Brumcon

Brumcon was the 1959 Eastercon, held March 27–30, 1959 (Easter weekend) at the Imperial Hotel in Birmingham, UK. The guest of honour was Kenneth F. Slater. The committee was Ron Bennett, Terry Jeeves, Bob Richardson and Norman Shorrock.

It was the tenth convention in the Eastercon sequence and the first of any kind in Birmingham, the second-largest city in the UK. Brumcon was the first Eastercon held under the auspices of the BSFA following the Association's creation the previous year. Membership was 60, an increase on the previous year's Cytricon IV but still well below typical membership in the first half of the 1950s.

In common with Cytricon II and III (1957 and 1958 respectively), the name Brumcon is a retrospective coinage. The programme book uses the term 'National Science-Fiction Convention'. It seems that the convention only became known as Brumcon after the 1965 Eastercon labelled itself Brumcon II.

Preparations

The BSFA was formed after a meeting at Cytricon IV in 1958 and at the same time it was decided that the Association would be responsible for the annual convention. The meeting also concluded that the 1959 event should be 'at the seaside' over Whitsun. The convention is not mentioned in the first issue of Vector but the second, in Autumn 1958, said the convention would again be over Easter weekend and invited members to indicate preferences for programme items. Vector #3 (Winter 1958) makes reference to an enclosed leaflet 'giving details of the annual get-together' and as of 2024 no copies have been traced. The issue itself does however confirm the venue as the The Imperial Hotel in the decidedly non-coast-adjacent Birmingham.

Venue

The Imperial Hotel was on Temple Street in Birmingham. It later went through a few names changes – becoming the Imperial Centre Hotel, in which guise it hosted the first four Novacons in 1971–4, and The New Imperial Hotel – before being converted into offices.

Attendees

A membership list in the programme book lists 43 members, with two more as 'stop press' inclusions. It includes all members up to March 20, 1959, one week before the convention. In Vector #4 (Spring 1959), Eric Bentcliffe said 'The total membership at the Convention was 60, and 56 people actually attended the con.' The convention balance sheet in the same issue shows 40 paying 5/- and 18 paying 12/6 (twelve shillings and six pence) for a total of 58. The assumption is that the former were BSFA members and the latter were not. There's a difference of two between Bentcliffe's total membership and the balance sheet. Ken Slater presumably didn't pay and so he accounts for one of them. Joyce Slater may have been the other although there is no evidence she was there and Ken Slater is listed as a member in the programme book while she isn't.

In the table below names marked (A) are known attendees, names marked (AN) are known attendees who are not on the membership list, and names marked (N) are members who are known to have not been present. The remainder, 10 people, may have attended and based on Bentcliffe's numbers apparently at least five of them did. Maddeningly, the combination of known members and know attendees adds up to 59, one short of Bentcliffe total membership, although everything balances if Joyce Slater was a member.

1. Jill Adams
2. Barrington Bayley
3. Ron Bennett (A)
4. Eric Bentcliffe (A)
5. Brian Burgess (AN)
6. Alan Burns (A)
7. Bob Champion (AN)
8. Ken Cheslin (A)
9. Les Childs (A)
10. Dave Cohen (AN)
11. Geoff Collins (A)
12. Peter Davies (A)
13. Karl Dollner
14. Keith Freeman (A)
15. D. K. Fawcett
16. George Gorse
17. Barry Hall (AN)
18. Sandra Hall (A)
19. Peter Hammerton (AN)
20. Paul Hammett (AN)
21. Joan Hammett (AN)
22. David Hardy (AN)
23. Bill Harrison (AN)
24. Frank Herbert (A)
25. Terry Jeeves (A)
26. Eddie Jones (A)
27. Eric Jones (A)
28. Margaret Jones
29. Brian Jordan (A)
30. Mike Kilvert (A)
31. Ethel Lindsay (AN)
32. Jim Linwood (A)
33. George Locke (AN)
34. Ivor Mayne (A)
35. Ken McIntyre (A)
36. Archie Mercer (A)
37. Jill Micklethwaite
38. Michael Moorcock
39. Stan Nuttall (AN)
40. Ella Parker (A)
41. Nancy Pooley (A)
42. Ken Potter (AN)
43. Bob Richardson (A)
44. Alan Rispin (A)
45. Phil Rogers (A)
46. John Roles (A)
47. Laurence Sandfield
48. Norman Shorrock (A)
49. Ina Shorrock (A)
50. Ken Slater (A)
51. Phil Sless (AN)
52. Pete Taylor (A)
53. Norman Wansborough (AN)
54. Norman Weedall (A)
55. Arthur "Doc" Weir (A)
56. Peter West (A)
57. Cyril Whitaker
58. Bobbie Wild (A)
59. Jack Wilson (A)

The convention

Ron Bennett wrote in Skyrack #1:

I think it only fair to mention that while I contested the Association’s implication that British fandom needed such an organisation in order to survive, I do congratulate the BSFA on the way it has gone about achieving its aims. There were several new faces present at the BrumCon, all of whom have been brought into fandom by the BSFA. Nor were these newcomers, as might have been expected, stuffy. They fitted in well and were most interesting to talk to.

Future conventions

• Report in Skyrack #1.
• Rob Hansen's page on the convention, including known attendees and links to publications and photos.

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Cytricon IV	Eastercon	London
first	Brumcon	last
Website	1959

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