The 9th World Science Fiction Convention, also known as Nolacon I, was held 1–3 September 1951 at the St. Charles Hotel in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. The chairman was Harry B. Moore. The guest of honor was Fritz Leiber. Total attendance was approximately 190. The at-the-door membership price was US$1, the same price charged from the 1st through the 12th Worldcon.
Notable events included world premiere screenings of The Day The Earth Stood Still and When Worlds Collide, plus a continuous two-day long party in Room 770 at the St. Charles Hotel that became legendary following the convention. Mike Glyer's long-running newszine File 770, named in commemoration of this party, has won the Hugo Award for Best Fanzine a number of times.
Hugo Awards were not presented at this Worldcon as the awards were not proposed until 1952, with the first Hugos actually presented in 1953 at the 11th World Science Fiction Convention. However, in 2001 at the 59th World Science Fiction Convention held in Philadelphia, a set of Retro Hugo Awards were presented to honor work that would have been Hugo-eligible had the award existed in 1951.
Read more about 9th World Science Fiction Convention: In Science Fiction Culture
Famous quotes containing the words world, science, fiction and/or convention:
“We doubt not the destiny of our country—that she is to accomplish great things for human nature, and be the mother of a nobler race than the world has yet known. But she has been so false to the scheme made out at her nativity, that it is now hard to say which way that destiny points.”
—Margaret Fuller (1810–1850)
“The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.”
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955)
“If there were genders to genres, fiction would be unquestionably feminine.”
—William Gass (b. 1924)
“The metaphor of the king as the shepherd of his people goes back to ancient Egypt. Perhaps the use of this particular convention is due to the fact that, being stupid, affectionate, gregarious, and easily stampeded, the societies formed by sheep are most like human ones.”
—Northrop Frye (b. 1912)