[This is a transcription of the Minicon 11 program book begun in 2013 and finished in 2019. It may well have errors. If there are errors in the original, the intent here is to reproduce them faithfully. When we notice that we've done this, we'll add a note in square brackets like "[sic]". We apologize for any inadvertently corrected errors. Lines filled with hyphens indicate page boundaries. When pages have page numbers, these are included. The page numbering in the book does not make sense, though, so we promise this is the order that the pages were assembled, even though it doesn't add up.] ======================================================================== Minicon 11 [Front cover artwork by Jim Odbert] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Advertisement for The Cricket Theatre] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Autographs 6:00 PM -- Friday, 16 April 1976 (The people with the straw hats are the pros.) [A big blank space] (The above blank space has been donated for your use by MNSTF and the Minicon; use thereof is not restricted to autographs.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Bob Tucker art] MINICON 11 PROGRAM BOOK -- 16-18 April 1976 All material herein is (c) 1976 by the Minnesota Science Fiction Society, Inc. Upon publication all rights revert to the author or artist. All uncredited material is the responsibility of the Publications staff. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Minicon 11 NOTES ON THE CON -- NAME TAGS: Because of the size of the con, and our use of expensive equipment, we are forced to require all convention members to either wear their name tags or show their registration cards in order to enter any convention function or meeting room. We apologize for this inconvenience, but it is absolutely essential. PLEASE -- WEAR YOUR NAME TAG!! COMPLAINTS, INFORMATION, ETC.: If you wish to volunteer to help the convention, or if you have any queries or complaints, please go to the convention Registration Room (the Dakota Room). A message board for those wish- ing to leave messages, requests for rides or room-mates, and so on, can be found there. BANQUET: A buffet-style, all-you-can-eat dinner, with roast beef and turkey, will cost you $8.25. It also guarantees you a good seat for the GoH speeches after- ward. We must inform the hotel ahead of time as to how many will be attending the banquet, so the deadline for purchasing banquet tickets is Noon on Saturday. BANQUET SEATING PLUS: If you wish to sign up for a specific table, or merely for a designated non-smo- kers' table, do so at Registration. If you wish to have wine with your meal, ask the waitress. LIQUIDS: Non-Minnesotans should take local liquor laws into account in their planning. The age limit here is 18. Liquor stores close early: 8:00 PM on Friday, 10:00 PM on Saturday. After those hours you can only buy liquor by the drink (or from room service at about $22.00 qt.). Plan ahead. COCKTAIL HOUR: Has a cash bar, and will take place at 5:00 PM on Saturday in the Minnesota Room. This is open to all convention members, whether attending the banquet or not. Only drinks which have been purchased from the hotel are allowed into the banquet; no cock- tail waitresses will serve at the banquet -- so if you wish liquor (other than wine) with your meal, bring it 5 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ from the cash bar. SATURDAY CLASS: Instructors interested in discussing the teaching of SF are invited to breakfast in the up- per level of the hotel coffee shop - 10:00 AM on Saturday. If you are interested in participating, please notify the convention Registration desk on Friday (so we can give the staff an estimate of how much space to set aside for it). Participants may se- lect from the regular menu (and pay individually). SPEAKING OF THE COFFEE SHOP: They don't normally dis- tribute breakfast menus after 11:00 AM, but you can order breakfast items anytime the coffee shop is open. CHECK-OUT TIME: Has been extended to 5:00 PM on Sunday. BLUE RIBBONS: The people with the blue ribbons are not necessarily first prize winners, but Minicon Committee members who are there to help you if you have some sort of problem. (Committee members can also be dis- tinguished by glaring orange name tags.) SPEECHIFYING: Seating will be available in the Minne- sota Room, beginning about 7:30 PM on Saturday, for convention members who wish to hear the GoH speeches but are not attending the banquet. DEFENSE DE FUMER: We have set aside a special party room for non-smokers: Room 563. HOSPITALITY SUITE: Rooms 553-61 (odd numbers). GOODIES: The Ontario SF Club has donated $125.00 to the Minicon for use in the promotion of fan sociali- zation. The Minicon has added this money to its own open-party subsidy fund. This fund was set up to en- courage convention members to throw open parties at the con. Such party-givers (having made arrangements with the Minicon in advance) will receive a subsidy in the form of refreshments for their parties. VIDEO-TAPING: we will be video-taping portions of the convention programming for the edification of future generations. Be on your most fannish behavior. ARTISTS: If you have material in the Art Show which 6 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ hasn't been sold, be sure to pick it up by 4:00 PM on Sunday. RUNE: It's a standing policy of the Minnesota Science Fiction Society to give one year's free subscription to the RUNE to all convention members. (The RUNE is the Society's amateur magazine.) For this reason, you are asked to be sure to print your name and address clearly when you register with the convention (if you don't, we can't send you the 'zine). You will have the option, when you register, of refusing the free subscription. History [art with caption "KenFletch drawing R Waller drawing KenFletch - - RWaller '74 Minicon 8] 7 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Advertisement for Alpha Draconis] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Advertisement for Ballantine] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ introducing the Guests of Honor [art by Ken Fletcher] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Edmond Hamilton Leigh Brackett Makers of Myth by Jack Williamson Ed Hamilton and Leigh Brackett are two of our most- loved and most-creative giants -- and two of my dearest friends. Few people have served science fiction so well, to give so much to so many of us. For Ed, this is a semicentennial year. The old Weird Tales published his first story, "The Monster- God of Mamurth," in the issue for August, 1926 -- the same year Amazing Stories was born. Nobody now has a better right to the title, Dean of Science Fiction. He was one of my first friends in what was then still a very tiny world. We met in June, 1931, in a Minnea- polis hotel, to begin a boat trip to New Orleans. I recall him as dark and lean, bright and genial, a fas- cinating talker who knew a million books but no more than I about river navigation. We learned fast. On the long days on the river, he retold to me many a great science fiction story I had never read. Eventu- ally we got to New Orleans, firm friends by then. On later visits to his home in New Castle, I learned to love the wooded hills of western Pennsylvania. He spent time with me in New Mexico. One depression win- ter, we lived at Key West -- a beach house in sight of Ernest Hemingway's mansion cost us eight dollars a month. Ed did more sailing and fishing than I oared for; I remember the time I waded indignantly ashore after he had jibed the boat and spilled me into the Atlantic. In those days he was composing his cosmic epics at white heat, punishing a little portable typewriter with two strong fingers. His energy increased with story tension; at the climaxes, the o's were all punched 11 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ out, leaving little round holes in the paper. His stories went out in first draft then, and none came back. The readers, in fact, consistently voted them better than the work of others, such as H. P. Love- craft, who have since received far more critical at- tention. In later years he took more time for polish, but those early stories had an elemental power that tinkering might have spoiled. In Los Angeles in 1940, we both met Leigh, who had just published "Martian Quest" in Astounding. Though she had been a Burroughs fan, her own imagined worlds were more real than his, drawn with a sometimes savage truth. She and Ed found things in common, among them Scots blood with a trace of Native American and a strong sense of wonder. They were married December 31, 1946. If science fiction is modern mythology, its central theme is the conquest of space -- the myth called "space opera" by those patronizing people who have never known the splendor of the future worlds it opens. Ed and Leigh have been two of its chief creators. With his stories of the Interstellar Patrol in Weird Tales, Ed was a true pioneer, and he has ex- tended the myth with many a space epic since, down to Star Kings - perhaps his greatest -- and his more recent Star Wolf series. Again and again, Leigh has added wonder and color and drama to the myth, with the stories she used to write for Planet, with all her novels for Ace, with the Ginger Star series still in progress. Their works are too familiar to need listing here. Once known as "world wrecker" for such tales as "Crashing Suns," Ed wrote most of the Captain Future novels and for many years most of the Superman scripts. Yet he was always able to shift from cosmic melodrama to write such thoughtful and sensitive stories as "What's It Like Out There?" and "He That Hath Wings." He has held his legions of readers, and I think it's past time the critics discovered him. The checklist of his stories takes five pages, sin- gle-spaced. Leigh has written less science fiction, ------------------------------------------------------------------------ because an early mystery novel got her a Hollywood con- tract. She worked with William Faulkner on Chandler's The Big Sleep and wrote many scripts for Howard Hawkes. Her TV Movie of the Week, Reflection of Fear is in production now. Jointly, Leigh and Ed were GoH at Metrocon (1954), at the Oakland Worldcon (1964), and the Detroit Triple Fan-Fair (1969). Leigh re- ceived the Western Writers of American Silver Spur Award for the best Western novel of 1963, Follow The Free Wind, and the Jules Verne Fantasy Award for Last Days of Shandakor. Ed has inspired Captain Future clubs in such far places as Sweden and Japan, and he received the First Fandom Hall of Fame Award in 1967. [Art on left side with a sign saying OUTSYSTEMS DEPARTURES] It's good news that Leigh is now editing a Best of Edmond Hamilton for Ballan- tine, and that Ed will later be editing The Best of Leigh Brackett. Books well worth waiting for; the best of either is very good in- deed. Best of all, they're still fit and still at work. Ballantine in plan- ning August publication for Leigh's The Reavers of Skaith, third of the Eric John Stark series, following The Ginger Star and The Hounds of Skaith. Ed writes that he keeps "picking away very slowly at a long star-adventure novel." I'm anxious to see it. 13 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Advertisement for Windycon 3] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Hotel map: 1st floor] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Program WHERE IT'S AT: MEETING ROOM LOCATIONS ARTSHOW: Wilson-Taft-Roosevelt Rooms (2nd Floor) HUCKSTERS: Lincoln-Jackson-Jefferson Rooms (2nd Floor) PANELS, MOVIES, MIMEO MAN & AUTOGRAPH SESSION: Iowa- Wisconsin Rooms (1st Floor) REGISTRATION: Dakota Room (1st Floor) BANQUET, GoH SPEECHES: Michigan-Illinois Rooms (1st Floor) UNCLE HUGO'S BOOKSTORE: Washington Room (2nd Floor) IMAGINATION UNLIMITED (ARTWORK): Adams Room (2nd Floor) AUCTION: Hoover Room (2nd Floor) COCKTAIL HOUR: Minnesota Room (1st Floor) FRIDAY 16 APRIL 1976 -- Noon : Registration opens 1:00 PM : Hucksters' Rooms open 3:00 : Art Show opens 6:00 : Autograph Session (Iowa Room) 6:30 : Opening Ceremony (Iowa Room) 7:00 : SF: HOW IT BEGAN Clifford D. Simak, Edmond Hamilton, Jack Williamson 8:00 : Films begin "Street Musique" (duration: 10 minutes) "Beauty and the Beast" (90 minutes) 8:30 : Hucksters', Art Show Rooms close 9:30 : Hospitality Suite opens (Rooms 553-61) 9:40 : Films "K-9000: A Space Oddity" (10 minutes) "Destination Moon" (95 minutes) 10:00 : Registration closes 11:25 : Films "Robot" (20 minutes) "Tarzan of the Apes" (silent)(65 minutes) "What on Earth" (10 minutes) SATURDAY 17 APRIL 1976 -- 10:00 AM: Registration opens 11:00 : Art Show, Hucksters' Rooms open 1:00 PM : TRANSLATING SF INTO VISUAL MEDIA Leigh Brackett, Ben Bova, Ruth Berman ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:00 : ELEMENTS 0F CRITICISM Lester del Rey, Lloyd Biggle, Jack Williamson 3:00 : THE EFFECT OF ALCOHOL ON SCIENCE FICTION Gordon Dickson, Bob Tucker, Joe Haldeman, Denny Lien, Bob Vardeman 4:00 : Auction (Hoover Room) 5:00 : Cocktail Hour (Minnesota Room) 5:30 : Registration, Art Show, Hucksters' Rooms close 6:00 : Banquet (Michigan-Illinois Rooms) 7:45 : GoH Speeches Leigh Brackett: ESCAPE HATCH Edmond Hamilton: 50 YEARS OF SF MAGAZINES Leigh and Norb Couch: ONE FAN'S FAMILY 9:00 : MIMEO MAN (Iowa Room) with a cast of characters 10:00 : Party Suite opens Films begin "Hungry Kook Goes Bazook" (5 minutes) "Phantom Tollbooth" (90 minutes) "The Emperor's Oblong Pancake" (5 minutes) "Voyage to the End of the Universe" (85 minutes) "A Visit from Space" (10 minutes) "Space Patrol: The Man Who Stole a City" (25 minutes) "La Jetee" (30 minutes) SUNDAY 18 APRIL 1976 11:00 AM: Hucksters', Art Show Rooms open Noon : Registration opens 12:30 PM: Auction (Hoover Room) 1:30 : Rusty Hevelin's Aussiecon Slide Show 2:00 : Registration closes 2:30 : THE FUTURE OF THE WORLDCON Ken Kellar [sic] and other noted worldcon experts 3:00 : Art Show closes 4:00 : Hucksters' Room closes CONTINUED ON NEXT YEAR ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Hotel map: 2nd floor] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Advertisement for Byob-con 6] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ introducing the Fan Guests of Honor [artwork by Jim Odbert] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leigh & Herb Couch by Hank Luttrell Professional guests of honor are easy to introduce: One can enumerate their contributions to the profes- sional science fiction field; One can cite the awards and honors they have received. Fan guests of honor, though, are harder to pin down. They must be people who, with their presence and personalities, have made science fiction fandom a more pleasant and rewarding hobby. Norbert and Leigh attended their first convention in 1966, the Ozarkon I, St. Louis fandom's first try at organizing a con. They had had peripheral contact with fandom for some time; after Ozarkon their enthu- siasm for fandom soared. The whole family scurried off for the worldcon, Tricon in Cleveland. (One of the most remarkable things about the Couch family has always been that it was a whole family of fans: Nor- bert and Leigh, Lesleigh -- their eldest daughter and now my wife -- and their sons Chris and Mike -- and this isn't counting the dozens of cats, who don't read sf but who are definitely fannish. Mike will be along at the Minicon, basking in his parents' glory. Norbert did his neo-fan apprenticeship tending bar for the Nycon bidding committee at the Tricon. Both Leigh and Norbert quickly became involved in the St. Louis Worldcon committee. Professionally, Norbert is a cartographer and has been involved with NASA maps and charts of the earth and moon; recently he worked with the Skylab photos. Leigh is well known in the microcosm of sf fanzines. She has edited Sirruish, the St. Louis clubzine, and later B.C., a personalzine. Occasionally a fanzine is lucky enough to get a letter of comment from her, and I'm immodest enough to mention that Leigh is a valu- able but too infrequent contributor to our fanzine Starling. At St. Louiscon Leigh became addicted to working at can registration tables. This sort of work may look like a good way to meet people (and it is), 21 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ but as anyone who has done it knows, it is hard work, and keeps you away from the rest of the convention. Norbert is one of the true heroes of the cons that he attends. Have you ever wondered how that ice and beer magically materializes in those party bath tubs? Do you ever wonder where those bottles that people call "smooth" come from? For years now, it has been Norb and others like him who, hearing folks say "ice" and "beer" and "smooth," jump into VW buses, fill them up at over-priced quick shops near the motels, and outwit bellboys to get the supplies into the rooms. Fandom owes much to Norbert's back, wallet and VW bus. Once, when pressed by a reporter at a convention, Leigh made up a story about how she and Norb met: while they were both attending St. Louis University, a sf book dropped from Leigh's notebook. Norb saw it, cried "Say, you read that stuff too!" and a fan- nish romance was born. If it isn't true it could have been, because Norbert and Leigh actually did spend many hours and many bottles of Stag sitting in campus hang-outs discussing the contents of the latest Astounding. While Leigh and Norbert have remained active in fandom since the 1969 St. Louis Horldcon, it must be admitted that St. Louis fandom in general has been much quieter since the heydays of the late '60's. But who knows what the future holds? Leigh recently informed me that she and Norbert have been made honorary members of a new Washington University fan group. This makes them perhaps the oldest members of a young fan group - while at the same time they are almost certainly the youngest members of fan- dom's greybeards, First Fandom. * * * * * PROGRAMMING NOTE: The first group "Smoooooth!" of Minicon 11 took place at 9:50 PM on the evening of Sunday, 11 April, 1976, in an apartment just south of Minneapolis. Tucker was present, and was radiant in a knit shirt and a single contact lens. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Advertisement for Landfall Theatre] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Art by Reed Waller titled "Whomever removeth this Sword from this Cheese..." and saying "Q: David Emerson" at the bottom.] introducing the Toastmasters ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jackie Franke by Bob Tucker Jackie Franke is an astonishing lady who lives in rural splendor just outside Beecher, Illinois with the obligatory number of children who may (or may not) grow up to be fans, and a doting husband named Wally who knows his wife very well indeed: for birthdays and the appropriate holidays he showers her with typewriters, mimeographs, stencil cutters, twiltone and staples, all esoteric instruments calculated to pacify her. Also around the Franks Freehold from time to time (depending on Jackie's temperament and Kelly's toler- ance) are assorted dogs, cats, chickens, horses, and free-loading fans -- although it is doubtful if the fowls and animals would recognize a fan if they were bitten by one. A burglar stopped by on at least one occasion and the dog made him welcome, mistaking him for a visiting fan. Jackie discovered science fiction fandom after first sampling Star Trek fandom, and this is an object lesson not to be lost on us: trekkies should be encouraged, not put down, and coaxed over to our side. She has since become an active correspondent, an ever-more- active fanzine fan, and an insatiable con fan. She publishes an apazine, Twixt, and a genzine currently called Fem-Lib SF. This title is most appropriate because of the cover artwork: every issue pictures some brawny lass fighting off the villain or the monster to save a male in distress. If it can be honestly said that she has a favorite activity, favoring one over the others, that would be attending cons. To be truthful, she is a con nut and will eagerly drive through snow, sleet, gales and monsoons to attend every one available between the Atlantic seaboard and the Rocky Mountains. (Her gas- oline bill is said to be greater than the cost of twiltone and staples combined.) She is fond of room parties, bridge, smoffing, sprightly conversations, and staying up all night to learn how many fans she can outlast. Her one weakness is a colored liquid called Southern Comfort, a liquid chockful of vita- 22 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ mins, giggles, and granola. I can forgive her the drinking. Jackie Franks is a very special person to me for a particular reason. She got me deported to Australia, and it really wasn't her fault that I sneaked back in- to the States later. About two years ago she and Bruce Gillespie concocted the idea of a "Tucker fund" to prepay my expenses to Aussiecon. By dint of much hard work, by wheeling and dealing, by wheadling and threats, by passing the hat and setting up special auctions, she succeeded in raising something over $2300 for my deportation. I love her for that, and by way of retaliation I am now exploring ways and means to deport her to the moon or one of those Buck Rogerish places. I daresay she wouldn't sneak back home as easily as I did. Committee EXECUTIVE - Don Blyly: Hotel Liaison Dave Nixon: Publications, Programming Margie Lessinger: Recorder Jan Appelbaum: Treasurer COMMITTEE -- Sue Ryan & Cat Ocel: Registration Richard Tatge: Art Show Gerry Wassenaar: Hucksters Jerry Stearns & Caryl Bucklin: Party Supplies Ken Hoyme & Mark Digre: Films Fred Haskell: Official Happy Deadwood Emeritus Karen Hennebry: Banquet Scott Imes: Video-taping, equipment procurement Ken Fletcher Linda Lounsbury Carol Anndy David Emerson Denny Lien AUCTIONEER: Joel Lessinger PROJECTIONIST: Benjy Lessinger, John Stanley And ably supported by the members of the Minnesota Science Fiction Society, Inc. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rusty Hevelin also by Bob Tucker Rusty Hevelin hitch-hiked into active fandom and into my ken thirty-five-years ago, when he thumbed his way from California to Denver to attend the 1941 Worldcon held in that mile-high city. It made an impression on him, he stayed around, and today he likes to stroke his luxuriant beard and tell impressionable young la- dies the harrowing tales of yesteryear -- before they were born. (And if they are suitably impressed he will let them stroke his beard.) Rusty did the usual things in World War 2, and came out of that experience and back into random to publish fanzines, ramrod a science fiction club in Philadelphia and worm his way into history via Harry Warner's All Our Yesterdays, He is in that book under two names, so nefarious were his many activities. He lives in or near Dayton, Ohio (but is most evasive about the actual location of his residence) in a house chockful of books, magazines, fanzines, program books from hundreds of conventions, and many rare old collec- tors' items other people faunch for. His own specialty is Arkham House books. He was once heard to express the wish that there be a con every weekend the year around, that he might attend them all. Lacking that full schedule, he does the best he can by managing thirty or more a year, rolling up in his red van filled to the gunnels with books and mage- zines fer the huckster rooms. Retired some years ago from a mundane job, he now earns a part of his living at the huckster tables. That red van is a marvelous machine, being fitted out with swivel seats, a center table for eating or poker playing, a closet and wash basin, and a full-sized bed at the rear. (Rusty likes to show that bed to those same impressionable young ladies mentioned above. The van windows are also fit- ted with curtains to shut out the world, and when they are closed a bright pink button reading "Rosebud uber Alles" is very visible.) If you are an impressionable young lady, ask Rusty 25 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ to show you the red van. Last ear reflecting his widespread popularity in fandom, Rusty won the DUFF award (Down Under Fan Fund) and joined some sixty other Canadian and American fans on the flight to Australia and the 1975 Worldcon at Melbourne. He was so overcome by the experience, so overwhelmed by the country, the fans, and with his friendly reception there, that he was seen to take his first drink. In full view of five hundred gaping fans he tilted the Beam bottle to that heard. Harry Warner will mark that moment in a future volume. [art by Dan Steffan captioned "To the SF Ghettoe, Driver -- and step on it!" ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Credit The Publications staff wishes to thank all contribu- tors to this Program Book, as well as those who helped with the two previous Progress Reports. Thanks go to Jim Odbert for the cover and the illos on pp. 13 and 20; to Dan Steffen for the illo on p. 28 (and to Fred Haskell for making it available)(Publications takes responsibility for the caption thereof); to Reed Waller for the illos on pp. 7 and 24 -- Get well soon, friend! Special thanks to Ken Fletcher for the illo on p. 10, and to Caryl Bucklin for digging it out of her files, and to myself for inking it (Publications takes all responsibility for deviation from the intent of the original illo). And we are disgustingly proud to be the first publisher of artwork by Bob Tucker, whose bit appears on p. 4 -- He acceded to our re- quest with his usual charm, and did it fast! (Obviously inspired by the rocket he fired.) Parrot Following are the answers to the problem which ap- peared in the Minicon 10 Program Book (as promised). Answers are probably correct, since the two members of the Minicon Committee who worked it out indepen- dently recently came up with the same answers: 1. The Frenchman. 2. The Dane. 3. 101 103 105 107 109 Dane Swiss Irish Greek Frenchman yellow blue red white green turtle rabbit cat dog parrot rum beer gin wine coffee Chevy Dodge Ford Buick Rolls Any questions? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Two page advertisement for Doubleday] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Back cover: advertisement for The Big Des Moines Con] ------------------------------------------------------------------------