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Fanfile, issue 1, February 1942
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FANFILE #1 Published at COVENTRY. Arthur Louis Joquel(?) II, Editor. February, 1942. No Charge. Box 5451, Metro Station, Los Angeles, California. All distribution rights reserved. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Midwinter in Missouri! Tune 1928. And in a drug store a brightly colored magazine cover has attracted the attention of an eight year old boy - a boy who has spent most of his time before that reading H. G. Wells' "Outline of History", the glacial periods are as close to him as his everyday life. and here was a magazine in which these things could come to life! Somehow the twenty five cents for the magazine was managed and the treasure taken home. Verne was Verne, and Wells was Wells, and a man name Gernsback wrote amusing extensions of the fabulous adventures of Baron Munchausen. But none of these had the horrible appeal of a story called "Revolt of the Pedestrians" by a Dr. Keller. And when the lad moved to Washington, D.C., that one story was carefully removed from the magazine and taken along. After almost two years spent in Washington in general, and the Smithsonian Institution and the Library of Congress in particular, return again to Missouri and in the same drugstore the boy, now approaching eleven, finds another magazine, this one smaller and less portentious, but with a story full of promise in it - "Mura of the Moon". This ran for four issues, and in the fourth one another story started - this one about the Mayas and a crew of Vikings that landed in Yucatan. By the time this finished I (for I was the young man in question) had acquired a definite taste for fantastic stories in general. Score for AMAZING STORIES and ARGOSY! We moved again to Washington, and it was there that I read Captain Meeks "Drums of the Tapajos", Williamson's "Prince of Space" and Bridge's "Via the Time Accelerator" (which proved time travelling to be practical, as far as I was concerned), and Olson's "Men Who Annexed the Moon". In 1932 I read "Troyana" and in WONDER STORIES a two part serial called "The Final Was" by Carl Spohr, which was one of the finest arguments for pacifism that I had read up till that time. While still in Missouri, the comic strip "Buck Rogers" had started in the daily papers and "Buddy Deering" in the Sunday ones. I read and saved them, and even intended to try to build a rocket ship! (POPULAR MECHANICS was giving rockets quite a build up then, and it really seemed absurdly simple.) The rocket plane never materialized but we did develop a blunderbuss-like flame gun, which took ten minutes to stoke up for ten seconds of flame. Disappointed at its lack of practicality, we discarded it. In 1932 we spent the summer at a YMCA camp near Washington, and found full opportunity to put our stfictional bent to work in a play, which was a mad mixture of Buck Rogers, "Drums of Tapajos" and "Troyana", and anything else we could cook up. No individual lines were written for the actors. Just a roughs script describing the action and from that, in three rehearsals, was developed the action, dialogue and all other essentials. Anti-gravity, Venus, gold, plant forests, flying snakes, hostile and friendly Venerians, a professor and three stooges, revolts, rockets and numerous other things went went into the making of this extravaganza. In the excitement one of the Venerians was accidentally shot at point-blank range with a blank cartridge, and his dying agony seemed more than real. Fortunately he was not serious damaged. The play ran for three installments, which we have since decided must have been three too many.
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FANFILE #1 Published at COVENTRY. Arthur Louis Joquel(?) II, Editor. February, 1942. No Charge. Box 5451, Metro Station, Los Angeles, California. All distribution rights reserved. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Midwinter in Missouri! Tune 1928. And in a drug store a brightly colored magazine cover has attracted the attention of an eight year old boy - a boy who has spent most of his time before that reading H. G. Wells' "Outline of History", the glacial periods are as close to him as his everyday life. and here was a magazine in which these things could come to life! Somehow the twenty five cents for the magazine was managed and the treasure taken home. Verne was Verne, and Wells was Wells, and a man name Gernsback wrote amusing extensions of the fabulous adventures of Baron Munchausen. But none of these had the horrible appeal of a story called "Revolt of the Pedestrians" by a Dr. Keller. And when the lad moved to Washington, D.C., that one story was carefully removed from the magazine and taken along. After almost two years spent in Washington in general, and the Smithsonian Institution and the Library of Congress in particular, return again to Missouri and in the same drugstore the boy, now approaching eleven, finds another magazine, this one smaller and less portentious, but with a story full of promise in it - "Mura of the Moon". This ran for four issues, and in the fourth one another story started - this one about the Mayas and a crew of Vikings that landed in Yucatan. By the time this finished I (for I was the young man in question) had acquired a definite taste for fantastic stories in general. Score for AMAZING STORIES and ARGOSY! We moved again to Washington, and it was there that I read Captain Meeks "Drums of the Tapajos", Williamson's "Prince of Space" and Bridge's "Via the Time Accelerator" (which proved time travelling to be practical, as far as I was concerned), and Olson's "Men Who Annexed the Moon". In 1932 I read "Troyana" and in WONDER STORIES a two part serial called "The Final Was" by Carl Spohr, which was one of the finest arguments for pacifism that I had read up till that time. While still in Missouri, the comic strip "Buck Rogers" had started in the daily papers and "Buddy Deering" in the Sunday ones. I read and saved them, and even intended to try to build a rocket ship! (POPULAR MECHANICS was giving rockets quite a build up then, and it really seemed absurdly simple.) The rocket plane never materialized but we did develop a blunderbuss-like flame gun, which took ten minutes to stoke up for ten seconds of flame. Disappointed at its lack of practicality, we discarded it. In 1932 we spent the summer at a YMCA camp near Washington, and found full opportunity to put our stfictional bent to work in a play, which was a mad mixture of Buck Rogers, "Drums of Tapajos" and "Troyana", and anything else we could cook up. No individual lines were written for the actors. Just a roughs script describing the action and from that, in three rehearsals, was developed the action, dialogue and all other essentials. Anti-gravity, Venus, gold, plant forests, flying snakes, hostile and friendly Venerians, a professor and three stooges, revolts, rockets and numerous other things went went into the making of this extravaganza. In the excitement one of the Venerians was accidentally shot at point-blank range with a blank cartridge, and his dying agony seemed more than real. Fortunately he was not serious damaged. The play ran for three installments, which we have since decided must have been three too many.
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