--was
another prize winner. Monsters, mutants, scientists, spacemen, aliens,
and assorted "Things" thronged the ballroom floor as the flashbulbs
popped.

John Campbell lectured on and demonstrated his controversial psionic
Hieronymus machine, and famous fans sprang from der vood-work out--Sam
Moskowitz, James Taurasi, Bob Tucker, Julius Unger, Raymond Van Houten,
Allen Glasser ...

David Kyle, E. E. Evans, James Taurasi, myself and 2 others were elected
Directors of the World Science Fiction Society.

No account of the Newyorcon could be complete without a deep bow of
appreciation to the altruistic trio of committeemen (including one
comely woman) who all but destroyed themselves engineering the
Convention: David A. Kyle, Ruth Landis and Dick Ellington.

By a vote of 3 to 1, London was selected as the site of the 15th Con, to
be held in '57. For an unforgettable experience in the fantastic
universe of science fiction enthusiasts, plan _now_ to attend the
LONCON!



Transcriber's Note:

    This etext was produced from _Fantastic Universe_ January 1957.
    Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
    copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and
    typographical errors have been corrected without note.





*** End of this Doctrine Publishing Corporation Digital Book "Out of This World Convention" ***

Doctrine Publishing Corporation provides digitized public domain materials.
Public domain books belong to the public and we are merely their custodians.
This effort is time consuming and expensive, so in order to keep providing
this resource, we have taken steps to prevent abuse by commercial parties,
including placing technical restrictions on automated querying.

We also ask that you:

+ Make non-commercial use of the files We designed Doctrine Publishing
Corporation's ISYS search for use by individuals, and we request that you
use these files for personal, non-commercial purposes.

+ Refrain from automated querying Do not send automated queries of any sort
to Doctrine Publishing's system: If you are conducting research on machine
translation, optical character recognition or other areas where access to a
large amount of text is helpful, please contact us. We encourage the use of
public domain materials for these purposes and may be able to help.

+ Keep it legal -  Whatever your use, remember that you are responsible for
ensuring that what you are doing is legal. Do not assume that just because
we believe a book is in the public domain for users in the United States,
that the work is also in the public domain for users in other countries.
Whether a book is still in copyright varies from country to country, and we
can't offer guidance on whether any specific use of any specific book is
allowed. Please do not assume that a book's appearance in Doctrine Publishing
ISYS search  means it can be used in any manner anywhere in the world.
Copyright infringement liability can be quite severe.

About ISYS® Search Software
Established in 1988, ISYS Search Software is a global supplier of enterprise
search solutions for business and government.  The company's award-winning
software suite offers a broad range of search, navigation and discovery
solutions for desktop search, intranet search, SharePoint search and embedded
search applications.  ISYS has been deployed by thousands of organizations
operating in a variety of industries, including government, legal, law
enforcement, financial services, healthcare and recruitment.