Eric L. Watts
| Fan | |
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| Name: | Eric L. Watts |
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| Fandoms: | Star Trek |
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| URL: | USS Republic NCC-1371: Eric L. Watts, Archived version |
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Eric L. Watts is a longtime and prominent Star Trek fan in the southeastern United States.
Watts began watching Star Trek in the early 1970s after school when he was in junior high school. His first exposure to organized fandom was when he attended the Star Trek and Science Fiction Mini-Convention in January 1978, when he was a junior in high school. Two and a half years later, in August 1980, he founded the United Federation of Trekkers (UFT), a Star Trek fan club in Columbia, South Carolina, and served as its president until 1988. During that time, Watts was also the editor and publisher of the UFT's various publications, including its monthly newsletters, Captain's Quarters (1980 to 1984) and Auxiliary Control (1986 to 1988), as well as five science fiction and fantasy-themed fanzines with a heavy emphasis on Star Trek: Star Sector One (1980), a one-shot, and four bimonthly issues of Transwarp (1985).
Watts was a member of the amateur press association Imaginapa (formerly Junior Apa-5) from 1980 to 2002 and served as its Central Mailer from 1983 to 1988, 1991 to 1997, and 2000 to 2002. In 1988, with the support of the Imaginapa membership, Watts launched the publication of The New Moon Directory (NMD), an apazine resource intended to replace and resume the purpose of the defunct South of the Moon, from which NMD's name was derived. Watts edited and published ten roughly annual issues of the New Moon Directory from 1988 to 1998.
Watts joined Dragon*Con in 1993 as their first Director of Star Trek Programming. He created and ran the very successful "TrekTrak" from 1993 to 2009. During that time, he created the Miss Klingon Empire Beauty Pageant in 1999 which would go on to be one of Dragon*Con's largest annual events; The TrekTrak Show in 2005 for which the ballroom stage was set up like a late-night talk show and Watts personally interviewed the celebrity guests à la Johnny Carson and David Letterman; and the Rainbow Flag Party, a late-night dance party devoted to the GLBT community, partly to protest Dragon*Con's longtime refusal to create a track of programming dedicated to gay elements, themes and celebrities in popular culture.
In 2003, Watts published Star Sector Two, a Star Trek fanzine comprised of previously unpublished material originally submitted to the UFT for publication in 1981 and several reprints of material originally published in Transwarp (1985). Although all the material was collected for or previously published by the UFT, which had long since disbanded, Watts published the fanzine as a fundraiser for TrekTrak.
In 2006, Watts was elected "Commanding Officer" (i.e., president) of the USS Republic NCC-1371, the Star Trek fan club and chapter of STARFLEET International chartered in Atlanta, Georgia. He has served the Republic for more than a decade and has been reelected to subsequent two-year terms five times. During that time, he has served as editor and publisher of two club newsletters: the quarterly paper-and-ink Sovereign Star (2007-2008) and the monthly e-newsletter The Republiqué (since 2008). Both newsletters have received multiple "Best Newsletter of the Year" awards from STARFLEET Region 2. Watts' current term as CO is due to expire in December 2018.
In 2011, Watts launched Treklanta (previously TrekTrax Atlanta), an annual Star Trek convention based in Atlanta, Georgia, that places special emphasis on fan-based events, activities, programming and productions.
In February 2010, following his departure from Dragon*Con, several members of the USS Republic encouraged Watts to continue his service to fandom by launching a new convention in Atlanta, which had not hosted an exclusive, Star Trek-only convention since 1993. Pledging their support, a core group of Republic members immediately began laying the groundwork for a new convention and three months later, on Memorial Day Weekend, Watts issued a press release announcing TrekTrax Atlanta. In October 2014, Watts announced on the convention's Facebook page that the name of the convention was being changed to "Treklanta" to make it "easier to pronounce, easier to spell and hopefully easier to remember" and because "it more clearly and more succinctly conveys the essence of what our convention is all about." The first three conventions, held from 2011 to 2013, were devoted exclusively to the Star Trek franchise. In 2014, the convention expanded its focus to include other space opera franchises such as Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Firefly and Babylon 5. In 2017, after three years of including other major space opera franchises in its programming, Treklanta returned to its original focus on "All Star Trek, All the Time." The highlight of each year's Treklanta convention is the Miss Klingon Empire Beauty Pageant, which Watts took with him when he left Dragon*Con. In 2015, Watts launched the first Independent Star Trek Fan Film Awards, created to recognize outstanding achievements in excellence among Star Trek fan films released the previous calendar year. The awards ceremony is held at Treklanta and Watts serves as one of the Masters of Ceremonies of the event.
Watts was interviewed about Star Trek live on CNN Today on CNN International in 2006, was featured in the Emmy Award-winning documentary Four Days at Dragon*Con in 2010 and served as a production assistant on the set of Star Trek: New Voyages for the episode "World Enough and Time" starring George Takei in 2006. He played Korgoth, the Klingon bartender, in the Project: Potemkin vignettes "Closing Time" in 2013, "Ladies Night Out" in 2014 and "Room Service" in 2015; and a dancing Klingon in the "We Are Klingon" music video on YouTube, released in 2013.
Watts is a two-time honors graduate of The Art Institute of Atlanta, holding Associate in Arts degrees in Visual Communications and Web Site Design & Administration.