http://caldwellian.wordpress.com/2008/08/18/thirty-things-you-learn-from-watching-current-british-sci-fi-sci-fi/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/dec/07/forrest-ackerman-science-fiction-obituary

The Battle Hymn of the Fanation:  the National Fanthem
by Petrov Pederson aka Con Pderson
originally published in THE OUTLANDER #2, May, 1949
(with thanks to Len & June Moffatt for finding this)

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Fan.
He is trampling out the places with Amazing on the stand.
His fantasy collection is the greatest in the land.
Forrest J goes marching on.

Forry, Forry hallelujah
Forry, Forry hallelujah
Forry, Forry hallelujah
Forrest J goes marching on.

Without a mind to guide them and without a guide to spare,
Dick Shaver takes the low road while Ray Palmer tears his hair,
They have felt the mighty vengeance of the Weaver in his lair.
Forrest J goes marching on.

CHORUS

While New Hampshire echoes wildly in the city of LA
With people owing money and without a dime to paym
Their Ackerman will reign until their hair is old and gray.
Forrest J goes marching on.

CHORUS

With Laney in the back seat and with Burbee cranking reams,
Our Ackerman is victim of a host of ghastly schemes,
Tho they think that they will conquer, he will chase them in their dreams.
Forrest J goes marching on.

CHORUS

In the famous Ackermansion, not a bit of room will show
For books and pics and magazines, both amateur and pro,
Not even for a mirror, just to watch his tendrils grow.
Forrest J goes marching on.

CHORUS

(later added by Ted Johnstone and Rick Sneary, in Zap #1)

We tremble in the presence of fandom’s number one
Lest he loose the fateful lightning of his terrible swift pun
His hoard of imitators will soon be on the run
Forrest J goes marching on

CHORUS

We’s the agent for a host of sci-fi writers near and far
His action can decide between a failure and a star
And woe betide his clients if he’s feeling under par
Forrest J goes marching on

CHORUS

In Hollywood he’s an expert on their alien planet scenes
He has seen them all a million times in all his fannish dreams
In his eyes you can see the distant future brightly gleam
Forrest J goes marching on

CHORUS

and back to Pederson’s original for the last verse

When Atomigeddon’s over and the sweeping up’s begun,
When Man deserts the planet and humanity is done,
In science fiction fandom he will still be Number One.
Forrest J goes marching on.

CHORUS

On January 20, 2009, Barack Hussein Obama II will take office as he 44th President of the United States.

That day, the day after the Martin Luther King holiday, providence willing, Ron, my sister and I will be in the crowd for Inauguration Day. Hopefully we’ll be able to get close enough to see, through the tears.

It’s hard to choke back the tears now, because my mom and dad did not survive to see this day.

I’m emotionally drained. It still feels like a dream. Truth to tell, I’d long thought that the first African American, or American of African ancestry, to be elected president would be a Centrist Republican like Colin Powell or a woman like Condolezza Rice, had they not tied their fortunes to the Bush administration.

This is breathtaking.

I think I’m going to cry again.

The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

    -- William Butler Yeats