Pat Mahaffey
(???? – )
Pat Mahaffey was a fan from the United States active in the 1950s. She attended the SFCon, the 1954 Worldcon and was the sister of Bea Mahaffey.
She was the presumably entirely unknowing subject of a hoax by the London fans at the Supermancon, the 1954 convention in Manchester, UK. Connie Mackenzie, wife of Stuart Mackenzie, was attending the convention and the London fans contrived to pass her off as 'Pat Mahaffey', sister of Bea Mahaffey and an unexpected visitor from the United States. Her attendance was supposed to be a 'secret', but Supermancon organiser Dave Cohen found out and arranged a taxi to take himself, Walt Willis, Ted Carnell and Stuart Mackenzie to the station to meet her. Cohen then introduced 'Pat' to various northern fans who were completely taken in. It was only some weeks later that Mackenzie admitted the truth and then as much as anything 'to discourage a local fan by the name of Ron Deacon who had been as taken in as the Northerners and who since the convention had been persistently trying to date her' (Rob Hansen, Then).
As Walt Willis explained in Oopsla #15 (November 1954):
[Deacon] had never met Stu's wife and fell for the hoax completely. In fact he fell for 'Pat' herself and, perhaps encouraged by the remarkable progress Stuart Mackenzie had seemed to make with her, started a campaign to try and date her. This went on with letters and phone calls and other advances weeks after they all got back to London, while Ron thought 'Pat' was a guest at Stu's house. Finally Stu got tired of seeing Deacon trying to seduce his wife under his nose and broke the news to him as gently as possible. Altogether it was a remarkable hoax, and one that deserves to go down in fannish history.
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