Back in this post, my longtime buddy Scott Shaw! told the story of how for the costume competition of the 1972 World Science-Fiction Convention in Los Angeles, he covered himself with peanut butter and went as "The Turd," a character he'd recently concocted for an underground comic. It's one of those stories that sounds like it couldn't possibly happen but it did, it did. I was there. In fact, I took this photo of Scott clad in a stocking mask, shorts and an awful lot of Skippy Chunky-Style…or whatever brand it was.
During the day at the con, a hat was passed. Folks were asked to put up a few bucks towards the obviously-worthy cause of covering Scott with peanut butter. I tossed in a few though, like the other donors, I didn't believe it would actually happen. I mean, nobody does things like that…right? Then that evening as a group of my friends were heading down in the elevator for the ceremony, we noticed a familiar smell in the air. "What's that odor?" someone asked. It took a few seconds to place it but I think I was the one who uttered — with a gasp of shocked realization — "It's…it's peanut butter." And we all looked at one another in amazement: He really did it?
We could spot traces of Scott's "costume" as we walked towards the ballroom. Here and there on the floor, we'd spot a tiny mound of peanut butter. And about a third of the people we passed had a smear of the stuff on one of their shoulders, having brushed past him. I got there in time to see Scott waddle up to Forrest J Ackerman, extend his arms and say, "Hug me, Forry! I'm a monster!"
The reaction to him was fascinating. The last time I'd been to an s-f convention, the costume event had been the subject of a controversy: Two women had entered without costumes — one wearing nothing, the other wearing darn near nothing. There were folks who'd spent months and mucho dinero designing their costumes…and here they were being upstaged by ladies who'd spent zero dollars and no time. As I explained here, arguments ensued and the judges finally opted to create a new, separate category for nude women.
At the '72 WorldCon, Scott managed to create an even greater argument. From what I could tell, there were some judges who felt that the sheer effort could not be ignored; that it was worthy of some kind of recognition. There were others who felt what Scott had on was not a true costume, and also that he'd caused enough mess that he should not be trophied and therefore approved of. When all the arguing levelled off, the decision was to create a new, separate category for Most Disgusting Costume. Would that Congress could solve the sequester problem with such patient wisdom.
Soon after, some WorldCon committee passed a rule that banned the wearing of edible substances in future costume contests. This struck me as a rather myopic way to prevent the cleaning problems Scott had caused. There was no law preventing you from covering yourself with mud or tar or even feces…but you couldn't cover yourself with a substance that most people love.
Anyway, that's the story. For a few years later, Scott was known to many as "that guy who dressed up in peanut butter." Then he became a very successful, popular cartoonist and now he's "that guy in the Hawaiian shirts who likes to draw Flintstones." I'm not sure it's an improvement in status but it pays better.