File 770 157 (november 2009).pdf

November 2009 1

#157

2 File 770: 157

Editorial Notes by Mike Glyer

LASFS at 75: The Los Angeles

Science Fantasy Society threw its

75 th anniversary bash at the Casta-

ways in Burbank on October 23.

Perched high on a hillside our ban-

quet hall had a vast scenic window

opening onto a magnificent view of

twinkling city lights, halfway to the

stars.

Master of ceremonies John Hertz

had not dressed like Beau Brummell

(though he sometimes does) which

he emphasized by pointing out

“This is one of the rare occasions

when Len Moffatt is better dressed

that I.” John did wear his beanie,

however, when he introduced our

first speaker, Roy Test.

Roy at last got the attention he’s always deserved as one of the

club’s founding members. Test and the late Forry Ackerman both

attended the club’s first meeting in 1934. But Ackerman was such a

legend and a polished raconteur that he was able to fully satisfy peo-

ple’s curiosity about the past. However, Roy’s story is quite interest-

ing in its own right.

After Hertz helped him up to the dais Roy joked, “I was a little

more agile when I first started reading sf stories.” He remembered a

preliminary club meeting at a movie theater one afternoon. More of

his memories were of meetings at Clifton’s Cafeteria when he was 13

or 14 years old. He said his mother, Wanda Test, volunteered to be

club secretary as a way to come to the meetings “and see what kind of

oddballs I was associating with. Maybe it didn’t occur to her I was the

oddest one there.”

(Forry wrote in Mimosa : “That very first meeting of all was at-

tended by nine people. There was a young fan named Roy Test; he

was interested in Esperanto, so we called him ‘Esperan-Test’. His

mother, Wanda Test, was our first secretary. In those days of the

1930s, Thrilling Wonder Stories was on our minds, so her minutes

became known as ‘Thrilling Wanda Stories’.”)

Roy remembered discovering a used bookstore with a trove of

very early sf pulps selling for 15 cents each. He worked at a gas sta-

tion for 10 cents an hour, so every hour-and-a-half he could buy an-

other copy from the magazine’s first year of publication.

When World War II started, Test went into the Army Air Corps

and trained to fly B-17 bombers. He is, in fact, still an active pilot in

the Commemorative Air Force. Roy said he occasionally flies a Rus-

sian paratroop plane, the largest single-engine biplane in the world.

By coincidence, I had toured the Planes of Fame museum in Chino a

year or so ago and I saw some

items donated by Roy on ex-

hibit — the first time I knew

that part of his story.

Len and June Moffatt fol-

lowed Roy. It was great to see

them together - they’ve been

part of LASFS for around 60

years. Other speakers in-

cluded John DeChancie, Karl

Lembke (Chair of the LASFS

board of directors), Mel Gil-

den, Laura Brodian Freas,

Larry Niven and Jerry

Pournelle.

Larry Niven said in 1963

he decided he was going to be

a writer and took the Famous

Writers School correspondence course. He was then 25 years old.

Having met Ray Bradbury years before (they had the same doctor) he

wrote him for advice, was referred to Forry Ackerman and ended up

attending LASFS meetings at the Silver Lake Playground. That

opened the way to all kinds of adventures, and to meeting his future

wife at the 1967 Worldcon. Larry said that Fallen Angels (written with

Pournelle and Flynn) embodied what he felt about fandom.

Jerry Pournelle quoted Heinlein to the effect that authors who read

their own works in public probably have other nasty habits, but he

agreed with Niven’s sentiments about Fallen Angels . He too had

joined LASFS in the Silver Lake days, when Paul Turner was pro-

moting the idea that we’d someday own our own clubhouse. Jerry

said he grew up with a future - “I knew in the 40s I would live to see

the first man on the moon. I didn’t know I’d live to see the last one.”

Although the future isn’t what it used to be, “I think it’s still there…

One of these days we’ll find people who do believe it and we will get

our future back.”

Fannish entertainers provided a change of pace between the speak-

ers. Lynn Maudlin sang “Gotta Kill My Clone” and “High Fron-

tier” (her response to the space shuttle tragedies). Storyteller Nick

Smith spoke. Charles Lee Jackson II reminisced about Forry Acker-

man. And throughout the evening letters were read from our absent

friends: Ray Bradbury, Ray Harryhausen, Paul Turner.

I shared a table with Milt Stevens, Marc Schirmeister and Joe Zeff,

and enjoyed seeing a lot of other long-time friends.

Thanks to Christian McGuire and Arlene Satin for their excellent

work organizing the event. And also for publishing the incredible 75 th

Anniversary Memory Book . What a treasure that is!

File 770:157 is edited by Mike

Glyer at 705 Valley View Ave.,

Monrovia CA 91016. File 770 is

available for news, artwork,

arranged trades, or by

subscription: $8 for 5 issues, $15

for 10 issues, air mail rate is

$2.50. E-Mail: Mikeglyer@cs.com

Taral: Bacover, 22, 29, 50

Brad Foster: 15, 17, 47, 54

Bill Rotsler: 2, 3, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14,

18, 46, 48, 49, 53

John King Tarpinian: (photos)

11, 57

Alexis Gilliland: 4, 6, 7, 51, 52,

55, 56

Alan White: 2, 46

Keith Stokes: (photo) 13

Andrew Porter: (photo) 15

157

Art Credits

Brianna Spacekat Wu: Cover

Art Credits

November 2009 3

JumpCon’s Senter

Pleads Guilty

Shane Senter appeared before a judge in

Hillsborough County Superior Court

(Nashua, NH) on November 23 to plead

guilty to two counts of felony theft and

two misdemeanor deceptive business

practice charges in connection with his

failed media convention, Jumpcon.

Through a previously agreed plea

bargain he stayed out of jail, receiving

four consecutive, 12-month suspended

sentences - provided he demonstrates

good behavior - and 14 years of proba-

tion on the four charges. Four of the

years of probation on the two misde-

meanor charges are to be concurrent with

the 10 years of probation Senter received

for the two felony charges. Senter was

ordered to pay $33,824.33 in restitution

to victims of Jumpcon.

He was also ordered to not own or

operate a business that would accept

payment “prior to producing promised

goods or services.”

Court-ordered restitution in this

criminal proceeding may not be dis-

chargeable by Senter’s Chapter 7 bank-

ruptcy.

force larger than the weight of

their climber.”

The NY Times covered Kare’s

victory.

Guy Nearly Goes

With the Wind

Guy Lillian III says he had never

seen a twister and regretted it .

Then on October 29, while the

latest in a series of terrible thun-

derstorms was marching across his

section of Louisiana, Guy started

driving home from work down the

Old Benton Road and got caught

in something much stronger and

more dangerous than he expected:

“A trashcan lid spun over my

hood like a giant frisbee. The rain

turned white. The white became

opaque. I couldn't see the road. I

hit my emergency blinkers and

pulled over, hoping I wouldn't find

a ditch... I remembered some of

that twister [documentary]: the

sudden white wind tearing hell out

of the world. I said to myself,

“Hell, I'm in the middle of it,”

because I knew what was coming

inside that depthless white pall.

“Now I was heading away from the ac-

tion. I floored Little Red and ran for it…. I

turned back to Old Benton Road. The tall

sign of one of the car dealerships was twisted

like a pipecleaner and leaning. That just hap-

pened, I said to myself….”

Guy assures everyone that he came

through “Unscathed, both me and car -- ex-

cept for a small crack in the windshield (the

car, not me). Found out that the twister was a

Force 2. I'm not rattled about it, just ...

thoughtful.” A complete write-up is coming

in the next Challenger .

Kare a Winner

at Space Elevator Games

Sf fan Jordin Kare and Thomas Nugent of

LaserMotive won $900,000 at the Space Ele-

vator Games on November 6. Theirs was one

of three competing teams which built proto-

types designed to climb a one-kilometer cable

held aloft by a helicopter.

LaserMotive’s climber was a sheet of

photovoltaic panels 2 feet square topped by a

motor and a pyramidal frame of thin rods.

Ground-based lasers shined on the photo-

voltaic cells to power the electric motor.

NASA, along with the nonprofit organiza-

tion Spaceward Foundation, sponsored the

contest. A $2 million purse was available,

which might be won by a single team or

shared depending upon the competitors’

achievements.

Jordin Kare (third from left) holds prize check.

What LaserMotive

won was second-prize

money. Later they made a

final attempt to reach the

5 meters/second prize

threshold for the rest of

the purse. As the contest’s

blog reported:

“In their last climb,

attempting 5 m/s, they

modified their climber to

decrease its weight (LM’s

Dave Bashford referred to

this as ‘Steamboat rac-

ing’) and ended up re-

moving too much struc-

ture - they got stuck to

their launch structure and

dragged it up the cable

75 ′ , with an additional

Dan Steffan Wins

2009 Rotsler Award

Dan Steffan has won the Rotsler Award,

given annually for long-time artistic achieve-

ment in amateur publications of the science

fiction community. Established in 1998, it

carries an honorarium of US$300.

Steffan’s imagination, his marshalling of

detail and his poignant satire have kept his

reputation high for decades. He is renowned

for his graphics, for example, the Ansible

logo and the cover of the April 2008 issue of

Chunga . He was an award winner for the

design of Science Fiction Eye . His art and

visuals for Pong and Blat! , as well as Boon-

/DVR NE '@MCNL

4 File 770: 157

fark , are always part of any conversation

about excellence in fanzine creativity.

The Rotsler Award is sponsored by the

Southern California Institute for Fan Inter-

ests, a non-profit corporation, which in 2006

hosted the 63rd World Science Fiction Con-

vention. The award is named for the late Bill

Rotsler, a talented and prolific artist over

many years. Current judges are Claire Bri-

aley, Mike Glyer, and John Hertz.

in the city where she was born, Pasadena,

CA before moving to Washington state in

1999, and the city treasures her memory —

Pasadena Public Library’s annual “One City

- One Story” program selected her novel

Kindred for 2006. It is fortunate for the com-

munity that Butler’s manuscripts, correspon-

dence, notebooks, photos and other materials

were acquired by a prestigious library so

close by - in San Marino, the next town over.

The librarian responsible for Butler mak-

ing the donation, Sue Hodson, the Hunting-

ton’s curator of literary manuscripts, is find-

ing it a bittersweet experience. “In a sense I

wish I hadn’t had the opportunity [to go

through the papers],” Hodson said, referring

to Butler’s untimely death in 2006. “I

thought it would be someone who came after

me. It’s a great joy, but I’m sorry, in a way,

it’s me unpacking the boxes.”

Diana and I think the world of the Hunt-

ington. Diana spent a couple of summers

using their facilities to work on her Inklings

book.

Haldeman, Varley Win

2009 Heinlein Awards

Dale S. Arnold of the Baltimore SF Society

reports:

“Joe Haldeman and John Varley are the

winners of the Robert A. Heinlein Award for

2009. The Robert A. Heinlein Award is for

outstanding published works in science fic-

tion and technical writings to inspire the

human exploration of Space. Winners are

selected by a committee of SF authors origi-

nally selected by Mrs. Virginia Heinlein and

chaired by Robert Heinlein’s friend Dr. Yoji

Kondo. The award prize consists of a wall

plaque certificate, large sterling silver medal-

lion and lapel pin. The likeness of Robert A.

Heinlein, as rendered by Arlin Robbins, is

featured on each of these items.

“The Baltimore Science Fiction Society

provides logistical support for the award and

maintains a website where winners are per-

manently recorded.”

zine Thrills Incorporated and was an original

member of the femme fan group Vertical

Horizons who enthusiastically participated in

the Australian fan scene.

The award may not be given annually, as

ASFF will only select work that meets an

appropriate standard of excellence. Assum-

ing such a work is published this year, the

award will debut at Aussiecon 4 in 2010.

Jurors selecting the first recipient will be

writer/editor Russell Blackford, editor/

publisher Rob Gerrand, authors Kim Wilkins

and Tess Williams, and editor Sarah En-

dacott.

2009 TAFF Ballot Released

Ladies and gentlemen, Frank Wu and the

tandem of Brian Gray and Anne KG Murphy

are your 2009 Trans Atlantic Fan Fund can-

didates. The winner(s) will go to the 2010

Eastercon.

Wu’s nominators are Guy Lillian III, John

Purcell, Kevin Roche, James Bacon

and Michael Rennie.

Gray’s and Murphy’s nominators are John

Scalzi, Steven H Silver, Geri Sullivan, Paul

Cornell and Cheryl Morgan.

Votes must reach the administrators Chris

Garcia or Steve Green by December 22 be-

fore Chris Garcia’s watch strikes midnight.

(Hint: it’s set to Pacific time).

New Hemming Award

The Norma K. Hemming Award has been

created by the Australian SF Foundation to

celebrate excellence in the exploration of

themes of race, gender, class and sexuality in

science fiction produced either in Australia

or by Australian citizens.

The award is named for Hemming (1927-

1960), a British author who migrated to Aus-

tralia in 1949. She wrote for the pulp maga-

Octavia Butler’s Papers

Come to Huntington

Octavia Butler’s papers have arrived at the

Huntington where they will join those of

Robert Silverberg and other well-known

writers including Jack London, Christopher

Isherwood and Charles Bukowski.

Butler, the most prominent African

American woman in the field of science

fiction, died in 2006. Butler lived for decades

Medical Updates

Joe Haldeman spent 52 days in two Cincin-

nati hospitals after emergency surgery for

acute pancreatitis on September 19. For part

of that time it was touch and go, spent in a

coma on a refrigerated mattress (to keep his

fever under control).

Gay Haldeman provided frequent updates

on SFF.net. Joe’s recovery was apparent in a

verse he penned on October 24:

The pancreas, a curious beast

Has functions hard to scry.

It sits around for sixty years

Then tries to say “bye-bye.”

On November 4 Gay celebrated Joe’s best

day since he was hospitalized: “He walked

across the room without help, got himself in

and out of bed several times, sat up for a

long time, ate well, talked about the future

November 2009 5

for the first time.” Rose Fox cheered Joe’s

continuing improvement by answering

his pancreatic poem with her own double

dactyl:

2009 Hugo Award Winners

Abdomen habdomen

Haldeman’s pancreas

Gave him a fever and

Twisted his guts.

Glad there’s no need for a

Pancreatectomy.

Get better soon, Joe–no

Ifs, ands, or buts!

Best Novel

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

(HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK)

Best Dramatic Presentation,

Short Form

Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed

Whedon, & Maurissa Tancharoen,

writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant

Enemy)

Best Novella

‘‘The Erdmann Nexus’’ by Nancy

Kress ( Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)

(Reprinted by permission. Follow Rose’s

commentary on PW’s Genreville.)

Joe was allowed to leave the hospital on

November 10. He and Gay are living in a

Cincinnati condo loaned by local fan Joel

Zakem. Joe will remain under the care of

local pancreatic specialists for weeks to

come, possibly returning to Florida by Christ-

mas, and he posted these sobering details to

SFF.net on November 11:

“Speaking of woods, I’m not out of them,

quite. I get tired walking across a room (but I

can do it, without the walker). I have the

clumsy ileostomy bag for another six months

or so, and some pretty serious surgery in store

then, when they reattach my large intestine.

(They removed about 18 ″ of it, including the

appendix as a little bonus.) And of course

there’s pain.”

Best Novelette

‘‘Shoggoths in Bloom’’ by Elizabeth

Bear ( Asimov’s Mar 2008)

Best Editor, Short Form

Ellen Datlow

Best Editor, Long Form

David G. Hartwell

Best Short Story

‘‘Exhalation’’ by Ted Chiang ( Eclipse

Two )

Best Professional Artist

Donato Giancola

Best Related Book

Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A

Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by

John Scalzi (Subterranean Press)

Best Semiprozine

Weird Tales edited by Ann

VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal

Best Graphic Story

Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha

Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones

Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by

Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne

Wright (Airship Entertainment)

Best Fan Writer

Cheryl Morgan

Best Fanzine

Electric Velocipede edited by John

Klima

Author and collectibles dealer Jerry Weist is

battling multiple myeloma, reports Andrew

Porter. The cancer was caught early, with no

complications in his vital organs or other

parts of his body. He’s just started on chemo-

therapy, an experimental program in which

stem cells are used to fight the dis-

ease, presently being used to treat 15 people

in Israel and 35 in the USA.

Weist is the author of Bradbury: An Illus-

trated Life , The Comic Art Price Guide , and

The Art of Frank R. Paul . From 1990 to 2001

he was a consultant at Sotheby’s specializing

in popular culture, overseeing the auction of

Sam Moskowitz’s collection.

A few years ago Weist acquired the Harry

Warner collection and sold the fanzines to

James Halperin of Dallas, co-owner of Heri-

tage Rare Coin Galleries. Not long afterward

Askance editor John Purcell interviewed

Halperin and reported Weist wanted to write

a book about fanzines.

Best Dramatic Presentation,

Long Form

WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete

Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim

Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton,

director (Pixar/Walt Disney)

Best Fan Artist

Frank Wu

The John W. Campbell Award

for Best New Writer

David Anthony Durham*

*(Second year of eligibility)

weeks continues that pattern I'll start to be-

lieve in light at the end of the tunnel.”

to conclude his problems had been caused by

anemia. He was able to attend the balance of

the Worldcon.

Australian fan Les Robertson was hospital-

ized in August treatment of kidney failure,

and will be regularly needing kidney dialysis.

Les has also had to have three toes amputated

in recent months, Australian SF Bullsheet

reports.

No (More) Time for Sergeants

St. Louis fan Tyler Harris joined the Army in

November 2001 in response to 9/11. He

signed up for eight years, with a four-year

active duty commitment. He was trained in

maintaining networking systems and de-

ployed to Kuwait and Iraq before being re-

leased from active duty. He became part of

the Individual Ready Reserves in 2006 to

finish his eight year enlistment. However, he

was recalled to active duty in December 2008

and sent back to Iraq with a unit of the Mis-

sissippi National Guard in June 2009.

Although his eight-year contract was due

to expire in November, Harris was going

Peggy Ranson is recovering from her heart

attack and bypass surgery. When Rosy and

Guy Lillian had brunch with her in October

they found she was doing well, not up to par

physically but in wonderful spirits.

Bruce Gillespie was slowly recovering “from

a knee effusion (sprain)” in October accord-

ing to Australian SF Bullsheet #92. Take it

easy and get well soon, Bruce.

Mike Glicksohn received an encouraging

word: “Tests have shown no signs of cancer

the last six months and if the test in two

Ken Konkol was hospitalized in Montreal

during Anticipation. He reported afterwards

that a battery of tests and X-rays led doctors

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