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Memoirs of a Superfluous Fan, 1944

Page 10

  LATE IN THE SUMMER OF 1937 my interest in the science fiction fan magazine field was at a high pitch, and I began to wonder why Los Angeles had never produced a fan mag on its own initiative.  With brilliant reasoning I deduced that with Ackerman, Roy Test, Squires, Paul Freehafer, Russ Hodgkins, and Morojo all here in Los Angeles, we should be able with little difficulty to put out a top flight fan publication.  My correspondences with Baltadonis suddenly took a technical turn, as I pumped the obliging fellow dry of all the information he could send via post on the subject of hektography.  Older fan readers will recall the Baltadonis SCIENCE FICTION COLLECTOR as one of the highest attainments of the hektographers' art.  His colour reproduction was superb, the pictures themselves far above the average, and the layout superlative.  I still marvel at the results he obtained, especially as contrasted with the first IMAGINATION! from Roy Test, who had planned to use this title for the official magazine of the World Girdlers' International Science League Correspondence Club, which folded earlier in the year along with m dues as Vernon Harry went to work nights.

  Just where the idea occured that IMAGINATION! ought to be the chapter organ, I do not know.  I believe that this, too, was Ackerman's idea, but in any event, after I read to the chapter letters from Baltadonis explaining in lurid details the use of the hektograph, Russ Hodgkins fell for the idea and the chapter voted $7.50 on September 2, 1937, to cover the cost of the initial hekto equipment.

  The heroic story of the first issue of IMAGINATION! is related in my editorial in the second issue.  It was a small-scale nightmare of those New York publishing houses who do all their desk work in New York and then send their material to Chicago for the press run.  In our version, when I arrived home from school in the afternoon, I would write up the material of the day, and hop with elite type (to which I am very partial), but the magazine was slated to come out in pica. Ackerman would have to spend an hour or so correcting spelling and indulging in other editorial adjustments, after which he copied the stuff on the hekto carbon, first having make another short car-trip to Morojo's apartment which boasted a standard typewriter, best for uses of this nature.  Then her son Virgil made the trip all the way back to my house, usually arriving at 10:00 in the evening, catching me in the process of shaving, a habit I acquired at a very early age, damn it.  As the LASFL only had two hekto pads, this mad-house continued for ten nights, after which we were all quite ready to retire in grace from the publishing field.

  It is said by learned ones that ignorance of one's own ignorance is inexcusable.  Up until the first issue of IMAGINATION! I had been ignorant of the fact that I did not know how to spell.  To this day I am especially weak in the matter of double consonants and adverbial ending changes, but in 1937 my spelling was incorrigable.  My habitual use of british and quasi-french variations, as in "civilisation, encountre, discovour," and an occasional unorthodox doubling of consonants is no doubt due to the fact that the dictionary which I used

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LATE IN THE SUMMER OF 1937 my interest in the science fiction fan magazine field was at a high pitch, and I began to wonder why Los Angeles had never produced a fan mag on its own initiative. With brilliant reasoning I deduced that with Ackerman, Roy Test, Squires, Paul Freehafer, Russ Hodgkins, and Morojo all here in Los Angeles, we should be able with little difficulty to put out a top flight fan publication. My correspondences with Baltadonis suddenly took a technical turn, as I pumped the obliging fellow dry of all the information he could send via post on the subject of hektography. Older fan readers will recall the Baltadonis SCIENCE FICTION COLLECTOR as one of the highest attainments of the hektographers' art. His colour reproduction was superb, the pictures themselves far above the average, and the layout superlative. I still marvel at the results he obtained, especially as contrasted with the first IMAGINATION! from Roy Test, who had planned to use this title for the official magazine of the World Girdlers' International Science League Correspondence Club, which folded earlier in the year along with m dues as Vernon Harry went to work nights. Just where the idea occured that IMAGINATION! ought to be the chapter organ, I do not know. I believe that this, too, was Ackerman's idea, but in any event, after I read to the chapter letters from Baltadonis explaining in lurid details the use of the hektograph, Russ Hodgkins fell for the idea and the chapter voted $7.50 on September 2, 1937, to cover the cost of the initial hekto equipment. The heroic story of the first issue of IMAGINATION! is related in my editorial in the second issue. It was a small-scale nightmare of those New York publishing houses who do all their desk work in New York and then send their material to Chicago for the press run. In our version, when I arrived home from school in the afternoon, I would write up the material of the day, and hop with elite type (to which I am very partial), but the magazine was slated to come out in pica. Ackerman would have to spend an hour or so correcting spelling and indulging in other editorial adjustments, after which he copied the stuff on the hekto carbon, first having make another short car-trip to Morojo's apartment which boasted a standard typewriter, best for uses of this nature. Then her son Virgil made the trip all the way back to my house, usually arriving at 10:00 in the evening, catching me in the process of shaving, a habit I acquired at a very early age, damn it. As the LASFL only had two hekto pads, this mad-house continued for ten nights, after which we were all quite ready to retire in grace from the publishing field. It is said by learned ones that ignorance of one's own ignorance is inexcusable. Up until the first issue of IMAGINATION! I had been ignorant of the fact that I did not know how to spell. To this day I am especially weak in the matter of double consonants and adverbial ending changes, but in 1937 my spelling was incorrigable. My habitual use of british and quasi-french variations, as in "civilisation, encountre, discovour," and an occasional unorthodox doubling of consonants is no doubt due to the fact that the dictionary which I used