Part of A Companion in Zeor
Remembrances, for inclusion, can be e-mailed to Karen MacLEOD
As I remember, Shirley Maiewski was one of the three people most responsible for encouraging me to create and publish that zine. She was always the very soul of patience and kindness to me after we met at ISTC Two in New York City.
When fate saw to it that Showcase was to be, Shirley offered her help -- busy as she was -- by writing of the death of Amanda.
Also, Shirley gave me two manuscripts of a novella she'd been working on for a long time and asked me if she should do something with it. Remember "Mind-Sifter"?
Shirley came all the way from Hatfield, Mass. with two friends one summer to visit me at the Parsonage in Indiana, and it was there that I learned she had an impish sense of humor.
After my marriage ended in divorce, she came to Terre Haute one summer while touring the state with a friend -- a REAL surprise.
Shirley was so busy with Welcommittee that, as she said to me in letters, she had no time to write -- what we all missed.
We couldn't see each other except in letters -- no in-person meetings after my divorce, and her last decade on earth, but Shirley was the only one in fandom who kept me informed of it as it was and is -- until now.
Shirley Maiewski is one of whom they will say:
They broke the mold when she
was created.
Goodbye, Shirley, we will miss you.
Sharon Emily-Marsh
Star Trek Showcase I - IV
At first I knew of Shirley as a name in the many letters Mother received from Trek fans across the country, and later she became a voice on the phone calling to speak to Mother about Trek and about writing. Eventually, however, I got to actually meet this special woman at a Trek convention called Benecia 1976 in Atlanta, because Mother and I stayed in the same hotel room as her, and a lot of fun adventures took place.
Shirley gave me a couple of very special jobs during that convention: to help with the table and show off the ST communicators (and boy, one can get VERY annoyed at that little "wheep-wheep-whip!" sound it would make) and to sell memberships in the James Doohan Aberdeen Pub Club. Thanks to being at that table, one of the local news outlets filmed me demonstrating that communicator.
I also one day got to open the door to our hotel room to find Mr. Doohan standing there, asking to talk to Shirley like it was an everyday occurrance! Shirley was certainly amused at my teenaged attempt to "act cool" when inside I was screaming "IT'S JIMMY!"
Shirley was also so kind and patient, given all the demands on her by Trek fandom. and the Welcommittee, especially at cons. But she always took the time to say "hi," or to listen to story ideas that were zipping around in my head.
As years passed, and my life headed in definite non Trek areas such as real life and a career, I lost touch with a lot of Trek friends, including Shirley. Fortunately, thanks again to Mother, Shirley and I got back in contact with each other, and though the Welcommittee had apparently fallen by the wayside some time ago, and she was in failing health, we still enjoyed a relationship and comradeship via the auspices of the "post awful". She knew and was happy about my marriage and my endeavours in the real world. I was greatly saddened when she was called Home, as she was truly a wonderful lady.
One hears much about how Trek people look out for each other, and accept each other. No one more truly lived this as Shirley did. She knew no enemy. The galaxy is surely a lesser place with her not here.
Return to: The entry page to Shirley Maiewski: A Tribute