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Over 5000 fans converged on the Pennsylvania Convention Center to attend Millennium Philcon, the 2001 Worldcon. The Philadelphia facility, formerly the Reading Terminal, dwarfs human dimensions. The main entrance is the Terminal's nine-story "headhouse" on Market Street. Escalators take visitors up to the Grand Hall, a dramatic space converted from the old trainshed, where acres of marble floor have replaced tracks and platforms. Designers have preserved the ninety-foot-high vaulted ceiling of 19th-century iron and glass, and integrated a neon sculpture that sprawls around the ceiling like a dissected theme park ride.
The Pennsylvania Convention Center was a great facility for the Worldcon. But when Mark Twain described Captain Stormfield's arrival at the Jovian entrance to heaven, it's likely he had this place in mind. The distance from the front door to registration was the equivalent of two city blocks. As if this stretch needed emphasis, the architect punctuated the corridor with frequent alcoves whose identical arrangements of benches and pictures resembled the endlessly repeating background scenery of a Tom and Jerry chase.
The long corridor traverses the second story, over Reading Terminal Market. It ends in a T-intersection with the Exhibit Hall. That intersection was the focus of the convention. Everyone passed by on the way to the Art Show and Dealers Room or the main program rooms. Registration, flyer boards, and snack stands were also sited around the intersection. One flight up, on the third floor, were the convention offices, including Program Ops and the Green Room.
Wednesday in Program Ops: Janice Gelb had recruited me to work in Program Operations. I entered with the greeting, "I've come to wear the chains I forged in life." Tom Galloway agreed, "Size 53 long!"
Janice rapidly acquainted her staff with her methods by wearing a t-shirt stamped with bright, metallic letters, saying "Warning - Sarcastic and Cynical." In reality, Janice can always be counted on for an effective and diplomatic answer to a problem.
Program Ops was an excellent place to meet the guests of honor, for one simple reason: we had the GoH badge ribbons. Fan Guest of Honor George Scithers came to get his, wearing a red hat and his customary plaid jacket. Having seen him looking like this in old photos, I asked him if he'd worn the same jacket to every Worldcon. George said, "No, the louder ones finally wore out!"
Ribbons: Ribbons are more than an eye-catching way to identify dealers, artists and program participants. They're a creative outlet for the committee to show it's not taking itself too seriously. Sharon Sbarsky placed orders for over 7000 total ribbons in dozens of varieties. She showed off her master set to those of us working in Program Ops. I wrote down what seemed to me the funniest and most cryptic titles:
Two Weeks
It's All My Fault
Tardis Pilot
Rubber Chicken
Triumvirate Free Zone
¾ Century of Boring Conventions
Elaine Rules
Lovely Parting Gift
Huey, Dewey, Louie and Unca Scrooge (for Treasury, said Adina Adler. Kathryn Daugherty added, "They all have green shirts with money printed on them.")
I hoped as the convention unfolded I would learn the meanings of them all.
Oddly enough, program participant ribbons ran out almost immediately. The committee ordered an exact number of these, intending to help control access to the Green Room, and it was not quite enough. Some people were agitated because they wanted to be able to get into the Green Room, others simply because they wanted the acknowledgement. As John Mansfield told his 1994 Worldcon committee, "It's amazing what a person will do for a little scrap of ribbon."
Registration: Registration suffered chronic problems. Eva Whitley Chalker's family had registered together, but only one of her two sons was shown as a member. When Dana Siegel's family tried to register, only one out of four badges could be found. Other fans also reported that Registration located records for only part of their families. These and other problems were the symptoms of choices and late planning by the local MilPhil committee which handicapped the Registration staff, who were forced to use their skills to make the best of it.
They were led by Winnipeg's Linda Ross Mansfield, who said the local committee did not give her critical resources until scant weeks before the con. She offered two examples of what they had to overcome: "(1) Not receiving the member database until very late (Aug 10th) blew my timeline out of the water and my home crew did yeoman service prepping all the [pre-registered members'] cards. (2) Not being told I would not have the benefit of any networked computers, (the last I had heard I had been restricted to four) until very late, meant that I was forced to print the name tag labels for the all the pre-reg'd cards, prior to the con."
A side-effect of the rush to produce badges in time was the choice of a tiny typeface to print the names. The badges could only be read by leaning closely forward and squinting. Registration did make name tag replacements in 24-pt. type during the con.
Be that as it may, unreadable badge names are a perennial complaint. Keith Lynch, a veteran fan, always comes to Worldcons wearing a virtual scarf made by stringing together all his membership badges. John Hertz pointed out to me that Keith's name appeared in suitably large type only on his 1996 Worldcon and 1999 NASFiC badges. This has been a problem so long, several of us proposed an amendment to the WSFS constitution to require 24-pt. type.
Thursday in Passing: Andy Dyer wondered if attendance was affected by the downturn in the economy. He felt it would be ironic if the local voters who said three years ago they didn't want to go to a Worldcon in Orlando also decided they couldn't afford one in Philly. This was a good question, because MilPhil entered the weekend with membership numbers appropriate to San Antonio and Winnipeg, rather than to a huge East Coast city within driving range of New York and Baltimore.
It was only Thursday, of course. Some working fans probably couldn't come in until Saturday. (In fact, on Saturday morning 290 one-day memberships were sold, worth over $24,500. The committee estimated that MilPhil broke even on the strength of one-day membership sales.)
I met Maria Pavlac, who has moved to Boston to take care of a parent. She explained her attendance at MilPhil was the byproduct of buying a membership to vote against the Boston/Orlando bid three years before. She was looking forward to voting for Charlotte, and with feigned reluctance predicted that if they won she'd come back for the 2004 Worldcon.
I also talked to John Pomerantz and Kathi Overton. Kathi told me she's been doing some work for IRS-TV, my employer's in-house video service. I hadn't seen her latest assignment, a training session delivered by a guy costumed as a one-touch keypad. Yes, your tax dollars at work.
John and Kathi also promised to post online the photo sequence showing the fans at their New Year's Eve Party when they announced they were getting married, then announced that the ceremony was going to be right now.
Opening Ceremonies: Fans often mention in their convention reports that they waited for a major event to start, but let's face it, in our hearts we don't really want them to start on time. We count on them to start late and leave us time to finish a conversation, meet a tardy friend, or gobble down the last bite of lunch. At MilPhil, this thinking even extended to fans actually appearing in Opening Ceremonies. Beside me in the crowd surging toward the Marriott Grand Ballroom, one of the actors answered his cell phone and explained to the director that he was on his way. Twenty more minutes passed before things began, probably to the pleasure of everyone but the director.
I used the time to greet Diana Thayer and Teddy Harvia. Teddy showed off his name badge, decorated with his Hugo nominee pin, another rocket-shaped pin, and little golden-colored bomber that would be suitable for World War II-era Retro Hugo nominees.
Eventually, the lights dimmed and Opening Ceremonies began. Early in the script someone explained that MilPhil took three years of planning. On stage, Lew Wolkoff emphatically agreed, "And we needed those three years!" Ben Franklin had used the time to invent the propeller beanie perched on his head when he strolled onstage. The ceremony's stream-of-unconsciousness story then gave way to swordplay by the SFWA Musketeers, and Mark Blackman (in a head bandage) giving his impression of a Monty Python character.
A beautiful redhead escorted Chairman Todd Dashoff to the microphone so he could introduce toastmaster Esther Friesner. Dressed in a glittering gown, she was ushered onstage by two Chippendale's-type studmuffins. As they departed with the redhead, Esther warned, "Don't do anything I wouldn't do!" Everyone laughed as if they knew what that was.
Esther introduced Fan GoH George Scithers with note that he wrote the first book on how to throw a Worldcon: "How to throw one, not how far to throw one." She introduced Editor GoH Gardner Dozois as co-creator, with George R.R. Martin, of the "Hugo Losers Party," which "he has been disqualified from attending." Esther called Writer GoH Greg Bear "A triple threat. This does not make him the Three Bears, however." She said Artist GoH Stephen Youll's less-well-known job is as a historical reconstruction artist at Durham Cathedral. As the punchline she revealed he's a twin: "But not Ashley or Mary Kay."
Todd Dashoff closed the ceremonies with a wonderful touch that gave the convention a sense of connection with Philadelphia's rich fannish history. Noting that Milton Rothman, chair of both previous Philadelphia Worldcons, was too ill to attend, Todd named him Chairman Emeritus and declared the con open in Rothman's name.
Accessibility: On the way out of Opening Ceremonies I talked to Doug Friauf, who navigates conventions in an motorized wheelchair. Doug reported that last night he was unable to get into 90% of the restaurants near the convention center because so many of them have a big step at the entrance.
As a result, Doug and some friends went to the McDonalds at the corner of Broad and Arch. He got up to the restaurant in the elevator. But when he left it broke down, and Doug was stuck inside munching his burger 'til two engineers fixed the problem.
Meet and Greet: MilPhil's Thursday night reception took place in the Overlook Bar, named for its view of the T-intersection formed by the exhibit hall and the corridor of meeting rooms leading out to Market Street. The third floor is set back from the exterior walls, like a terrace, making the bar a perch above it all.
MilPhil did its best to help people eat, drink and be merry. The event was well-publicized inside the con. The quality of veggies, cheese and fresh fruit was suited to the tone of the event. Program participants had all received free drink tickets redeemable only at the Meet and Greet. Yet attendance was modest. Everything possible had been done to spark the event except one thing. They forgot to close Philadelphia's vaunted restaurants. Thousands of fans went out for a great meal.
However, the GoHs and a lot of the other fan-friendly pros showed up at starting time. They mostly had each other to talk to at the beginning, and drew a corral of stuffed chairs around Gardner Dozois, who was leading the laughter. Then, once more fans arrived, they all got up and circulated through the party.
After the reception, I ran into Robin Johnson of Tasmania. He said he was just getting over yesterday's travels. He started at 6 a.m. in England by falling down a flight of stairs. He still made it to his plane - though it sat on the runway for three hours before being allowed to take off. One bright spot came when he was allowed to upgrade his seat, or as Robin phrased it, "upgraded from bottom to bottom-but-one."
Mike Walsh of Old Earth Books pointed out the SFWA president, who wasn't wearing a badge. I asked if he was going incognito to learn what the common people think? Walsh said, "And learning they're buying huge quantities of Star Trek novels."
Andrew Porter had taken the train down from New York, and half-seriously claimed he lived close enough to go home every night. As we talked, Rusty Hevelin passed by wearing a t-shirt with the message, "Oops, wrong planet!"
Thursday Evening Program: Who Wants To Be a Millionaire: Chris Barkley promised the contestants on his trivia show the chance to win "one million Turkish lira." He'd asked me to appear as one of the "lifelines," so I went early. Tom Galloway was on the dais setting up his boom box and loading the CD of themes and musical prompts from the British version of the game. Then he warmed up the audience of 80 with serious scientific questions like, "Earth is what planet from the sun?"
When Chris started in earnest, he asked more challenging questions, so contestants eventually needed their lifelines. All three questions I got called for dealt with the history of the space program, and I remembered enough to help.
The first contestant anguished about trying to answer the 500,000 lira question, then decided to bail out and take the 250,000 he'd already won. (By the way, Chris, I never actually saw any lira…) Galloway gave him a "Lovely Parting Gift" ribbon for his badge.
The second contestant easily worked her way through the low-money questions, like "What is the name of the convention you're at?" She also knew what BEM stood for, and that Millennium Philcon's official mascot was not Benedict Arnold. However, she didn't make it past the 64,000 lira question, because she didn't know where the first Worldcon was held. She gambled by not calling on her lifelines, wanting to save them for higher level questions.
In the third round, Chris relented and let perennial Worldcon trivia contest winner Leo Doroschenko be a contestant. Chris, and everyone else, expected Leo to promptly run the table. But there was a question he could not answer: "What university did Indiana Jones teach at?" (Princeton.) Leo redeemed himself later, winning the "Trivia For Chocolate" event, and tying for first with Len Wein on "The Weakest Link" (hosted by Pat Cadigan.)
Friday In Passing: I started the day by working another shift in the Green Room. Janice Gelb had everything running smoothly. The only "problem" was that Mark Blackman had found it impossible to display the "5 minutes" warning sign in a room darkened for a slide show.
Most of the people I helped wanted to be added to the program. The organizers, Laurie and Jim Mann, had so many people respond positively to their participant questionnaire that although hundreds were placed, nearly 200 respondents were not. Some came to the Green Room in hope of last-minute openings. They were shown a list of about 20 vacancies that needed to be filled, and several were added that way.
One vacancy never seemed to get filled. Many would see the title of a panel called "Worldbuilding 101" and be ready to volunteer. Then they'd read the names of the other panelists - Greg Benford, Hal Clement and Yoji Kondo - and speechlessly go away.
Exhibits: The convention center's huge exhibit hall was split by pipe-and-drape into three main areas. In the back was the Art Show and Dealers Room. The front half was ringed by fan tables, miscellaneous exhibits and functions like Site Selection and Sales to Members.
The main areas were a study in contrasts. The Art Show hangings imposed geometric orderliness on half the hall, while the Dealers Rom looked like a kicked-over anthill, with fans swarming over tables of merchandise.
There was no effort to visually unify the huge, generic space using thematic decorations. In the past, Magicon did this with a miniature golf course; L.A.con III transformed the exhibit hall into a spacescape by running colored streamers and star-shaped balloons across the ceiling; and ConFrancisco divided the floor with avenues of carpet
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