Gerry Webb

(October 1941 – )

Gerald Maurice 'Gerry' Webb is a British fan from London active from the early 1960. He was for many years a regular convention attendee, and has been active in the British Interplanetary Society (BIS).

In Scottishe #71 (June 1976), Ethel Lindsay said:

Gerry is tall, wears glasses and is one of the few good-looking men in fandom. He has a strong collecting instinct and books line almost every room in his home. He even collects comics. On one wall is a huge poster showing man in space. At the time he bought this he was wearing a beard that Anne disliked. So she agreed to allow one wall of her living-room to look like something from 2001 on condition the beard was shaved off. Gerry duly shaved, being a dyed-in-the wool fan.

Webb graduated in Physics and completed postgraduate work in Space Science (University College London). He joined the BIS in 1958, was elected to Fellow in 1969, and served as president from 2018 to 2021.

Webb certainly attended Bullcon, the 1963 Eastercon, and was on the committee for the 1969 convention, Galactic Fair 1969. He was for many years a regular attendee at London First Thursday meetings, Eastercons, Novacons and European Worldcons, appearing on science and space oriented programme items. In later years he was known for hosting invitational room parties. Greg Pickersgill recalled a panel at Concourse, the 2004 Eastercon, ostensibly devoted to the 1950s radio serial Journey Into Space:

Then Gerry Webb – a genuine spacecraft entrepreneur – carried the whole thing into a different dimension, as usual, with spellbinding anecdotes about his associates with the Russian space-scientists, and determinedly introducing the concept that throwing a spacecraft off the planet should be as routine as driving a truck down the M1, if a little more labour intensive. And made the right points to back up his assertions, as indeed did Peter Weston who in support read out from a piece he'd done for the Programme Book, a startlingly vivid description of the purposeful but unglamorous way that the Russians actually do these things. In retrospect it was a perfect item, wedding comedy, history, science and science fiction together in a way that cumulatively makes you see the world just a little differently afterwards. Bloody great stuff.

A somewhat unusual claim to fame was reported in Ansible #14 (December 1980):

Our very own Gerry Webb has reached fame (Daily Express, 18-11-80): he's been 'selected' by Dateline's computer as an ideal mate for Lady Diana Spencer, the lady who is currently not going to marry Prince Charles. 'Lady Diana might soon forget Charles if she met Gerald Webb, a 34-Year-old. former trainee astronaut and Government space research scientist... What he lacks in high breeding, he surely makes up for in brain power.' 

He was listed as one of the researchers for The Visual Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (1977)

In 1983 he founded Commercial Space Technologies Ltd, supporting the space industry with consultancy, management and launch brokerage services.

Awards, Honors and GoHships:

• 1985 – Picocon Pi
• 1989 – Picocon 7

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Person

1941—

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