Starbase Baltimore

DateS: May 23-26, 1980
Location: Marriott's Hunt Valley Inn; Baltimore, Maryland
Guests: George Takei, Walter Koenig, Mark Leonard

Overview

This was my very first Star Trek convention and, looking back, no convention after this one really came close. It was probably the newness of it all--it seemed like there was no end of interesting stuff to do from the moment we walked in the door to the moment we left (which was pretty late on several days).

I recall going to this convention with three different friends--John Bernardo, Bob Honeycutt, and Andy Mazurek. None of us was old enough to drive at the time, so either my parents or John's provided transportation. What's interesting is that I don't remember doing anything with John, Bob, and Andy at the same time...I remember doing specific things with each of them, but it seems that we went our separate ways and just randomly linked up throughout the weekend.

So much has changed about conventions since my first foray into that facet of Trek fandom. The price, for one thing. According to my registration flier, advance registration for the entire weekend was $10 (rising to a whopping $20 if you procrastinated and bought tickets after April 1). Compare that to the $239 each that my friend Dan and I paid to go to the Creation Star Trek convention in Las Vegas in 2005. And it's worth pointing out that all of the autographs from the stars were free back then. Compare that to the $20-$75 per-autograph that the stars were charging in Vegas. Sheesh.

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The Stars

There were a lot of things that drew me to this first convention, and high among them was the chance to meet some of the stars of the show. The headline stars at this convention were:

There were also a couple of other "guest stars" at the convention--people that nobody had ever really heard of, but who had some passing association with the show or the first movie (which had just premiered six months earlier):

Needless to say, I got autographs (from the first three...not the other two). I picked up a book called Trek or Treat at some point before the convention. It is a book full of black-and-white pictures from the original series with "funny" captions. (They were funny at the time...not so much anymore.). Anyway, I had the stars sign on pages where their pictures appeared. It became my "official" autograph book during my early convention years.

Check the Convention Highlights section for more on my encounters with the stars.

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Convention Highlights

Honestly, there are so many highlights from Starbase Baltimore that they defy listing with mere bullet points. So every one gets its own sub-section.

Rap Session with the Stars

Probably part of the fun of this convention was being 15 years old and having no adult supervision. My friends and I spent a lot of time wandering the halls of the Hunt Valley Inn (which seemed a lot bigger back then...). Thinking back, it seems like we spent hours just sightseeing--both in the convention areas and on the guest floors.

It was on one of our visits to the latter that my friend Bob and I were wandering down a hallway and came to a double-door that was being guarded by two people with convention badges. We were curious and we asked what was happening inside. We were told that there was an invitation-only "rap session" with the stars happening inside. Bob and I weren't on the invitation list, but we asked if we could go in. The guards said that they weren't supposed to let us, but not everyone had shown up and it was about to start, so...sure!

So, Bob and I entered a suite where about a dozen other fans were already sitting in the living room area on couches and on the floor. We sat down, and moments later George Takei walked in. He sat down, talked about Star Trek a bit, and answered questions for a half hour or so. He was very friendly and chatty (more on that later).

Next, Mark Leonard came out. He wasn't so keen on talking about Star Trek. Remember, this was seven years before Next Generation, and the first movie had just finished its run, so it wasn't really "cool" for "serious actors" to be enthusiastic about Star Trek. This begs the question of why Mr. Leonard showed up at the convention. At any rate, the fans tried to ask him about Star Trek, and received terse answers at best. Finally, Mr. Leonard said, "Let's talk about something else. I wasn't just on Star Trek. I've done many other wonderful things." The crowd wasn't really interested, though. He left shortly thereafter.

Next up was Jesco von Puttkamer. Despite the fans' obvious interest in space, they didn't really seem to know what to ask an honest to god rocket scientist. He wasn't there for long.

Finally, Walter Koenig came in. He was initially the opposite of George Takei--very quiet and reserved. But, once the fans started talking to him, he got more and more animated and turned out to be just as nice (if not nearly so outgoing) as George Takei. My friend Bob and I asked him about how he developed his Russian accent (Bob and I were in the same Russian class in school). We even criticized the accent a bit--in a good-natured way. He took it well.

On the way out, I asked Walter Koenig if he'd be interested in reading some of the sci-fi scripts I had written in junior high school (I still have them--blatant Trek rip-offs, but I thought they were great at the time). He let me down easy.

This was easily one of the most memorable convention experiences in a convention that was full of memorable experiences.

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Close Encounters with George Takei

No. It's not what you're thinking. Stop that.

As I said earlier, George Takei is a really friendly, outgoing guy. Of all of the stars I've ever met in person, he has to be the nicest, most genuine person. When he talked in front of a crowd, it was obvious that he wasn't just there to cash in on his Star Trek fame. He was there because he loved to be there. He really enjoyed hanging out with the fans. Of course, anyone can come off as nice in a public setting. But you really find out what a person is like when you meet them one-on-one.

Turns out that happened twice at Starbase Baltimore.

The first time, I was riding an elevator alone (no doubt returning from one of my exploration junkets, since I was coming down from the third floor). The elevator stopped on the second floor, and in walks George Takei. Now, I have always hated those gushing fans who drool all over a star and make a nuisance of themselves, so I decided that the best thing for me to do if I wanted to maintain my dignity was to say nothing.

The elevator started moving. I stood there, wearing my convention badge proudly on my Superman t-shirt trying (without much success, I suspect) not to look like a total geek. George Takei turns to me, looks at my shirt, and says hello, and then says, "You know, I once ran a marathon with someone who wore a full Superman costume." I stammered something in reply, and we chatted about his marathon for the 45 seconds or so that it took for the elevator to reach the lobby. When the doors opened, George said, "Well, it's been nice talking to you!" and went on his way.

I was very impressed at how normal a guy he was, and was quick to tell all of my friends about our epic conversation.

The second encounter was on the last day of the convention. They were closing down the dealer's room and everything was over. Bob and I were waiting for whoever was picking us up that day to pick us up, and Bob was munching on Fritos. While we were standing in the hallway, George Takei walked into the men's room. Jokingly, I said to Bob that George Takei was a nice guy and that he (Bob) should offer him some Fritos or something.

Not one to turn down a dare, Bob waited until George came out of the restroom, walked over to him and said, "Hi, Mr. Takei! Want some Fritos?" George turned around, smiled, and said, "Thank you! You're very kind!" He then proceeded to reach in the bag and grab a huge handful of Fritos. He walked away across the lobby, munching them.

No big deal in either case...but to a couple of 15 year old Star Trek fans, it was. And it definitely made a lasting impression about what a cool guy George Takei is.

Maybe, subconsciously, that's why one of the few voices I imitate well is his...

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The Costume Party Play

Every day, they posted sheets with the day's events all over the convention. My friend John and I were looking at one of these one day, and we saw that they were having tryouts for parts in a play that was going to be performed the next night at the costume party. The "play" was actually the bar fight scene from the episode The Trouble With Tribbles. John said he wanted to try out to be a Klingon, and he convinced me to go along.

When I got there, there were a bunch of people trying out. Like John, I was really only there to be a Klingon extra. But, when they cast the part of Scotty, it was obvious that most people thought the guy who had been picked sucked. John kept nudging me and saying that my Scottish accent was way better, and I should try out to be Scotty. So I did. As I recall, the guy who was originally cast as Scotty was something of a jerk that was already well-known around the convention. After my audition (the other guy was kind of surly about the fact that I did audition), whoever was in charge had the two of us turn around and by a show of hands, they voted on who got to be Scotty. I won by a landslide. Jerk-guy got to be Kirk. (We carried the performance through to the follow-up scene where Kirk angrily interrogates the people who were involved in the fight.)

That night, I studied the lines from the scene until I knew them cold. We rehearsed the next afternoon and found out two things. First, the play would be performed in front of the stars (scary). Second, the fist fight from the scene was to be replaced by a pie fight (fun).

So, the costume party started, and we did our little performance. It went swimmingly. I got to throw the first pie at the lead Klingon (played by a hot girl who was dressed as an Orion slave girl). Chekov was also female--played by Gail Standish (who I got to be friends with).

The only star who showed up that night was Walter Koenig, and he got a huge kick out of the performance.

In retrospect, it was a pretty bold move for me--I tend to be very shy by nature. But the feeling of camaraderie at Star Trek conventions seems to bring even the most diehard introverts out of their shell. And I had a blast.

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The Phaser Battle

I am proud to say that I participated in the epic event that caused the Hunt Valley Inn to institute a "no phaser battle" policy for all future conventions.

The Starbase Baltimore phaser battle was an after-hours event where about 60 people--divided into two teams--armed themselves with fake phasers, ray guns, blasters, and other sci-fi weaponry and hunted each other all over the hotel. There were no boundaries. There were referees...but they were never anywhere to be found.

The rules were simple: hunt down and kill everyone on the other team. The weapons, for the most part, didn't do anything. Basically, you just went "bzzzzt...bzzzt" while pointing your weapon of choice at the enemy, and the enemy was supposed to drop dead. Everything was done on the honor system--which meant that "bzzzzt...bzzzt" was competing with "nuh uh...you missed" for the most frequently uttered phrase in the game.

So the teams were set, and the referees gave us a time period during which we were supposed to spread out. Then, the battle began. Now, keep in mind that this was a fairly sizeable hotel...not huge, but big enough to be host to more guests and events than just the Star Trek convention. In other words, in addition to the 60 or so crazed phaser-armed humans and near-humans running around the hotel, there were also "normal" guests. And, as it turns out, a high school prom.

Did I mention that there were no boundaries?

Long story short, here are the highlights:

So, as you can probably tell, the Starbase Baltimore phaser battle was, in essence, a bunch of uncontrollable geeks who were set loose amidst normal folk. The next night's battle was restricted to the ground floor--no guest floors, no ballrooms.

After that convention, such games were strictly forbidden at the Hunt Valley Inn.

Oh...as a side note, Bob also purchased a phaser water pistol in the dealer's room (although he wasn't in the phaser battle as I recall...). He loaded his one day, and shot it at a light above an elevator on one of the guest floors. The light exploded. We ran.

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The Trivia Contest

After my stellar showing on Star Trek Day at the library, I was psyched...and a little scared...to take on a big crowd of fellow geeks at the convention. There turned out to be around 250 contestants in the contest, and (as I recall) they had to spread it out over a couple of sessions.

Everyone stood in a long line stretching to the back of the huge ballroom. One by one, the contestants took the stage. They stepped to the microphone, and the guy in charge read the question. The contestant answered and then either got back in line or walked away in abject defeat. The contest was triple-elimination--which meant that you could get two questions wrong, but if you go a third one wrong you were out.

I got my first two questions wrong.

Needless to say, I was really bummed and I expected to be eliminated on my third trip to the stage. But then the Trek trivia that was rattling around in my brain finally started clicking, and I hit my stride. The line got shorter and shorter, and I just kept getting my questions right. I was on a roll!

Finally, it got down to five of us. We rotated through several increasingly difficult questions, and all of us kept answering correctly. Finally, they got the five of us on stage and started digging through trivia books to find questions that would finally trip us up.

The one that killed me was quoting a headline that had been on Spock's tricorder screen for about a second and a half in City on the Edge of Forever--the headline proclaiming Edith Keeler's death. I dug deep, and said "Social Worker Dies." The actual headline was "Social Worker Killed."

That one word took me down. But, even today, I can brag that I came in third out of over 250 in a Star Trek trivia contest. Of course that was back in the days when there were only 78 episodes and one movie. But still...

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New Friends

Like I said, I'm shy by nature--and back in 1980, I would shrink away from attention until I became invisible. I have never made friends easily...but at this particular convention, I managed to make two new friends who I stayed in touch with (for a while at least) after the convention ended.

The first of the two was Gail Standish. Gail played Chekov in the costume party play. I honestly don't remember if I met her at the play rehearsal or if I met her earlier than that, but we hung out for a bit at the convention. I remember that I found her very attractive--although for the life of me I can barely remember what she looks like today.

The other friend I made was Strick Bonner. Strick was an outgoing guy who was into gaming and into Star Trek and into The Who. I cannot for the life of me remember how Strick and I met at the convention, but I stayed in touch with him for a long time afterward.

I exchanged letters with Gail on and off after the convention, and with Strick for years afterward. (For those of you who are too young to remember such primitive correspondence--many years pre-e-mail--we used to call this "being pen-pals." )

Eventually, I had Strick and Gail over to my parents house for a pool party. Strick (who also found Gail very attractive--it was usually the main topic of his letters) was thrilled that he got to see Gail in a bathing suit, and thanked me profusely as I recall.

After the pool party, I lost touch with Gail. Strick fell of the radar for a while as well...but I ran into him again in college at Towson University. We ended up playing Dungeons and Dragons and other games together throughout college, then lost touch again.

Hey--Strick and Gail! If either of you guys should happen to read this, drop me a line. We have a lot of catching up to do!

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Other Stuff

All of those were the major highlights of the convention as I remember them. Like I said, there were a lot of things that made that first con stand out in my mind as the best one. Some of the other stuff that made Starbase Baltimore great included:

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