Eastercon

Eastercon was a UK convention held April 8–9, 1944 (Easter weekend) sponsored by the Cosmos Club (CSC) of Teddington, a suburb of London. Walter Gillings was the 'Convention President' and John Aiken the 'Organising Secretary'. The originally announced GoH (or dinner Guest Speaker) Professor A. M. Low was 'unable to be present under military exigencies'. While it was called 'Eastercon' and it was held at Easter it is not generally regarded as being an Eastercon in the sense of the ongoing near-annual series dating from 1948.

Preparation

Cosmic Cuts v2#3 (August 1943), the clubzine of the CSC, reported that:

Feelers have been put out by the BFS during recent weeks with a view to seeing if they could find someone to run a London Convention during August. It was suggested that there might be three conventions yearly, one of which should be in London. August has definitely been ruled out and the date of the proposed London Convention is next Easter.

Pages 9 and 10 of Cosmic Cuts v2#5 (December 1943) were issued separately as Convention Extra #1 and distributed as a rider alongside Futurian War Digest #32, effectively acting as a first progress report for the projected convention. The convention hall was reported booked and meals arranged for an expected attendance of 'some forty or even more, delegates'. Prospective attendees were encouraged to send a convention fee, refundable in the event of non-attendance, of 15/- for both days, including 'all meals and entertainment'. This may have been the first British convention to charge a membership fee.

Convention Extra #2 followed in February 1944, announcing Professor A. M. Low as a guest speaker and predicting 'dozens of famous British and overseas fan personalities to meet'. It also announced advertising rates for the projected souvenir book and invited attendees to lend items to 'The Convention Museum', a display of fan curios and treasures.

A two-page Eastercon Final Notice! was issued in March and in April E. Frank Parker's Lamppost #3 included a map of the area around Shirley's Cafe and effectively acted as a final progress report.

Venue

Teddington is about 12 miles south-west of central London . Events on Saturday were to take place in central London. On Sunday, Shirley's Cafe on Park Road, Teddington, the regular meeting place of the Cosmos Club, was hired for the day. The convention was held in its upstairs room. In 2008 Rob Hansen confirmed that the building still exists and has become a chemists.

Attendees

Convention Extra #3 (April 1944) said 'Present indications are that the estimated attendance figure of forty or thereabouts will prove to be pretty nearly right'. Rob Hansen has identified 26 attendees named in contemporary accounts:

1. John Aiken
2. Sydney Bounds
3. Tommy Bullett
4. Hal Chibbett
5. W. Alan Devereux
6. George Ellis
7. Bruce Gaffron
8. A. Gascoigne
9. K. W. Gatland
10. Walter Gillings
11. Madeline Gillings *
12. H. Gomberg
13. Fred Goodier
14. Peter Hawkins
15. Arthur F. Hillman
16. Gordon Holbrow
17. Donald Houston
18. Ron Lane
19. Michael Lord
20. John Millard
21. S. G. J. Ouseley
22. Mrs Ouseley *
23. E. Frank Parker
24. Laurence Sandfield
25. Dennis Tucker
26. Arthur Williams

For names marked *, John Aiken's report refer to 'the Ouseleys of the Stoke-on-Trent group' so the assumption is that Mrs Ouseley was present, as was Madeline Gillings, Walter's wife. There is however no evidence that either was a fan per se. Michiganian John Millard was in the UK serving in the Canadian airforce. Gus Willmorth from Los Angeles, also stationed in the UK, had hoped to attend but his leave was cancelled at the last minute, reportedly due to army-wide preparations for D-Day.

The convention

The Saturday afternoon session in central London involved a visit to the bookshops of Charing Cross Road, a screening of some Disney shorts at the Cameo News Theatre, and a trip to the Pillars of Hercules pub followed by dinner in the Shanghai Restaurant.

The Sunday session saw a more conventional programme. Starting at noon at Shirley's Cafe, there was a comedy quiz panel, a 'Presidential Address' by Gillings on future of fandom, an auction conducted by Parker, a film show, and a later a gathering in a nearby pub.

The advance publicity said some informal events were planned for the Monday but these did not happen based on reports.

Rob Hansen summed up his detailed history:

… the thing that most impresses about it is that it happened at all. The other wartime cons were small affairs, but the 1944 Eastercon was as full and complete a convention as any that had been seen in Britain to that point. Organising and running it under wartime conditions was a magnificent achievement. Both it and those responsible for it, the Cosmos Club, deserve to be better remembered and more celebrated than they have been.

Publications

Peter Hawkins produced a convention booklet on the day that was generally regarded as unreadable due to poor quality paper. A souvenir book Eastercon 1944 edited by Bruce Gaffron was published in November, 'badly delayed by the interference of doodle-bugs'.

Future conventions

Eastercon would be followed by Midventionette and Norcon II, both later in 1944, but they were on a much smaller scale. The UK would not see a convention of comparable size and scope until the Whitcon of 1948. When the list of past Eastercons was codified in 1971 the sequence was dated from Whitcon and so this Eastercon is not generally regarded as being an Eastercon.

• Eastercon 1944 detailed history at Rob Hansen's website. Includes the Programme Book but not the souvenir one
• 'Eastercon Diary' by Aiken in Futurian War Digest 35 (Vol. 4, Number 5), June 1944 (summarised/quoted above)
• Summary/quotes of the above in Column 40 of Harry Warner, Jr.'s All Our Yesterdays dealing with the FWD in general

See also Early Conventions.

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Norcon	early conventions	Midventionette
	1944

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