Scott Imes, long time science fiction fan and Store Manager for Uncle Hugo's in Minneapolis, MN passed away unexpectedly on December 11, 2001.

Scott was a member of the Minn-STF Board of Directors for many years and Exec of Minicon science fiction convention in the 1980s. He was active in the videotaping various of World Science Fiction conventions over a span of 25 years.

He is survived by longtime companion Margie Lessenger. Scott was 52.

Minneapolis Star-Tribune obituary: http://www.startribune.com/stories/462/895052.html.

Scott was a man of parts, as someone in an O'Brien book might say. He had many varied interests. One of them was Tibetan religious art. Scott insisted that he was not interested in the religion (though he did say that he thought it would be a good thing if more people converted to Buddhism as it was a pacifist religion). He had a large collection of Tibetan drawings. He had been working on identifying the figures depicted for many years.

Some time ago, a restaurant in downtown St. Paul had a fund-raiser for the Tibetan community. There was a "performance" of Tibetan chant. Several of us, including Neil Rest, me, Scott, and Margie went. Before the chanting, the abbot announced that they were also selling T-shirts and you could have one autographed in Tibetan script, by the monk of your choice. I still have my T-shirt, signed by the abbot, I think.

If you know of Scott's passion for autographs, you might be able to guess what happened next. Scott proceeded to get autographs from each of the monks in turn. After working at this very diligently, he discovered that there was one more monk in the room than he had signatures. It was difficult to keep track of who had signed and who hadn't. It would have been difficult if they had written in English; very few of the monks spoke any English at all.

Scott went to talk to the abbot to ask if the abbot could point out the monk whose signature he had not yet obtained. The Abbott spoke very little English, and Scott no Tibetan at all. It was a long conversation, of the type that I have no patience for and which embarrass me dreadfully. Neither Scott nor the abbot looked embarrassed or distressed. They both looked as if they were having a good time. Eventually, the abbot understood what Scott was asking. He called the other monks over, and they all huddled around the T-shirt, trying to sort out who had and hadn't autographed it. Eventually, the missing signature was obtained. Scott was like that. Pleasantly obsessed, interested in detail, polite without being obsequious, and forceful without being hurtful.

Scott had a mission from God: to bring people to the reading of science fiction. I can't remember the number of times a hapless mother came in just to buy her son the latest Star Trek book. It was a rare occasion that she didn't walk out with at least one book for herself, and often additional (better) science fiction for her kid. The depth of Scott's knowledge of the field is hard to describe. He could make recommendations depending on any number of criteria: theme, writing style, plot format, scientific accuracy, and more. He always asked if you were reading something good, and remembered that to pass on to other people. For years, I read what Scott told me to. :-) He was an especial fan of Cordwainer Smith, and he was the one who first gave me Smith to read.

It'll be a strange world without Scott Imes. He was a force for good. He was a man of many parts.

Lydy Nickerson

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An old fannish friend has passed, and the final paragraph to one chapter in KC's 30 year fannish history has now been written. I'm depressed. Another one of us, one of the old MidAmeriCon committee, is gone. It's just too soon. He was a year younger than me.

We first met at the '75 MiniCon where he was single-handedly video taping a lot of the Minicon program using professional video gear--3/4" Beta, just like the big boys used at TV stations. What a concept in fandom! (Video was not yet a part of the fannish lexicon.) It turned out that Scott was not only a fan but was also an audio-visual professional, working for Bloomberg Photo-Sound in Minneapolis. We hit it off immediately, and the germ of an idea began to form while we were hanging out together all weekend long...

Before he became such an integral part of Uncle Hugo's SF Bookstore in Minneapolis, Scott, at the beginning of his fannish career, was a major department head for the Kansas City worldcon, running MidAmeriCon's entire audio-visual division. We worked closely together on MAC for two years on this new, important WorldCon innovation. It was his brainchild, and thanks to him and his dogged dedication and professionalism, worldcon entered the Video Age. In fact, without him, MidAmeriCon wouldn't have had this new capability at all. WorldCon was advanced because of his efforts.

I remember how he trained his large MAC a/v staff through several weekend long "CommuniCons" during MidAmeriCon's organizing period. When MAC finally arrived, KMAC Channel 12 was on the air, the first ever closed-circuit SF/WorldCon broadcast channel. Thanks to Scott, the MidAmeriCon a/v crew were a well-oiled machine when they got to Kansas City, ultimately compiling some 40+ hours of video history of the 34th WorldCon--a first in fandom. I know he worked harder than I did, the chair, at the KC WorldCon, and that's saying quite a lot!

I last saw him (and Margie Lessenger his longtime life companion) at the MidAmeriCon 20th Anniversary reunion in 1996, which was part of ConQuesT 27 here in KC. He was the con's special guest. Following that ConQuesT, we hung out at the house for another day while their car's radiator got repaired. It gave us a chance to catch up on a whole host of things since it had been almost a decade since we had seen each other. The three of us had a great time together, talking about the glory days, talking about science fiction, talking about life. I'm now very glad we had that time together.

I just can't believe he's gone. It's just too soon. Just what is it about us, boomer generation fandom, that makes so many pass on so prematurely? (shaking head in dismay)

Ken Keller

Posted December 13, 2001