The Journeymen - Part One
There is not room in any history to detail the deeds and acts of every single person who ever took part in the events that shaped that history. Who remembers the name of the woman who made Hitler a cup of tea, just before he gave his great speech in Berlin? (And no, it wasn't Mrs Doyle, neither the PM7 one nor the Father Ted one
) The Romans are famous for laying out nice straight roads, but who can actually name the poor bastards who spent hours and hours of their lives making these roads?
So then before we delve into the histories of the people who if you like became 'famous' - or infamous even - in CMS history, lets take a little moment to pay tribute to those who played as much smaller role, but nevertheless a role that was important enough to be at least minorly remembered. I have absolutely no idea how many people have ever posted anything on the CMS/FMS forums - no doubt Raptor does though - and most of them have no chance of ever appearing in any history at all, they are the ones who not simply make the tea of Hitler, but in fact who made the tea bags. No-one cares about them. Sorry, but its a fact of life.
Yet above that, but not quite at the level of deserving a huge slice of a mention in any great detail, are a band of people that have nevertheless been around and done enough to at least deserve a small mention here, and so thats what they will get - a small mention.
Harlequin was a Dane, the Great Dane we called him - though that girl in Torquay kind of shattered that myth. Harlequin was not an overly successful writer, he never won any awards and for the life of me I cannot think of one of his stories. He did however, and to his great credit, travel all the way to Torquay from Denmark for the I believe 2nd official CMS 'meetup' around early 2003. In fact it was so early there was nothing open but that is indeed another story.
Chris Boston The most famous thing that Chris - one of the early CMS 'Kiddies Team' - achieved as that he, for some reason, liked to dress up as a girl as pose as one on the forum, hence his nickname 'Christina'. Chris though was a fine kid, who was more than happy to ride that particular joke and was also one of those so easily sucked into the CMS 'Jokes & Japes' that from time to time filled the board with mirth.
Noelspurs Noel was another of the Kids. Noel's claim to fame is twofold, that he tried and failed on numerous occasions to create an alternative to the UCMS, and also that he is one of the few people who, to the best of my knowledge, tried to keep copies of, if not every story, at least the ones that mattered and at one point he even had a website dedicated to that.
Displaced_Seagul It could be argued that d_s deserves a higher place in the whole scheme of things. A hugely talented writer, he could write reams and reams of pages and still not bore you to tears. A complex personality, d_s eventually stopped writing and went more and more to the 'OTF' where he, for whatever reason, tended to be picked on by the 'enlightened' members of that forum. Displaces was a regular CMSer for a fair while, and whilst he did contribute much, he simply doesn't make it into my book of legends by a hair's breadth. He also happens to share the same birthday as me, albeit 20 years later.
Avatar Another Scandinavian, this time from Norway, Avatar had the reputation of being the 'man who sits on the fence'. A member of the UCMS from start to finish, it is an absolute travesty that Avatar never won a CMS award and you would have to think that someday someone will realise we miss him and vote accordingly.
Trigz Another Norwegian, Trigz was a fairly controversial figure in the early days of the forums. A decent enough writer but real life eventually got in the way and Trigz ran off to get married and never came back. Another who really is missed more than we think.
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