Boskone 22

Boskone 22 was held February 15-17, 1985 at the Copley Marriott, Boston in Boston, MA. The GoHs were Kate Wilhelm and Damon Knight, the Official Artist was Carl Lundgren and the Special Guest was Shawna McCarthy. It was chaired by Ann Broomhead and attendance was 3420.

This was the year that Boskone began to be called the "Winter Worldcon", a tribute to the quality and richness of the convention, but also evidence of the ultimately fatal rapid growth. It was the largest SF convention in the world that year, as Worldcon was Aussiecon II and consequently smaller than usual.

Boskone's rapid growth continued and the convention teetered on the edge with large numbers of high-school age kids beginning to attend. (Besides the official membership of 3420, there were hundreds of people attending without memberships.) The Copley Marriott was a new hotel which had opened just a few months before Boskone 22, and had actively solicited the convention. Apparently, the reality of Boskone was not what they wanted, because soon after it was over they told the committee that they did not want Boskone back.

While the general size and growing unruliness of the convention was a major issue, the final straw was the hotel's discovery that Boskone’s film program showed XXX pornography in the early morning hours. (This was evidently a custom of the film crew and a surprise to much of the rest of the committee, but that didn't make the hotel feel any better about hosting the convention.) For more on the grown and collapse of Boskone, see Rise and Fall of the Giant Boskones.

The Boskone Book was Late Knight Edition, a collection of stories by Damon Knight. For GoH Kate Wilhelm, Boskone produced Pastiche, a SF-related game she had invented.

• Boskone 22 publications and photos on fanac.org
• Con report by Mike Glyer at File 770 52, p. 14.

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Boskone 21	Boskone	Boskone 23
	1985

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