GOH: Anne McCaffrey
It was, by all counts, the largest Balticon ever. The Hunt Ballroom seemed to be bursting at its seams during Anne McCaffrey's GOH speech.
As Don recalls, the Friday midnight showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show was delayed, and he tried to stay up to catch it but had to leave soon after Brad and Janet entered the castle. After all, he had a 45-minute drive home, and the same drive back in the morning. So he missed his first complete viewing of Rocky -- but he'd seen enough that he knew he had to go back. Luckily, there was always a crowd at college who would be willing to go....
The Hunt Valley Inn had an Easter-Morning Egg Hunt, which was attended by all the nouveau riche of Hunt Valley; this year, the contest was won by a little girl dressed in a Gold Dragon costume from Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern books. McCaffrey herself gave a wonderful speech about the development of Pern and of the stories, and for the first time Don learned the truth about Blue and Green Dragonriders.
This was the first Balticon at which Don saw Mary Mand -- a friend from his earliest days of high school, whom he hadn't seen for years. There was a time there when Mary and Don only saw one another at Balticons -- even though they lived less than half a mile apart.
This Balticon is also notable for a particular bidding party held on Saturday night: BOSTON IN 1980 celebrates the anniversary of THE FALL OF MORDOR (25 March, S.R. 3019). At the time, Boston was Baltimore's competitor for the 1980 bid...but there's no denying that they had a wicked sense of humor.
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