The TransAtlantic Fan Fund

All the Past TAFF Races • Latest Printed Reports • Sister funds: GUFF and DUFF

From the TAFF ballot form: The Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund was created in 1953 for the purpose of providing funds to bring well-known and popular [science fiction] fans familiar to those on both sides of the ocean across the Atlantic. Since that time TAFF has regularly brought North American fans to European conventions and European fans to North American conventions. TAFF exists solely through the support of fandom. The candidates are voted on by interested fans all over the world, and each vote is accompanied by a donation [...] These votes, and the continued generosity of fandom, are what make TAFF possible. (See ballot link below for more.)

TAFF Archive

    Current Administrators
  • Europe: Bridget Bradshaw, 103 Rustat Road, Cambridge, CB1 3QG, UK. Email taffbug at googlemail com.
  • North America: Chris Garcia, 962 West Weddell Dr. #15, Sunnyvale, CA 94089, USA. Email garcia at computerhistory dot org.


TAFF site Web

TAFF Reports in Printed Form

  • Tobes Taff Ting, extracted by torture from Tobes Valois at the 2005 UK Eastercon and published April 2005. Available as described here, including PayPal option. Best to send a cheque for £3.50 to T Valois, 20 Bakers Lane, Woodston, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, PE2 9QW. Available in the USA from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • WorldConNomicon, James Bacon's lightning 2004 report (40pp A4, small print with many photographs) is available from him: £5/Euro7/$9 inclusive of postage, to 211 Blackhorse Ave, Dublin 7, Ireland. For those on the UK mainland, Claire Brialey adds: "We have a stock of James Bacon's TAFF trip reports here, for easier payment and posting to people who want them in the UK. The same price of five quid including p&p applies (cheques can be made payable either to me or to James himself) ... 59 Shirley Road, Croydon, Surrey CR0 7ES." Available in the USA from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • New Routes in America, Peter Roberts's at-last-completed 1977 trip report -- now running to 30,000 words, with copious cartoons and five new concluding chapters written in 1999 -- was published in December 1999; A4 softbound, 32pp small print plus covers, prelims and binder. Available post free at £6 from Dave Langford, 94 London Road, Reading, RG1 5AU, England ... actually it's out of print, but I'll consider a reprint edition if there's sufficient UK interest. Meanwhile, Jerry Kaufman has reissued New Routes in America in the USA: $10 postpaid within North America, from Jerry at 3522 NE 123rd St, Seattle, WA 98125, USA. All profits to TAFF. [Currently OUT OF PRINT.]
  • Snufkin Goes West, Maureen Kincaid Speller's collected `Notes from the TAFF Trail' -- not the full trip report, which is to follow -- has a tasty Sue Mason cover; 10pp A4; £1.50 (cheques to Maureen Speller) or $3 (cheques to Roger Robinson) from Fishlifter Press, 14 Northway Rd, Croydon, Surrey, CR0 6JE.
  • Have Bag, Will Travel is the 1996 TAFF trip report by Martin Tudor, who published it while still in office (it takes the average Langford five years, and the average Hansen ten). £5 post free from Martin Tudor at 22 Ravensbourne Gro, Willenhall, W.Midlands, WV13 1HX, or from Mark Plummer at London pub meetings. Available in the USA from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • The Tudor Dynasty (Bid Zine), Martin Tudor. Available from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • On The TAFF Trail, Rob Hansen's 1984 trip report. Available from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • The TransAtlantic Hearing Aid, Dave Langford's 1980 trip report, was published by Rob Jackson's Inca Press in 1985 and remains available from Dave Langford, 94 London Road, Reading, Berks, RG1 5AU. This is a 74pp (plus card covers) A5 booklet illustrated with splendid cartoons by Atom, Jim Barker, Brad Foster, Alexis Gilliland, Rob Hansen, Stu Shiffman, Dan Steffan, Taral, and D. West. £5/$10 post free. Proceeds to TAFF. Available in the USA from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • The Moffat House Abroad, Len & June Moffatt's 1973 trip report. Available from Suzanne Tompkins -- see her newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.
  • Colonial Excursion, Ron Bennett's 1958 trip report (published 1961), was available from him until his death in 2006: it is expected that his son will pass the remaining copies, if any, to the US TAFF administrator. 93pp duplicated UK quarto (10" x 8") plus card covers. £5/$10 post free.

Announcements & Updates

19 December 2008 Chris Garcia writes: "I think it's time to open up my TAFF Report to the masses for free. So if you find the time, just remove the password protection and let 'er go!" Front page now freely accessible here.

1 December 2008 By popular demand, here too is a PDF version of the 2009 Westbound TAFF Ballot.

26 November 2008 On this site at last: the 2009 Westbound TAFF Ballot (HTML).

13 November 2008 Correction! The TAFF candidates are in fact Steve Green and Tom Womack. Updated LJ announcement.

6 November 2008 Candidates for the 2009 westbound race are John Coxon and Steve Green. Preliminary LJ announcement.

24 September 2008 The second issue of Chris Garcia's newsletter President Taff's Bathtub.

26 August 2008 The westbound TAFF race from Europe to the 2009 Worldcon (Anticipation in Montréal, Canada) is announced.

19 June 2008 Today's amazing double-bill: Suzanne Tompkins's fifth and final TAFF newsletter, and Chris Garcia's first.

10 April 2008 Chris Garcia, man of dynamism, apologizes for the delay in sending Rockets Across the Waters, the complete report on his March 2008 TAFF trip. There is a copy on this site (7.92Mb PDF), but for the time being Chris has requested that access should be reserved for TAFF supporters whom he'll provide with the login ID and password. Ask him: garcia at computerhistory dot org.

10 February 2008 Here is Suzanne Tompkins' latest TAFF newsletter.

6 February 2008 Latest voting figures now added to the Big List, here. • First word of Chris Garcia's itinerary: "He reports that so far he is: arriving on the 15th [March] and leaving on the 30th; traveling to various parts of the UK including Croydon on the 15th/16th, North London for the 17th/18th, and then to Eastercon. After the con, he is planning to visit folks in Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds."

22 January 2008 Our TAFF administrators still haven't managed to release the detailed voting figures. Suzanne Tompkins has stated that Chris Garcia's win was "on the first ballot with 62.7% of the total combined NA/Europe votes. No other candidate received 20% of this combined vote." • Peter Sullivan felt that a link from here to his "Chris for TAFF" site would be inappropriate while the race was still on: but now here it is in all its glory. Just for the record....

November 2007 The winner of the 2008 TAFF race is Chris Garcia -- see announcement.

September 2007 Suzanne Tompkins's latest TAFF newsletter: Two-Year Taff-Life #3.

August 2007 The 2008 TAFF race is on, with four NA candidates -- Chris Barkley, Linda Deneroff, Chris Garcia and Christian McGuire -- and here's the ballot. • Although this site has a policy of HTML documents only, there is a demand for downloadable PDFs of this ballot. Duly added, with much grumbling: European A4 and US Letter formats.

Peter Sullivan has rekeyed the relevant parts of Shelby Vick's fanzine confusion 12 (1952), covering the original Walt Willis trip fund and its final accounts. Later: Peter has also rekeyed the missing issues of Jean Gomoll's newsletter Taffiles, so the set on this site is now complete. What a hero!

July 2007 The 2008 nominations deadline has been extended to 31 July -- see announcement.

April 2007 Nominations are now open for the 2008 race -- see announcement.

November 2006 The 31 October cancellation of the 2007 Liverpool Eastercon makes the current TAFF race a little problematic. Later: as a result, this TAFF race has been postponed to 2008 -- see announcement.

October 2006 The 2007 eastbound race is on, with candidates Chris Garcia and Mary Kay Kare. Here is the official announcement and here is the ballot form.

September 2006 Another announcement from US administrator Suzanne Tompkins. The current nominations deadline is extended to 30 September 2006, and consideration is being given to the possibility of a TAFF trip later in 2007 should the UK Eastercon be cancelled.

August 2006 Robert Lichtman unearthed Wally Weber's "TAFF report synopsis", briefly describing his 1964 trip.
• US administrator Suzanne Tompkins sends digital text of her second newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #2 (published in July).

July 2006 Necronomigone is a TAFF newsletter "Ghostwritten by Claire Brialey & Mark Plummer" for James Bacon, outgoing European administrator. With accounts, statistics, and the names of all the voters in this year's race -- just as it ought to be. Thanks to Claire for providing a digital copy.
• The Japan Expeditionary Travel Scholarship (JETS) is a one-off fund running from Europe to the 2007 Japanese Worldcon.

June 2006 Suzanne Tompkins announces the 2007 eastbound TAFF race.
• Thanks to Rob Jackson for completing the transcription of Dave Langford's 1980 trip report, whose full text can now be read on this site: The TransAtlantic Hearing Aid.

May 2006 The TAFF winner is announced: Bridget "Bug" Bradshaw. Her victory statement appears here, and her trip plans are developing here.
• Meet the Candidates: new TAFF pitches written for Chunga by all three 2006 contenders.
• The plokta.con pi TAFF event announcement is now updated with a provisional programme for the day.

April 2006 James Bacon sends an official announcement of the deadline change and TAFF event as below.
• There will be an informal TAFF event (plokta.con pi) in London on 27 May at the Horseshoe Inn, 26 Melior Street, London, SE1 3QP (not far from London Bridge Station). 12 noon - 12 midnight. £3 reg, students £2.50; all proceeds to fan funds. A mini-convention on the TAFF deadline day, at which the 2006 TAFF results will be announced. Please note that the voting deadline has been brought forward by three hours to 9pm rather than midnight (British Summer Time) on the 27th, to allow vote-counting and announcement at this event.
• Steve Stiles stunned the fannish world: "This is to announce that I've finished my TAFF Report, which concludes with the 145th chapter. Entitled 'Harrison Country: The Cutty Sark Affair, or TAFF Report At Sea,' it will appear in the next CHUNGA. • Like previous chapters, this is a historically accurate document, although Phyllis Eisenstein mentions that I left out the wooden women -- story of my life, I'm afraid."

January 2006 Link added to Shelby Vick's fanzine confusion 12 (1952) -- now on line at efanzines.com -- with much about the original Walt Willis trip fund and its final accounts.

December 2005 US administrator Suzanne Tompkins has published her first newsletter, Two Year TAFF-Life #1.

October 2005 The 2006 TAFF Ballot is officially released, with candidates as below. Here's a PDF version.

September 2005 Candidates for the 2006 westbound TAFF race to LAcon are, reportedly, Bridget Bradshaw, ½r Cruttenden, and Mike `Sparks' Rennie. (Fran Dowd had hoped to stand but withdrew for health reasons.)

August 2005 Suzle Tompkins attended Interaction, the Glasgow Worldcon, as TAFF delegate, and Damien Warman and Juliette Woods as GUFF delegates.

July 2005. Randy Byers published his third and final TAFF newsletter: The Weekly TAFF News #3, July 2005 • Bridget Bradshaw and 1/2r Cruttenden intend to stand for the next westbound TAFF race, to LAcon in 2006. • Bridget's Stakhanovite frenzy continues, with the rekeying of chapters 2 and 3 of Dave Langford's report -- now almost complete in digital form!

June 2005. SCIFI announced its donation of $1,000 to TAFF to mark the publication of James Bacon's and Tobes Valois's trip reports: many thanks! • Mark Plummer sent digital text of Maureen Kincaid Speller's newsletter Taffkin's Bum: #2, Autumn 1999 and #3, Easter 2000. • Bridget Bradshaw heroically rekeyed chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7 of Dave Langford's report, whose full digital version is under construction (rekeying help also volunteered by Mary Kay Kare). Further wanted newsletters now supplied by Robert Lichtman.

May 2005. Robert Lichtman sent his 1989 TAFF Report in Progress. • Damien Warman and Juliette Woods are the 2005 winners of GUFF. • Rob Hansen sent his complete 1984 trip report On The TAFF Trail in electronic form for the site, and Robert Lichtman provided a copy of Ken Bulmer's hefty 1958 newsletter TAFF Steam -- plus the last missing ballot forms. As a result, all past TAFF ballots from 1954 to the present can now be read on line. The wording changed a great deal before settling to something like the modern version in 1971.

April 2005. Thanks to Earl Kemp, Rob Hansen, Robert Lichtman and Paul Vincent for their mighty efforts (as detailed here) to expand our collection of on-line TAFF newsletters. • Suzanne (Suzle) Tompkins won the 2005 TAFF race from North America to the 2005 Worldcon in Glasgow. See the official announcement with voting figures. • Speaking of which, the long list of All the Past TAFF Races now includes tables of votes for most past TAFF elections -- more to be added when traced. Similar tables appear in All the Past GUFF Races (with much-appreciated help from Irwin Hirsh and his Australian Fan Funds Page). • TAFF thanks Joe Siclari and FANAC for donating $200 to the fund to reward the publication of James Bacon's and Peter Weston's reports.

March 2005. James Bacon has completed his TAFF report WorldConNomicon (40pp A4, small print with many photographs), with a "prototype" available at Corflu in February and the finished version to be launched at Eastercon 2005. Also at Eastercon, James had a cunning plan for Tobes Valois's TAFF report ... and did indeed successfully torture the report out of Tobes. See under TAFF Reports below.

All the Past TAFF Races • Latest Printed Reports • GUFF and DUFF