Sponsor a Bench at MidAmeriCon II

MidAmeriCon II’s Patty Wells and Melissa Morman are looking for help furnishing the exhibit hall at this year’s Worldcon in Kansas City. Here’s their pitch:

One of the advantages of being favored with five acres of exhibit hall is that we have the room to make our dreams come true. One of our dreams is to put a river through it — so we have also gone and put a park alongside that for good measure. And what is a park, or a river, without park benches to sit on and admire the view or converse with a friend?

At the Worldcon in London a couple of years ago, the convention scattered benches throughout the Fan Village and other parts of the Exhibit Hall, and asked fan groups to sponsor a bench with a plaque commemorating their group, their bid, or a member of their group on it. This idea was well-received by the fannish community and much fun. M2 is continuing this tradition (it’s been done once, so it’s now a tradition, right?).

We are therefore offering you and your group the opportunity to get your message out, publicize your group, or memorialize a lost friend. The benches we are ordering for the fan fair are a lovely metal bench in a design sure to add to your local con should you take the option of taking the bench home after the con.

There are multiple ways you can participate:

OPTION 1 — Sponsor a Plaque ($150)

Send us your group’s name and/or message and we will have it engraved on a plaque that will then be attached to one of the park benches (see above). If, like many of us, you are traveling to KC from distant lands, the plaques will be removable for you to take home as a memento for the group or person you honored. We will have the plaque made with your message. The plaques will take two lines of text, with roughly 20-25 characters per line.

OPTION 2 — Sponsor a Bench! ($200)

This gets your group’s message on a plaque AND you can take the bench with you when the convention is over as a comfortable addition to your next fannish event. And if you are taking the bench home, arriving during Exhibit Hall set up and decorating your bench in some fannish fashion to make it more memorable is encouraged.

OPTION 3 — Sponsor a Bench AND a Park ($500)

Want more exposure for your group? Sponsor a pocket park along the river! Surround your bench with flora and maybe even some fauna; make it distinctive! M2 will name the park after your group and place an acknowledgement sign in the park which may also contain a custom message (“Come to your party on Friday night!”, “Vote for Trantor in ‘99”, or even “Ygnvie is a Louse!”). With this option, you may again take the bench home with you (along with its plaque!) as well as the acknowledgement sign.

If your sponsor dollars are received early, your sponsorship can be acknowledged in the convention’s pocket program.

For more information, please send an email to:

[email protected] or contact Melissa Morman on FB.

Thank you for your consideration. The more we personalize something as large as a Worldcon exhibit hall, the more fannish the Worldcon is.

Colorado Fans Evacuate

Waldo Canyon fire. (Denver Post)

Kent Bloom and Mem Morman evacuated their home in Colorado Springs on June 26 to escape the Waldo Canyon fire.

Morman told fans they have gone to live with her daughter across town.

Their house is not on the burned out list, so they are cautiously hopeful. The Waldo Canyon fire has burned 347 homes and is only 30% contained at this time, reports the Denver Post.   

Google Maps shows Kent and Mem live approximately a mile east of the fire-ravaged Mountain Shadows neighborhood. (See details in the local government’s preliminary damage assessment  [PDF file].)

Bloom chaired Denvention 3, the 2008 Worldcon.