Kubla's Ninth Khanphony
Kubla's Ninth Khanphony (Kubla Khan 9) was held in 1981 at the Holiday Inn, in Nashville, TN. GoH: Charles L. Grant, Artist GoH: Jack Gaughn.
Dan Caldwell writes:
The Quality Inn (used the previous year for Kubla Khan Ate) rented most of its function space as offices, so Kubla moved to the Holiday Inn on Briley Parkway. We thought the Holidome area would be great feature for the con. But we were the first convention to be held in the new hotel, and between staff inexperience and culture clash it was a disaster. Little seemed wrong until the masquerade on Saturday night. The art show was so big (750 pieces, I counted them), that we had no space for pre-judging. So the masquerade staff had it in the Holidome area. The masquerade, as usual followed the auction, which, with some 200 pieces up for sale took forever. Soon bored members of the masquerade wandered into the hotel bar to "freak out the mundanes" which they did all too well. The food & beverage manager, trying to get a Country & Western bar started (Opryland was only 4 miles away), was not amused.
Lou Moore came in and told Dan, the auction head, to hurry up as there was a riot going on outside. Dan told the auctioneer, Rusty Hevelin, to auction art as fast as was humanly possible. Art never moved so fast. There was no milking a piece for raises, it was "going once, twice, three times, sold." If you were not quick, you never got to bid at all (although the art show grossed almost $9,000). Meanwhile, outside the auction things only got worse. Finally Lou came in and summarily stopped the auction, just to get the masquerade people away from the mundanes.
The next morning, the food & beverage manager blatantly took over part of our function space for an unannounced public buffet. And the restaurant staff simply refused to serve anyone wearing a con badge. Despite loud complaints, Khen never did sue the hotel for breach of contract.
| Convention | |
| 1981 |
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