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12 December 2007 @ 10:42 pm
Conventions Are Not Healthy for Children and Other Living Things  
Since I recently shared two examples of the kind of annoying kid I used to be back when I'd badger writers and artists for autographs and sketches, I figured that it was only fair to reveal what they saw when they were under attack.

So here's a picture of that pest, which was published in the 1972 program book for Phil Seuling's famed New York Comic Art Convention, held each year over the July 4th weekend at the Statler Hilton Hotel. I'm the one slightly to the right of center, sitting in the front row at a panel the previous summer. I was 16. Back then, I'd attend programming nonstop, and would always sit in the front row, absorbing all the behind-the-scenes knowledge I could. (Some of it actually sank in.)

Note the long hair, leather headband, and denim jacket with metal studs and patches saying things like War Is Not Healthy for Children and Other Living Things.

That little squirt to the left? My younger brother, Lee, who was only 12 at the time!
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( 11 comments — Leave a comment )
karen_w_newton[info]karen_w_newton on December 13th, 2007 12:58 pm (UTC)
The Seventies were an embarrassing decade, so all in all, your picture has held up pretty well— and so have you!
Maura McHugh[info]splinister on December 13th, 2007 01:14 pm (UTC)
Aw goodness! I love the touches of the decade in that photo - the camera with the old-style flash, your headband, that single gal among the flood of geeks, those moustaches!
scottedelman[info]scottedelman on December 13th, 2007 04:16 pm (UTC)
Female fans were rare in those days. One of the few who attended that particular con was my future wife, though I didn't know it. (That isn't her in the picture.) I didn't meet her until years later when I started my staff job at Marvel Comics.
Paul Di Filippo[info]pgdf on December 13th, 2007 04:09 pm (UTC)
So long ago, yet just yesterday!
[info]sclerotic_rings on December 13th, 2007 04:33 pm (UTC)
Things can always be worse. I mean, remember that bedsore of an alleged human at the 1999 Readercon, the one who shaved his head halfway through the convention and then dressed up like Hunter S. Thompson? Compared to that shit-tick, this wasn't a problem in the slightest.
scottedelman[info]scottedelman on December 13th, 2007 04:48 pm (UTC)
Man, you're lucky that took place in the days before we all started to carry digital cameras and photo-snapping cell phones. If it happened today, there'd be before and after pictures of you up on flickr before the con was over!
[info]sclerotic_rings on December 13th, 2007 06:00 pm (UTC)
You don't have pictures? You want to buy some?
[info]sclerotic_rings on December 13th, 2007 06:03 pm (UTC)
Seriously, dude, if you want pictures to post, I can scan them in for you. I figure they'll come in handy the next time someone at Readercon asks me to be a guest again and "But I don't write any more" doesn't work. Best of all, these contain "during" pictures that even Rick Wyatt and Dave Truesdale, my roomies that weekend, don't have.
scottedelman[info]scottedelman on December 13th, 2007 08:36 pm (UTC)
While I wouldn't mind seeing the before and after to fulfill a sick personal curiosity—particularly since my memory can't seem to retrieve the images even though I was there—I don't feel the need to post them. That's a crime you'll have to commit yourself!
RealThog: morgan brighteyes[info]realthog on December 13th, 2007 04:38 pm (UTC)
"Note the long hair, leather headband, and denim jacket with metal studs and patches saying things like War Is Not Healthy for Children and Other Living Things."

You haven't changed a bit, have you?
Mary[info]maryturzillo on December 14th, 2007 07:25 pm (UTC)
Scott as a babyfan
Scott, that is an adorable picture! You were so cute! (As was Lee, of course, but we're talking about that starry-eyed kid with long tresses and an amazingly fertile mind -- )
( 11 comments — Leave a comment )