John Millard
(November 30, 1917 – November 28, 1998)
The 6-foot-tall, distinguished, blue-eyed John L. Millard got into fandom in the late 1930s from Michigan, where his Toronto family had moved in 1919.
After attending Chicon in 1940, he helped found the Galactic Roamers, a southern Michigan Doc Smith club that formed at the start of 1941 when delegations from Jackson, Battle Creek and Detroit met in Jackson, MI. The Jackson-based Millard became the president. He chaired the 1941 Michiconference in Jackson.
He was one of the founding members of The National Fantasy Fan Federation (N3F) in 1941, too.
In 1942, he attended Denvention, and then joined the Royal Canadian Air Force, participating in Anglofandom while serving overseas, as mentioned in several issues of Futurian War Digest. He attended Eastercon in London and Norcon in Leeds in 1945.
An early Toronto fan, Millard moved back to his birthplace after World War II and helped start the Derelicts, after meeting Beak Taylor and Ned McKeown at Philcon. He was part of the successful, spur-of-the-moment Toronto in 1948 Worldcon bid. He also bid for Toronto in '73 and chaired the resulting Worldcon, Torcon II. He was honorary chair emeritus of the Toronto in 2003 bid.
He administered the Walter Gillings Travel Fund. He was Fan GoH at Rivercon X in 1985. He was one of the organizers of Secondary Universe IV.
Millard was chairman of the Friends of the Merril Collection from its inception in 1980 until about 1990 and was co-chair of the Building Committee for 15 years in the search for new facilities for the Collection.
Millard was a member of First Fandom. He was a regular congoer who remained active in fandom till his death in 1998.
His photo appeared in the Spring, 1999, issue of Scientifiction: The First Fandom Report. He was the subject of an N3F Founding Members article in the December, 2018 issue ((Volume 77, Number 12) of The National Fantasy Fan.
Awards, Honors and GoHships:
- 1985 — Rivercon X
Person | 1917—1998 |
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