The recipients of seven First Fandom awards were announced during opening ceremonies of the Glasgow 2024 Worldcon on August 8. Emcee Vincent Docherty named the winners of the First Fandom Hall of Fame Award, the Posthumous Hall of Fame Award, and the Sam Moskowitz Archive Award.

FIRST FANDOM HALL OF FAME. This prestigious achievement award has been presented annually since 1963 to a living recipient who has made significant contributions to Science Fiction during their lifetime.  This year, the members of First Fandom have elected Mary & Bill Burns, and David Langford to the First Fandom Hall of Fame for 2024.

POSTHUMOUS HALL OF FAME AWARD. This esteemed award (est. 1994) was created by First Fandom to acknowledge people who should have but did not receive deserved recognition during their lifetime.  This year, the members of First Fandom have inducted Alfred Bester, Michael David Glicksohn, Mike Resnick, and Peter Weston to the First Fandom Posthumous Hall of Fame for 2024.

SAM MOSKOWITZ ARCHIVE AWARD (“for attaining excellence in Collecting”). This notable award (created in 1998) recognizes not only an impressive collection but what actually has been done with it.  Previous award recipients have published articles and books, made collections available for public viewing, loaned items for other projects, and donated material to be preserved for future generations.  This year, the members of First Fandom have chosen Joe Siclari & Edie Stern as the recipients of the Sam Moskowitz Archive Award for 2024 in recognition of a lifetime of service to science fiction fandom.  

---

FIRST FANDOM HALL OF FAME

Mary & Bill Burns

In 1967, British fan Bill Burns and American fan Mary Ensley were both at the NyCon3 Worldcon, but they didn’t meet there.  It wasn’t until three years later that they met in London, where Mary was en route to the 1970 Worldcon in Heidelberg and Bill was working at the BBC.  Bill decided it would be a good idea to attend the Worldcon, and after the couple spent time together at Heidelberg, a long-distance relationship ensued.

Mary imported Bill to New York in June 1971 and the pair were married in late August that year.  They spent part of their honeymoon at the first Boston Worldcon, Noreascon 1, and have been attending conventions together ever since.  They visit the UK around Easter every year and have attended 110 Eastercons between them, as well as many Worldcons.

In 2009 Mary and Bill were joint Fan Guests of Honour at Eastercon LX in Bradford, and they received the same honor at Dublin in 2019, the first Irish Worldcon and the couple’s first-ever convention in Ireland.

Mary is U.S. Marine Corps veteran.  Mary ran the art show at Eastercon for years and then was responsible for on-site registration.  Bill founded www.eFanzines.com in 2000 to “help traditional fanzine publishers make the transition to on-line publication” and he was the recipient of the Doc Weir Award in 2003.

Bill Burns writes:

Mary and I are surprised and delighted by your announcement!  Having become involved in fandom in the 1960s (1964 in England for me and 1967 in the USA for Mary), we met a good number of the founding members of First Fandom, so it is indeed an honor to be added to the Hall of Fame.

Mary & Bill Burns accepted their award in person.

---

David Langford

David Langford, active in British Fandom since the 1970s is best known as a writer, editor and critic who publishes the newszine Ansible.

Over the years, he has worked on many convention committees and their publications, and has often served as Fan GoH.  He was the TAFF delegate in 1980, traveling to Noreascon Two, writing The Transatlantic Hearing Aid (1985) as his trip report.  The Auld Lang Fund was organized to bring him to Aussiecon Three (1999).  He won the 2002 Skylark Award. 

Langford runs Ansible Editions, a small press that publishes both fanand pro material; fan publications include a number of free ebooks from the TAFF website, which he maintains.

As a fan writer, he has received 21 Best Fan Writer Hugo Awards.  Ansible has received 6 Hugo Awards.  He was proof-reader and copy editor for The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and received the FAAn Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021.    (From Fancyclopedia)

Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer, who are Fan GoHs at this year’s Worldcon, delivered David Langford’s remarks and accepted the award on his behalf during the Opening Ceremony.

---

POSTHUMOUS HALL OF FAME

This esteemed award was created in 1994 to acknowledge those people in Science Fiction who should have but did not receive deserved recognition during their lifetime.

This year, members of First Fandom inducted four people into the Posthumous Hall of Fame: Alfred Bester, Michael David Glicksohn, Mike Resnick, and Peter Weston.

---

Alfred Bester

Alfred Bester (1913-1987) was a science fiction author, TV and radio scriptwriter, magazine editor, and scriptwriter for comics. He is best remembered for his novels The Demolished Man (winner of the inaugural Hugo Award in 1953), and The Stars My Destination (1956).

In the late-1930s, Bester met literary agent Julius Schwartz, who agreed to represent him.  After Schwartz moved to DC Comics in the early-1940s, he convinced Bester to become a writer of comics.  Bester worked on various titles, including Green Lantern (he is credited with writing the modern Green Lantern oath.) During WWII, he was also the writer for The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician. 

In the mid-1940s, Bester wrote radio scripts, including Nick Carter, The Shadow, and others, and began writing for television.  Years later, he wrote travel articles for mainstream magazine Holiday, eventually becoming a senior editor.

He was unable to attend the 1987 Worldcon as GoH, so Julius Schwartz delivered his acceptance speech. The Science Fiction Writers of America named Bester its Grand Master in 1988, and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame inducted him in 2001. (From Wikipedia)

---

Michael David Glicksohn

Mike Glicksohn was a Canadian high school math teacher and the co-editor of the science fiction fanzine Energumen which won the 1973 Hugo Award for Best Fanzine. Glicksohn was nominated for an individual Hugo in 1977.  He was born May 20, 1946, in Ports-mouth, England, and died March 18, 2011, in Toronto, Ontario.  He was a Guest of Honor at Aussiecon 1, the 33rd Worldcon, in 1975. (Excerpted from Wikipedia)

Mike’s widow, Susan Manchester, writes:

Hurray for Mike! He would be so proud of this!  How very wonderful. Just a few words about Mike’s love of fandom. Indeed, he loved fandom.  He found a family there as many others have done.  As I knew little about fandom when we got married, Mike cut down on the number of cons he attended.  I did not ask him to do this.  When he committed to something he truly devoted himself.  He was that kind of person. 

I know he would feel honoured to receive this award.  And he would feel humbled.  I never knew him to gloat over his accomplishments.  To be remembered in this way would mean so much to him. On his behalf, let me offer his heartfelt thanks for this recognition.

On a personal note, Mike was the love of my life and I still have difficulty in the world without him.  He was an amazing human being.  He has been gone 13 years.

Chas Baden and Lynn Boston Baden accepted the award on Susan’s behalf.  Chas said:

Thank you!  Lynn and I have been asked by friends of Mike Glicksohn’s to accept this award and bring it to Toronto so it can be presented to Susan Manchester, Mike’s long-time partner and widow.

I did not know Mike, but I have been told this award honors his lifetime of continuous activity as a genuine SF enthusiast.  He had great influence in fanzines, winning the 1973 Hugo for Best Fanzine for an issue of Energumen.  He also had influence in running conventions, poker games, and a legendary, yearly barbecue/birthday party he ran with Mike Harper called Mikecon.

His influence was not only felt in Toronto, but especially across Canada, the US, England, and Australia, who honored him by naming him the Fan GoH at Aussiecon 1, the 33rd Worldcon, in 1975.

He was a beloved mathematics teacher, and had a long teaching career at a local technical school.  He used poker to teach statistics, and also teach the dangers of playing poker with Mike Glicksohn!

I would like to thank John Coker and First Fandom for the honor of accepting this award.

---

Mike Resnick

Mike will be remembered by many in our community for his love of fandom and his service to many of the early fans.

Mike Resnick (1942-2020) was an American writer of SF, fantasy, horror, and mystery.  He was a seasoned editor, newspaper man, columnist, anthologist, and publisher.  He was nominated for 37 Hugo Awards and won five times.  He was nominated eleven times for the Nebula Award, and he won once.  He was the GoH at Chicon 7.  He was executive editor of the magazine Jim Baen’s Universe, and creator and editor of Galaxy’s Edge magazine.  He sold his first piece of writing in 1957, while still in high school.  His work has been translated into dozens of languages. 

Resnick and his wife Carol were participants in SF fandom from 1962.  Carol created cos-tumes in which she and Resnick appeared at five Worldcon masquerades in the 1970s, win-ning four out of five contests.  He wrote more than seventy novels, published twenty-five collections, and edited more than forty anthologies. As of 2012, he had been GoH at more than 40 science fiction cons and toast-master at a dozen others.” (From Wikipedia)

Mike’s daughter Laura Resnick arranged for Chris M. Barkley to deliver the family’s written remarks.  He kindly did so, and accepted the award plaque on their behalf.  Laura requested that this award be dedicated to her mother, Carol.

Here are the family’s acceptance remarks:

The Resnick family thanks First Fandom for this honor, which would have meant so much to Mike. 

Although many readers over the years knew him as a prolific science fiction writer, he always thought of himself first and foremost as a fan.  This community was his home and his family.  He loved fannish culture, conventions, and hanging out late into the night with his fellow fans.  He had an almost encyclopedic knowledge of fannish history and a great affection and respect for First Fandom.

Somewhere out there in the stars, his spirit is still celebrating the sense of wonder that embodied science fiction and fandom for him.  Thank you.

---

Peter Weston

Peter Weston (1943-2017) is best known for founding the longest-lived fan group in the U.K., chairing the 1979 Worldcon, and editing the Andromeda series of original anthologies. He was Fan GoH at Noreascon 4, in 2004.

During 1963-1976, he published the award-winning, multi-named fanzines Zenith, Zenith- Speculation, and Speculation, getting four Hugo nominations and a Nova Award.

For years, Peter’s foundry cast the Hugo rockets for the Hugo Awards.

He organized the Speculation Conferences in Birmingham, UK, co-founded and chaired the Birmingham SF Group in 1971, and helped start Novacon later that year. In 2008, he was inducted into the Knights of Saint Fantony.

Peter was a four-time Hugo Award nominee (1965, 1966, 2005, 2010) and five-time Locus Award nominee (1971-74, 1977).  He received the Doc Weir Award (1975), Nova Award (2007), Fellow of NESFA (2010), and a Lifetime Achievement Award at Corflu 32 in 2015. (From Fancyclopedia)

Acceptance Speech for Peter Weston’s Award

Peter’s daughter Alison Weston prepared an acceptance video.  Here is the text:

Hello, Glasgow.  Hello, Worldcon members.

Thank you for honoring my dad, Peter Weston, with the First Fandom [Posthumous] Hall of Fame Award.  Science fiction was my dad’s great passion.

Discovering science fiction as a small boy growing up in post-War Birmingham was a revelation.  It created in him a life-long enthusiasm and opened his mind to infinite possibility, what he always referred to as “a sense of wonder.”

That small boy devoured every science fiction book that he could find.  He would hide on other shelves all the science fiction books he could find in the library, so that no one else could take them out while he was reading and returning the measly two books allowed at a time.  So, to all the Birmingham fans of the same vintage, if you wondered why you could never find anything at the library, now you know why.

Science fiction gave my dad many opportunities to do things, to have adventures, from writing his award-winning fanzines, winning the TAFF in the 1970s [1974] and traveling to the US, chairing the Worldcon in Brighton in 1979, right up to being a Hugo Award nominee for the book about his life in fandom that he wrote in his retirement.

Dad had a lot of other hobbies.  He joined other clubs.  He was a busy man.  But, science fiction was his great passion that stayed with him for the whole of his life.  Apart from his family, it was the thing that meant the most to him.

And, in science fiction fandom, my dad found a community, a community of people who shared his interest, who shared his passion, who shared his curiosity for possibilities yet to be conceived; a community based on a sense of wonder, something that he kept for the whole of his life.

It would have meant a great deal to my dad to be honored here today.  It means a great deal to all of us in our family.  We are very proud of him for the wonderful man that he was.

So, on behalf of my mom and the rest of our family, thank you very much for remembering Peter Weston, lifetime science fiction fan, in the First Fandom [Posthumous] Hall of Fame.  Thank you very much and I wish you a very good Convention.

---

SAM MOSKOWITZ ARCHIVE AWARD (FOR EXCELLENCE IN COLLECTING)

The Sam Moskowitz Archive Award (created in 1998) recognizes not only an impressive collection but also what has been done with it. 

The members of First Fandom have voted to present this year’s Sam Moskowitz Archive Award to the team of Joe Siclari & Edie Stern.

---

Joe Siclari & Edie Stern

By Jon D. Swartz: Siclari started in science fiction (SF) fandom in 1965 by collecting everything he could find related to SF and fantasy:  books, prozines, fanzines, and other paraphernalia.  By 1966, he was a fanzine fan.

He has been active in running cons, clubs, collecting and preserving SF and fan history.  From Staten Island, he then moved to Florida in the late 1970s.  Around 2000, he moved back to New York State with his wife, Edie Stern.  Joe is president of FANAC, the sponsor of Fanac Fan History Project; The FANAC Fan History Project YouTube Channel; and, the Fan History Zoom Series.

Stern is a well-known SF club, con, collector, and fanzine fan.  She started in fandom in 1970 by subscribing to fanzines she read about in Amazing Stories.  She is a past chair of SFSFS, head of the 1992 Worldcon program division, co-editor of the SFSFS Shuttle, Tails of Fandom, and Shadow of a Fan, among other SF activities. 

Siclari and Stern are also collectors of SF and fantasy art, and have helped create many special art exhibits at Boskone, as well as at several Worldcons and the World Fantasy Conventions during 2014 – 2018. 

Together, Joe and Edie have received many genre awards, including the 2016 Big Heart Award.  They are both Fellows of NESFA and were named Fan GoH at Chicon 8 in 2022. 

Here’s a note from Joe Siclari and Edie Stern:

We are greatly honored to have been selected to receive the Sam Moskowitz Archive Award. Sam was the first great historian of fandom and we are happy to follow in his footsteps.  He was a contributor to one of my (Joe) earliest fanzines and we both read quite a few books he wrote or edited about the field.  Our goal at www.fanac.com is to archive and disseminate as much of science fiction fandom’s legacy as we can. We, of course, are using electronic means to get the material to readers.

Joe Siclari & Edie Stern accepted their award in person.

---

[Thanks to John L. Coker III for providing the draft text and supplying the photos.]