Torcon
The sixth Worldcon, the first in Canada, Torcon was held July 3–5, 1948, at the RAI Purdy Studios in Toronto, ON. (It was, in fact, the first Worldcon outside the United States, but “Canada can hardly be counted as a separate country,” Dick Eney wrote in Fancyclopedia 2, dismissing Torcon as an “international” event.)
GoH: Robert Bloch. FGoH: Bob Tucker. (It was the first to have a fan GoH.) It was chaired by Ned McKeown.
Other committee members: Bill Grant.
The hastily contrived bid for Toronto in 1948 was chosen in the 1948 Worldcon Site Selection at Philcon, defeating a bid from Milwaukee in 1948; it was sponsored by the Derelicts (the Toronto Science Fiction Society).
The complete talks at Torcon were wire recorded and later printed in the Torcon Report. Its progress reports were issued as the fanzine, Torque, edited by Beak Taylor.
George Young debuted the propeller beanie.
The 1949 Site Selection was held there.
- Lloyd Eshbach's Torcon I Reminiscence.
- “Torcon Memories” by Leslie Croutch.
- “Torcon Daze” by Art Rapp.
- Torcon I publications and photos on fanac.org.
| From Fancyclopedia 2, ca. 1959 |
| from Convention Torcon, marked by the first appearance of the helicopter beanie and zapgun, was put on by the Toronto (Canada) Derelicts over the July 4 weekend. (Patriotic Amerifans celebrated Independence Day and defied the tyranny of King George.) Tucker presented his Little Kinsey Report (which Bloch later parodied), Wollheim defended sex (on prozine covers, that is) and Doc Keller plugged for science-boosting stf. Oh yes -- and Rothman introduced a film on atomic physics, with results told under ZAP-GUN. |
| Philcon | Worldcon - Bidding - Hugos | Cinvention |
| first | Canadian Worldcons | Torcon II |
| 1948 |
| This is a convention page. Please extend it by adding information about the convention, including dates, GoHs, convention chairman, locale, sponsoring organization, external links to convention pages, awards given, the program, notable events, anecdotes, pictures, scans of publications, pictures of T-shirts, con reports, etc. |
