The Drink Tank 007 (2005).pdf

The Drink Tank

A Seventh Issue

The Horvat Collections Plays in Iowa!

There are several very large collections of fanzines that still rest in private hands. Honestly,

preserving the history of fanzines is something that is best left to professionals, mostly due to the

fact that they can best provide the physical conditions that will best allow a large collection to

survive. The collection of Mike Horvat is now in the hands of the University of Iowa, given to

them after the building that they were housed in forced Mike to get rid of them, first trying an

auction, but eventually going to U of I. The quality of the collection is described by those who

know best as "pretty good", which could translate to anything between 'amazing' and 'decent'.

Knowing what I know about the Pelz and Carr collections that currently live in The University of

California at Riverside's J. Lloyd Eaton collection, I'm not sure if it's on that level, but I

understand that it is a significant and multi-faceted collection.

There are still many great collections of fanzines out there. The largest collection of fanzines

that I know of actually has very few SF zines. It's mostly Punk zines from the 70s and 80s (about

50k different titles from around the world, but mostly the UK and US) and earlier rock zines.

These two strands may actually be the most significant periods in the history of amateur

publishing when you look at what they led to in wider journalism.

The early rock zines of the 1950s and 60s were hugely important to the development of music

journalism. If you look at the reviews of the time, they were written by critics who were typically

writing Jazz and Classical reviews. The first wave of rock 'n roll fanzines were written by those

who would go on to become music reviewers and later found magazines like Rolling Stone and

Cream.

The Punk zine, which was savaged over the years by lots of different folks, may be more

significant in that you can follow the roots up and see that the Zine Explosion of the 1990s

certainly grew out of them. The Punk aesthetic, informed, whether they knew it or not, by

DaDaism, certainly changed magazine publishing, as there is no question that magazines like

Wired took elements of their look from the pages of zines like Sniffin' Glue.

I Love Baseball!

Believe it or not, there is a long tradition of Baseball Fanzines. Starting in the early portion of

the 1900s, baseball fans have been putting together fanzines for their favourite teams or players

or just for the game in general. The earliest I've ever seen, back when I used to appraise things

like baseball memorabilia, I got my hands on a 1920s edition of Baseball Fan's Magazine. I used

to write for one called Catcher's Mask back before it went away with the death of the editor. At

one of the Catcher's Mask parties in the early 1990s, Ben showed a video of an at-bat with the

radio call of the Cardinals great announcer Jack Buck.

Buck is a Hall of Famer in the football and baseball halls. He was announcing a Cardinal vs.

Reds game from Riverfront in the 1970s. Joe Morgan had been fouling of shots for a few minutes

and Jack, bored since the Red's had a 12-1 lead, begin reading the out of town scores. He wasn't

really paying attention at all and Morgan fouled a sharp drive into the seats and one of the fans

made a dive like a third baseman driving to prevent extra bases. The crowd went nuts, cheering

the play since they had been rather bored for the last few innings. Buck, hearing the crack of the

bat and the cheers made a call.

"A BIG home run for Joe Morgan, number thirteen for the year!" he said and then he must have

looked down to see who was stepping to the plate, not really noticing what he had just said.

"Now batting, Joe Morgan."

The Drink Tank

A Seventh Issue

Westminster Dog Show 2005

What can I say, I like dogs. All sorts of dogs. There is no animal I enjoy more

than a good dog. Every year, the USA network puts on the Westminster Kennel

Club Dog Show. It used to pre-empt WWF's RAW and I never really cared since the

Dog Show featured awesome dogs. This year, as usual, I was glued to the TV.

The first group, the Working Group, was as solid a field as there's ever been.

There were at least five dogs who looked like they could have competed for the prize

and that were as close to the Dog Standard as possible. I'm a fan of the Komondor,

and I spent some time learning all the breed standards and I've never seen a better

at any Dog Show. But, even with such a great dog, the Great Dane topped that,

and so did a Boxer. The winner was a Great Pyranees Mountain Dog. The Great

Dane was my number one, but the GPMD was in my top five, so I can't complain.

The Terrier Group was not nearly as competitive. There was

a beautiful Scottish Terrier, a near-ideal Miniature Bull, but

no one came close to Coco. Coco, six years old, ancient by

WKC standards, had been the smart money last year when

Josh, a Newfoundland, upset her. She gave birth to a litter

last year and came back and dominated the group. The

Terriers had a four hundred pound gorilla over-shawowing the

rest of a typically strong group.

The other Monday groups were solid. The Toy Group was won by a Pekingese that

I thought looked like a Bantha. It beat the number one dog in America, a Standard

Poodle. I actually thought that that the Pomeranian was a better dog, but that may

just be because I know Pom standards better.

The Non-Sporting group was also excellent, especially with a three-way battle for

the top in my eyes. A Tibetan Spaniel, a Tibetan Terrier (not actually a Terrier) and

a Chow Chow battled with the Tibetan Terrier winning.

Tuesday featured a strong set of three groups, and three very strong winners.

The Bloodhound took a solid hound group and the German Short-Haired Pointer

won the sporting. The Herding Group had a

gorgeous Border Collie win, with an immaculate

Puli from Stanford getting pulled to the final group.

Best in Show was a tough call. Coco was the

crowd fave, but showed only well. The German

was on fire showing, as was the Bloodhound. The

Pekingese did well, but was nervous. I still would

have gone with Coco, or that Great Dane that lost

out to the GPMD, but I can't say that the German

Shorthaired Pointer didn't deserve the win. It

made the right stand at the right time.

The Drink Tank

A Seventh Issue

Breeding Space by Laurens Van Charante

Another student film that simply blew me away, Breeding Space is a strange short that

translates Patricia Highsmith's story The Snailwatcher to the screen. It's one of those movies

that just seems to fall into place exactly where you wanted it to while still giving you bits of

surprize.

The story is of a man, completely dissatisfied with his own marriage, who becomes enchanted

with the way snails mate. He spends hours watching them and their off-spring mate and mate

again. It's a bit disturbing, especially the close-ups of the snails in the heat of mating with a

soundtrack borrowed from 1950s romance films. It's slightly surreal, though at the same time

you feel like there are any number of obsessed collectors that might be playing on the same field

as our poor hero.

The cinematography is dark. So dark, it could be called darque. Van Charantes has said that

he was going for a film where the only light was that that came from the snail's tank, which this

very nearly pulls off. The acting is good, especially by the snails. The ending, which you had to

see coming, is about as satisfying as your gonna find in a dark comedy. Van Charantes, then at

Syracuse, hasn't made much of a splash since, though I understand he's done a couple of short

films. He's a talented Dutchman and I hope to see more from him.

A Very Short Story

When to Fold 'em

Stacey dropped her hand: Three kings. Taylor dropped his: Straight to the Jack.

"Damn." she whispered, looking up into Taylor's eager eyes.

Jackie smiled, an arbitor who simply wanted a winner.

"You know the score, Stace."

Stacey lowered the strap around her left shoulder. Taylor, moved in quick for his bite. enjoying

the flavour of a young ladies meat.

He certianly enjoyed her taste far more than she had his when she showed her full house.

M Lloyd on Aussie Rules Football

My ex-husband and I moved to Australia, the land of his birth, in 1997. He

didn't have to convince me to make the trip, I knew I could love Australia more

than the US because of Aussie Rules Football.

It's an odd combination of violent gladiator match and soccer. There's the

obvious rugby connection, being a game of Houligans that happens to be

played by gentlemen. It's a brutal and fast-paced game, beautiful to watch if

you're a sick bastard.

We moved to Geelong, where the single greatest footy player of all-time

played. Gary Ablett is easily the best to ever take up the sport. A rugged

individual, he was rough and tumble the whole way. He's one of the top goal

kickers ever, and even won the Medal for Best Player in the Grand Final when

Geelong lost! Of course, I think he kicked 10 goals that day. He's not in the

Football Hall of Fame due to some troubles after his career. He's not well-liked

and some say he'd be a blotch on the Hall, but how couldn't they include him?

The Drink Tank

A Seventh Issue

Comments and Complaints

Sent to Garcia@computerhistory.org

By My Gentle Readers

Henh-henh! The PuppyBowl. I'll admit that I spent about half an hour watching The Puppy

Bowl on "Super Bowl Sunday" and loved every minute of it. *That's* entertainment!

So you're a pulp fan too! What magazines do you collect? There's a whole 'nother world of pulp

fandom out there if you want to discover it. One place to start is the PulpMags list that I

moderate on YaHoo!, (and by the way, you should also join us on the Trufen list, also on YaHoo!.

Lists like these are where fandom is largely happening these days.)

I'm not a title collector as much as a buyer of whatever I can get cheap. Astoundings

and a couple Argosys over the years. I've got a few Weird Stories (all in dreaadful shape)

and several Westerns. I also have a lot of True Crime-types.I'll certainly join up the Yahoo

Group. I've never known many Pulp Collectors.

Standard Fannish Complaint Dept.: Admit it; you're designing these complaints to get

discussion going, aren't you? If so, good job! This one is also an Old Topic in Fandom that's

never been resolved to everybody's satisfaction. Why are fans so grumpy in fanzines? Actually,

things aren't *usually* as grumpy as they seem. Much of that stuff is done just to spark

discussion (hmmm... where have I heard that before?) and fanzines fans learn to expect that sort

of thing after a while. However you know this, and what you're really talking about are the true

feuds that erupt in fanzines from time to time. Well, fans have opinions and are rarely shy about

sharing them, and once a perceived slight takes hold in a fan it tends to fester. There's a well-

known fanzine fan who still carries a grudge against me for objecting in print to *his* attack on

another fan a few years ago. So it goes. We fans are human, and we humans do seem to love our

political machinations and intrigues. I try to ignore these things as much as possible. Cheryl's

zine is a good one by web standards. I've not read very many web-based zines yet so I can't really

say more than that. Was it a Hugo quality zine? I dunno. Certainly far worse fanzines have won

a Hugo in the past. ERBDOM, to cite one example. I do know that rich brown is one of the best

writers about fandom and fanzines that ever put hand to keyboard, and he knows the history and

traditions of the field like few others. If he wrote a review of my work - even if it was a bad review

that dragged me across the coals - I'd be sure to read it carefully to see what I could learn from it.

Curt Phillips

Curt Phillips for TAFF! Please visit my TAFF website at

http://www.freewebs.com/absarka/links.htm

If only I had written it to get discussion going. Really, I was just typing and that's what

came out. The upside: it did get people talking (and folks reading), but down side, it

seems that my fears for the future are still there. I spent some time acting, and when you

act, you have to learn the importance of reviews and how to take them. That experience,

plus having very little ego, has helped me much over the years. I once burned a favour to

get a manuscript right onto the big man's desk. I got it returned a while later with a Post-

it that read 'This writing shows no promise what-so-ever'. I certainly got a lot of pointers

from Victor's column, and he didn't come across as grumpy. Feuds have threatened to

tear apart fandom, and came close during the period of when fandom was at it's

strongest. I'm interested in seeing us stick around for a while, and we gotta take steps.

There are a lot of things that need to happen to keep fanzine fandom active and vibrant.

Basically, I want there to be a Corflu 52, and that will require much new blood.

The Drink Tank

A Seventh Issue

Ah, the eternal question of Literary Fandom vs. Media Fandom! I suspect that some things in

Fandom just can't be reconciled and this particular feud is one of them. I've never been a Media

fan as such though I do watch a lot of movies and collect my favorites on DVD, but then Media

fandom goes far beyond just watching movies. I'm more of a fan and collector of SF books and

magazines. In fact, I even collect pulp magazines which must surely be on the extreme edge of

Literary SF fandom. My impression is that Media fandom really got started as a going concern

with the rise of Star Trek fandom in the 60's. Tthough there were certainly devoted fans of shows

like Science Fiction Theater and Captain Video long before that, but it was Star Trek that first

attracted many thousands of new fans to the hobby and we all know what proceeded from that. I

suspect it was precisely *because* so many of those early ST fans were co! mpletely new to

fandom that the resentment against Media fans that you wrote of began to emerge. Suddenly

fandom was swamped with all these strange faces all running around bursting with enthuiasm

about Kirk and Spock and tribbles (hmmm...*there's* a disturbing image...) while the long time

fans were busy pointing out that while Star Trek was interesting enough, it really seemed to be

derived from this literary influence or that one, and what about that series of stories that G.

Payton Wertenbacker wrote in 1931 in Science Wonder Stories...

But the Star Trek fans didn't give a damn about any of that. Star Trek was their initial

exposure to SF of any kind (for the most part. There were certainly exceptions like John & Bjo, of

course) and so ST was where it all started for *them*. The Literary fans resented the Media fans

for not paying any attention to the older SF, while the Media fans resented the Literary fans for

not being as enthuiasistic as *they* were. And so both camps found more comfort in withdrawing

with others who shared their own interests and grumping about the others.

The ensueing Balkenization of Fandom only got worse from that point. Worldcons that had

once attracted 400 or 500 fans who at least talked about all aspects of SF suddenly began

attracting 2000, 5000, 10,000 fans, most with fairly specific interests (costume fans, fanzine fans,

gamers...) and if they even had any interest in exploring other sub-fandoms, they didn't really

have the time. And so we get back to the real question: why does the resentment continue? I

think it comes down to a perception of a lack of respect. And please note that I wrote

"perception". We all fall losely under the mantle of Science Fiction fandom, but while to me SF

means Astounding Stories, and Robert A. Heinlein, and like that, to the next guy SF means

Farscape and HHGTG; and to that guy over in the corner it means fanzines... and I suspect that

somewhere down deep inside us we all suspect that if another fan isn't enthuiastic about the

same SF stuff! that we are, then he must secretly be sneering at us. I think that's where the

lingering resentment comes from these days.

I don't think I have any particular resentment towards media fans or anybody else, but then I

live and have always lived in Abingdon, Va where the next nearest fan of any sort lives about 50

miles away. I'm always impressed whenever I meet *anybody* who even admits to reading or

watching any sort of science fiction. Bab 5? Never heard of it. But I'll talk about it with you

anyway...

Curt Phillips

Curt Phillips for TAFF! Please visit my TAFF website at

http://www.freewebs.com/absarka/links.htm

I'm not quite young enough to remember the days when WorldCons were single-tracked

affairs of less than two thousand. The curve upwards in interest is easily tracable with

the release of Star Trek and Star Wars leading to new fans coming in. The sneering at

various 'odd' sub-fandoms is still around, though it's only OK if you're sneering at furries

it seems. For me, SF will always mean Phillip Jose Farmer and Gojira movies.

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