Progress Report 1 November 1999 PARAGON Joy\w/]e5C1 (GO Ml PARAGON Blackpool 13 “-16™ April 2001 Norbreck Castle Hotel Guests of Honour Stephen Baxter Michael Scott Rohan Lisanne Norman Claire Brialey Mark Plummer Committee@ Chair: Alice Lawson Finance: David Cooper a& Pas Steve Lawson Programme & Rhodri James & emberships: Guests: Nick Mills Publications: John Dowd Operations: Nigel & Sabine Furlong Contact information Membership & general enquiries Website Paragon www.keepsake-web.co.uk/paragon 379 Myrtle Road SHEFFIELD Email $2 3HQ general enquiries; Telephone: 0114 281 1572 [email protected] For individual email addresses for oa particular departments see the a} website. TORR EESE PR 1 was produced by John Dowd. The text was written by membersofthe Ba committee andproofread by Fran Dowd. David Kirby is also known as Guinness and is a Sheffieldfan, wit and raconteur. The cover started life as a NASA photograph of the Apollo 11 launch. 2 Paragon PR1 What does it take to make a good certainly have a good one. John Eastercon? Dowd, Nick Mills, David Cooper, Rhodri James, Nigel Furlong, Sabine I mean other than a lot of your Furlong and Steve Lawson. Between friends in the same place at the same them they have a great range of time, which I admit, is a strong point. talent and experience in various aspects of con running. Most of us A GOOD HOTEL: The Norbreck Hotel have worked together successfully in in Blackpoolcertainly fits the bill. It the past and the other memberswill has enough room for everyone and only enhance our strengths. So at everything we want to do, including the moment the programme people plenty of lounge space. are programming, the OP’s people are opp’ing and the publication INTERESTING GUESTS:Our choice people are pubbing (oops sorry, that’s of guests covers a wide variety of all of us). areas, from hard sciencefiction to fantasy and notforgetting fanzines and fandom itself. In future publications What doesit take to will keep you up to A GOOD LOCATION: make a good date on how the Blackpoolis certainly committee is doing that. Lots of things to Eastercon? and how things are do and see. (Although going in general. In the programme will be the meantimeif you so good that you will not want to have any comments, ideas or suggestions on any aspect of leave the hotel. Right lads?) the convention, please feel free to talk to any of the committee. We will A STRONG PROGRAMME:It is an also have a suggestion box on the ideal time to look back and see what con desk. has gone before. I personally do not believe in having a programmeitem Here are some thoughts to get you or panel just because it has always going. Do you think Eastercons have beenthere. If it has, why, when and too much programmingor not wheredid it start, is it still relevant? enough? Do you read publications At the same time I do not believe we from coverto coveror only the should discard something becauseit membership list? What do you has been done before. Some things expect from a PR? are worth re-visiting. Another thing we intend to do is find outif there is Add to the above mix, good company anything newto try - or even a new and conversation with good food and way to do old things perhaps? As I drink and hopefully we will have a have said before, all ideas welcome. great convention. We will provide the hotel to meet in, the guests and All of the above will be written about programmeto talk about. by other people in this and further The rest is up to you. PR’s. Which is good, as I am hopeless at this writing lark. (What do you Looking forward to seeing you ata ‘mean, you had already noticed?) con desk somewhere. To do all this I need a committee. I Paragon PR1 Memories of Blackpool Alice starts this series ofreminiscencesoffresh strip. Oh no. It’s a men only sport. air andfun in our chosen town. Women don’t have a choice”. Rememberthat this was in the mid When I was about 18 (yes I can 70s and the Chippendales probably rememberthat far back) a group of had not even been born yet. One of us decided to go to Blackpool for a the lads replied that we wereall talk week. Thatin itself was no surprise. and that even if there were such a Most of Glasgow at that time would thing as a male stripper, we would not dream of going anywhereelse. not go. Oh yes we would wereplied, For some reason, it seems that, for safe in the knowledge that we could one week in summer and one not be proven wrong. Right he weekend in September, Glasgow just replied. There is one on tonight. seems to move en massto Blackpool. Here are yourtickets. So, for a crowd of teenagers looking for a fun holiday Blackpool was the GULP! only place to go. Five of us went in all. We were aged 18 or 19 andall Well we did go. I remember thinking looking for a good time. Club 18 to how daring we were. How grown up. 30 had nothing on us (or so we Don’t ask me why butI did. I vaguely rememberit). We booked into a remember being scared and thinking boarding house. Now, I had heard that it was somehow wrong.I was stories of landladies and thought convinced we would be arrested or them all exaggerated. Boy was I something. We saw, we laughed and wrong. wondered whatall the fuss was about. Yes it was a bit sleazy, but not Thefive of us had to share a as bad as I thoughtit would be. At bedroom, luckily next door to the the. time I remember saying that from bathroom. I remember one night now on I would keep my big mouth coming homelate and being told by shut. the landlord that we were too noisy and if we did not behave he would So how come I am running an not let us out next night! All in all Eastercon? we had a great time. Lots of pub crawling andflirting. In a room above us were 4 lads from Glasgow. They were nice lads and over breakfast we would chat about where wehadall been the night before and exchange notes on pubs and clubs andso on. One morning they told us they had been to see a stripper. Talk about a red rag. Being liberated young women; we started giving them some stick. They did point out that it was their choice to go if they wanted to. “True” says I “but they never think that women would like to see a bloke 4 Paragon PR1 Programming Nick Mills and Rhodri James have attempt it. Instead wewill been thinking about our programme. concentrate programming in two large function rooms supplemented As yet, planning for the programme by a numberof smaller spaces. is still in the very earliest stages but These latter include newly we are gettingour creative juices refurbished rooms openingoff the flowing ready for someserious Norcalympia exhibition hall. brainstorming in the near future. Weaim to provide a well-balanced There have been some changesto mixture of programmeitems,literary, the Norbreck, since the previous scientific and fannish. In doing so Eastercon in this hotel, Illumination we wishto reprise two aspects of © in 1992. This has resulted in the Illumination: its strength in smaller loss of one of the main function scale programmeitems and, above rooms used then. This means that a all, its sense of fun. In short, expect programmeon as ambitious a scale all the usual stuff and we hope a few as Illumination is out of the question surprises. - even if we were foolhardy enoughto Ops The Furlongs, Nigel and Sabine have been thinking deeply abouttheir empire. We need volunteers. Volunteers, whether working a one hourshift as a gopheror eighteen months as a staff member, make the con possible. At this time we don't want to have Redemption ’01 anyonelabelled or called security/ stewards at any time during the con. A Blake’s 7/Babylon 5 Convention Our thoughts are to have gophers do 23-25 February 2001 mostjobs. These jobs will include door watching, fetching drinks, Ashford, Kent, UK acting as ushers for the masquerade any other tasks as needed. and For further information email us, visit the website or write to; Opswill provide services for all parts Redemption, of the convention. The dealers' room, 26 King’s Meadow View, Wetherby, the art show needcover, butall LS22 7FX departments may require assistance. a team of roving Weare planning www.smot.com/redemption will be the eyes and gophers. These [email protected] ears of Ops and thusof the convention. Paragon PR1 Blackpool - What else is there? David Cooper has compiled this sampler of Blackpool's attractions. Besides the magnificent Norbreck Blackpool Tower Castle Hotel, what else is there in Blackpool’s famous landmark, the Blackpool to entertain the jaded Tower, celebrated its centenary in convention memberor the bored kids 1994. After a £13 million who have had enough of hanging transformation, the Tower provides about with all these strange people? seven levels of fun for all the family Well, Blackpool describes itself as including the Dawn of Time, a Britain’s undisputed capital of stunning animatronic ride that takes entertainment. The biggest and most you through the entire history of the popular seaside resort in Europe, Earth, from dinosaursto astronauts. Blackpooloffers just about There are new express Tower Top everything a visitor can wishfor.