"I was there" in the late 1970s when Vootie was started by "the Funny Animal Liberation Front" in Minneapolis, and when I tried to join, they said that I didn't qualify for membership because I couldn't draw; it was an APA for cartoonists only. ("Funny animal" turned out to mean "any comic book characters except costumed heroes".) "I was there" at the 1980 Worldcon in Boston when fans were intrigued by the first Erma Felna painting in the Art Show -- an anthropomorphic cat-girl pilot in front of a high-tech realistic fighter plane -- and the artist, Steve Gallacci, said that he had a whole sketchbook filled with Erma Felna drawings for an s-f story that he was writing about a spacegoing race of bioengineered animal-people trying to find out their origins. "I was there" when the group of s-f fans and cartoonists started to discuss other "funny animal" characters in s-f and animated cartoons, and it turned out that almost all of these turned out to be our favorite s-f stories and cartoons. "I was there" when Don Bluth's "The Secret of NIMH" came out in 1982, and Tim Fay & John Cawley started a NIMH fan club to write their own fan-fiction sequels to it. "I was there" when Vootie fell apart in 1983 despite Tim Fay's & Marc Schirmeister's attempts to keep it going, and when Schirm created Rowrbrazzle in February 1984 to be its replacement -- and he made it a real funny animal club, that all funny animal fans could join, not just cartoonists; I was a charter member. "I was there" when the informal funny-animal discussion and "I'll draw in your sketchbook if you'll draw in mine" fan groups around Gallacci at West Coast s-f & comic-book conventions solidified into the first "Furry" room parties organized by Mark Merlino & Rod O'Riley. "I was there" when Merlino tried to formalize the fandom by proposing that funny animal fans should adopt the annual BayCon in San Jose to get together at. "I was there" at the 1987 BayCon when anti-Furry fans graphittied Kris Kreutzman's Furry Party posters into "Skunk-Fuckers' Party" posters, and used them to try to get the Furry fans expelled from the con (it didn't work, but the hostility was enough to convince Merlino that the BayCons would not be a good hangout for funny-animal fans). "I was there" when Merlino & O'Riley started the first convention just for Furry fans, ConFurence 0 in January 1989; I attended all the annual ConFurences (except 1991, when I was in France) until 2004, the last one. Ask me about the early days of Furry fandom. (And I'm sure that Confurence 0 was larger than 42 fans -- I made it as 60+ fans -- even if I was not on its Committee.)
"I was there" in the late 1970s when Vootie was started by "the Funny Animal Liberation Front" in Minneapolis, and when I tried to join, they said that I didn't qualify for membership because I couldn't draw; it was an APA for cartoonists only. ("Funny animal" turned out to mean "any comic book characters except costumed heroes".) "I was there" at the 1980 Worldcon in Boston when fans were intrigued by the first Erma Felna painting in the Art Show -- an anthropomorphic cat-girl pilot in front of a high-tech realistic fighter plane -- and the artist, Steve Gallacci, said that he had a whole sketchbook filled with Erma Felna drawings for an s-f story that he was writing about a spacegoing race of bioengineered animal-people trying to find out their origins. "I was there" when the group of s-f fans and cartoonists started to discuss other "funny animal" characters in s-f and animated cartoons, and it turned out that almost all of these turned out to be our favorite s-f stories and cartoons. "I was there" when Don Bluth's "The Secret of NIMH" came out in 1982, and Tim Fay & John Cawley started a NIMH fan club to write their own fan-fiction sequels to it. "I was there" when Vootie fell apart in 1983 despite Tim Fay's & Marc Schirmeister's attempts to keep it going, and when Schirm created Rowrbrazzle in February 1984 to be its replacement -- and he made it a real funny animal club, that all funny animal fans could join, not just cartoonists; I was a charter member. "I was there" when the informal funny-animal discussion and "I'll draw in your sketchbook if you'll draw in mine" fan groups around Gallacci at West Coast s-f & comic-book conventions solidified into the first "Furry" room parties organized by Mark Merlino & Rod O'Riley. "I was there" when Merlino tried to formalize the fandom by proposing that funny animal fans should adopt the annual BayCon in San Jose to get together at. "I was there" at the 1987 BayCon when anti-Furry fans graphittied Kris Kreutzman's Furry Party posters into "Skunk-Fuckers' Party" posters, and used them to try to get the Furry fans expelled from the con (it didn't work, but the hostility was enough to convince Merlino that the BayCons would not be a good hangout for funny-animal fans). "I was there" when Merlino & O'Riley started the first convention just for Furry fans, ConFurence 0 in January 1989; I attended all the annual ConFurences (except 1991, when I was in France) until 2004, the last one. Ask me about the early days of Furry fandom. (And I'm sure that Confurence 0 was larger than 42 fans -- I made it as 60+ fans -- even if I was not on its Committee.)
Fred Patten