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scottedelman
scottedelman
04 February 2008 @ 08:21 pm
D.C. Yesterday, Denver Tomorrow  
Like many of you, I'm currently making plans to attend Denvention 3, the 66th World Science Fiction Convention, to be held later this year in Denver. Looking ahead to yet another WorldCon brings back memories of my first WorldCon, Discon II, the 32nd World Science Fiction Convention, held in Washington, D.C. back in 1974.

I was still living in Brooklyn with my parents at the time, and drove down in a van with a group of other fans. Here's the only photographic evidence of that trip. The image is fairly faded by now, because I don't have an original print, only a poor photocopy. (Click to see a larger version of these four sorry mugs.) This photo was snapped on a day we stole away from the con for a few hours to play tourists. We're sitting in front of the fence that surrounds the White House.

Who are these four stooges? See No Evil is comic-book colorist Carl Gafford. Speak No Evil is Paul Levitz, then just a green employee at DC Comics, the company for which he is now Publisher. Hear No Evil is Steve Gilary, a fellow comic-book fan. And as for me at the far right, well ... by the placement of my hands, I guess my role is Do No Evil. So while my hair may have changed with the years, my habit of hamming it up for the camera has remained consistent.

It was a great first WorldCon, and if I ever find the clipping of the article I wrote about the experience for the Brooklyn College student newspaper, I'll upload that as well.
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International Bon Vivant and Raconteur[info]nick_kaufmann on February 5th, 2008 06:38 am (UTC)
Did scissors and razors not exist in 1974?
scottedelman[info]scottedelman on February 5th, 2008 02:27 pm (UTC)
In 1974? Maybe.

In Brooklyn? Not so much.

And I was unwilling to go down to the river with the other cavemen to scrape away my stubble with a clam shell.
karen_w_newton[info]karen_w_newton on February 5th, 2008 02:13 pm (UTC)
You all do look pretty scruffy. If folks with this much hair tried this today, they'd probably be chased off by the Secret Service.

Paul Di Filippo[info]pgdf on February 5th, 2008 05:09 pm (UTC)
You guys looks identical to the four males of Kirby's FOREVER PEOPLE.
scottedelman[info]scottedelman on February 5th, 2008 05:49 pm (UTC)
Funny you should mention that—one year I had a long discussion with Tom Fagan about a group of us (not those in the picture, however) attending the famed Rutland parade dressed up as the Forever People. I was going to be Big Bear, of course. We were even going to assemble a Super-Cycle! It never happened, but it was sure fun to dream about pulling off for a couple of months in the '70s!
Paul Di Filippo[info]pgdf on February 5th, 2008 05:58 pm (UTC)
With irene as Beautiful Dreamer, of course!
scottedelman[info]scottedelman on February 5th, 2008 06:02 pm (UTC)
To show how long ago that was—we weren't married yet! Depending on exactly when that conversation with Tom Fagan would have taken place, we might not have even met yet!