Golden Age Collection 22 22

[Pat Calhoun]

Avalon packagings of 2 from Startling Stories 1939/1959 1941/1961 both covers by Ed Emshwiller. 'Giants From Eternity' has five great figures from the past brought back to life to deal with a blight from space- this edition is dedicated "to Julius Schwartz for old times' sake"...

 

[ciorac]

The link I mentioned in an earlier post today includes the following bit of Wellman's comic history:

 

In 1939, the Wellmans moved from New York to the Watchung Mountains area of new Jersey. Their only child, Wade was born there. In early 1940 Wellman took a job with Harry M. Chesler as managing editor of the Gold Medal syndicate. While he had the job only long enough to establish credit to buy a house, Wellman plunged full-tilt into writing for the Golden Age comic books. Many of his friends from the s-f pulps were involved in this new field, including Earl and Eando Binder and their artist brother Jack. Wellman turned out a tremendous volume of work, inventing characters and writing stories for all the major and most minor outfits, including such notable comic heroes as Captain Marvel, Prince Ibis, The Spirit, Blackhawk, Green Lantern, Plasticman, Captain America, Aquaman, and countless others.

 

Wellman was asked to develop the character of Captain Marvel, and was shown a few Superman comics with instructions to copy him. In Captain Marvel #1, Wellman amused himself by spelling out his name through the first initials of the balloons of the first story. A decade later, this had major consequences in the infamous Fawcett/DC plagiarism lawsuit. Wellman was a key witness for DC, inasmuch as his initials in the first Captain Marvel comic proved he was in at the creation. Since Wellman testified that he was instructed to copy Superman his testimony was damning to Fawcett. Captain Marvel had outsold Superman in the 40s. It is an odd twist that one of the Big Red Cheese’s best writers would ultimately send him into limbo.

 

Wellman considered the comics work to be the very bottom of hack writing and kept no records of his work. He wrote countless examples of two-page prose fillers (which were essential to claim a second class mailing permit) for which coined the term “squinkus.” [Ed note: Wagner is incorrect here, Wellman's journals define a squinka (plural squinkas) as the plot and dialogue for a comic, not the two-page fillers]. Wellman ended his comics career after the war, although the early issues of Strange Adventures contained several s-f stories credited to him. And the huge stacks of prime, first issue, Golden age comics he wrote for? Well, he kept most of them around until his son tired of them—then he gave them away at Halloween!

 

 

Odd that they would refer to the Binder brothers using the pen name eando, which we all know was sort of a pseudonym for Earl and Otto "E and O"

[Annihilus]

Wellman considered the comics work to be the very bottom of hack writing and kept no records of his work. He wrote countless examples of two-page prose fillers (which were essential to claim a second class mailing permit) for which coined the term “squinkus.” [Ed note: Wagner is incorrect here, Wellman's journals define a squinka (plural squinkas) as the plot and dialogue for a comic, not the two-page fillers]. Wellman ended his comics career after the war, although the early issues of Strange Adventures contained several s-f stories credited to him. And the huge stacks of prime, first issue, Golden age comics he wrote for? Well, he kept most of them around until his son tired of them—then he gave them away at Halloween!

 

 

I'll admit to being pretty ignorant of much more than the major goings-on in the GA comics world (with a few exceptions, such as L.B. Cole & EC) since I'm still relatively new to the genre in terms of digging in and researching. What has surprised me though is just how far behind I am in terms of ancillary related interests such as some of the pulps and pulp authors. I had no idea Wellman wrote comics (or stories of Appalachia for that matter). I guess I've been steeped in the Lovecraft/Machen/Blackwood/Bloch corner of the world for too long and it's time to expand horizons a bit.

 

It doesn't surprise me a bit that Wellman thought what he did about comic work being 'at the very bottom of hack writing'. Many authors of the day already thought that pulp writing was at the bottom of the barrel to begin with (and much of it was, frankly), I can only imagine that would carry down even further when one had to stoop to writing 'funny books' which was new and geared towards kids. I can only imagine what HPL would have thought of the genre had he lived to see it.

 

This stuff is great. Hope you all will forgive my ignorance as I get my feet wet here.

[BangZoom]

 

I read an interesting article about Frank Robinson that originally was published in the The Oregonian newspaper in 2009.

 

Link

 

Tear Down This Wall!

 

And earlier this summer, Frank Robinson did just that, bringing the famous "Wall of Pulps" down forever and shipping his renown pulp magazine collection off to Silver Spring.

 

The celebrated author of Pulp Culture and the speech writer for former San Francisco Mayor Harvey Milk, Robinson spent the last 30 years assembling the finest collection of high-grade pulp magazines in the world. The pulps were displayed -- gloriously -- on the wooden shelves of a floor-to-ceiling wall in the living room of his San Francisco home.

 

But shortly after he returned from playing himself in Gus van Sant's "Milk," Robinson realized the thrill of owning that collection was gone.

 

"I'm looking at them one day," Robinson said, "and I realized I hadn't read a single one. I was collecting magazines in near mint and you don't read a magazine in near mint and have it stay in near mint. Then I realized I wasn't even looking at them. If a couple magazines fell off the shelf, I left them there.

 

"There was nothing," Robinson said. "I'm not kidding. The only interest I had left was pride of possession, showing them off to other people and bragging about them. Jesus, I had those magazines for 30 years. That's longer than most people keep their wives."

 

Robinson had no interest in allowing Heritage Auctions to profit off his collecting passion. Instead, he called John Gunnison at Adventure House, arguably the country's largest dealer in pulps.

 

Gunnison told me last week that he will use Robinson's collection to produce an Ernie Gerber-style book on the pulps: "As Frank proved with Pulp Culture, there's a market out there for books on pulp images. People have been asking me for decades to put out a Gerber style book on the pulps. The problem has been finding images that are good enough that you don't have to spend countless hours retouching them."

 

With Frank Robinson's collection, problem solved. Gunnison argues that the 6,000 pulps don't qualify as a true pedigree collection: "Frank has been upgrading for decades. It's not like he bought these off newsstands and carefully slipped them away, the way Edgar Church did."

 

But the pulps are in extraordinary condition. I've seen the Weird Tales. All but five of the books are gem perfect.

 

"That's the one thing Frank was the most proud of," Gunnison said. Whenever a stunning new array of Weird Tales became available, he added, "Frank was always at the right place at the right time." Once Adventure House publishes those images, Gunnison will use the book as a catalog to sell the collection. "As a single run, Frank's Weird Tales will generate the highest prices," he said.

 

Asked what it might take to buy the run, Gunnison said he thought $165,000 would do the trick.

 

Once Robinson decided to bring down his wall, Gunnison swung by with a truck, loaded it with pulps and drove the collection back to Maryland.

 

Robinson? He held on to 20 pulps. An N.C. Wyeth cover. A Leyendecker. An upgraded copy of the first Weird Tales (August 1939) that he bought off the newsstand. An Indian cover. A logging cover from Complete Stories And no Spicys, no Terrors, no Horrors, no gallery of space ships.

 

"If you looked at the 20 magazines, you'd have an entirely different view of the pulp field," Robinson said. "Every cover I picked out was a people cover. I have a very low opinion of most pulp magazine art. I understand the appeal of the posters, but from the viewpoint of art, let's not kid ourselves."

 

Gunnison estimates that Robinson's book won't be available until summer 2010. He first must catalog the 14,000-piece collection of Darrell Richardson, a Baptist minister from Memphis who focused on the science-fiction and adventure pulps. Richardson, who was also a big Edgar Rice Burroughs collector, spent 70 years amassing his collection.

 

 

[Scrooge]

"Robinson had no interest in allowing Heritage Auctions to profit off his collecting passion. Instead, he called John Gunnison at Adventure House, arguably the country's largest dealer in pulps."

 

Sometimes, one must really bite their tongues ...

 

Hopefully, Jon gets his projected book on track and we do get a good quality pulp cover books. Jon's earlier efforts on Baumhofer and Belarksi are great btw. One should be able to find them for cheap by looking online.

[adamstrange]

Speaking of science fiction, I found this graphical history in my wanderings around the web. If you click once, it will super-size so that the text is readable.

 

http://scimaps.org/submissions/7-digital_libraries/maps/thumbs/024_LG.jpg

[Annihilus]

Speaking of science fiction, I found this graphical history in my wanderings around the web. If you click once, it will super-size so that the text is readable.

 

http://scimaps.org/submissions/7-digital_libraries/maps/thumbs/024_LG.jpg

 

That's pretty cool - someone spent a lot of time creating that. You'd almost have to print out a poster sized version to really get a good look at it (unless you have a giant monitor, which I don't have).

[Scrooge]

Another tool I use sometimes when I find an author I like is Literature Map which is one of several websites with the same concept. An other for example is http://www.whatshouldireadnext.com/ but it's not as "good". Literature map allows you to see what other authors you should consider and I find that better. Doesn't mean that you'll like the other authors but it narrows choices and lets me discover people I might not be aware of.

 

Note: In Literature Map, it's best to put in the entire name, so don't type in just Flaubert but Gustave Flaubert.

[Annihilus]

I'm sure you guys have seen these many times before, but I just acquired my very first two copies of Weird Tales (both with great Hannes Bok covers) and containing my favorite Lovecraft Story of all time: The Case Of Charles Dexter Ward (Parts I & II). Not the earlier or more expensive issues, but the story and the covers make me

 

Two down, half a bazillion to go!

 

 

 

 

[Pat Calhoun]

there is something special about WT - Congratulations! -Pat

[Ted Knight]

there is something special about WT - Congratulations! -Pat

 

+1.

 

Two down, half a bazillion to go!

 

I know what you mean. And heaven help you if you have high standards...

[Pat Calhoun]

The later years of Weird Tales can’t match the glory of what went before but still have much to offer. Many late-1940s issues boast phenomenal Matt Fox covers- this time (July 1949) with the versatile Fredric Brown contributing the lead novelette. The 1950s brought one final writer into the Weird Hall of Fame. Even though Joseph Payne Brennan only had four yarns in WT (well the mag folded just as he was revving up) he continued in that vein enough to fill several hardback volumes with two from Arkham House shown below. ‘Nine Horrors’ 1958 Utpatel jacket, dedicated “To the memory of Weird Tales”, includes the four from WT. ‘Stories of Darkness and Dread’ 1973 with DJ by Denis Tiani contains more fine weirdies with a memorably grim SF finale, ‘The Dump’.

Also pictured via image from web is the March 1953 WT with Finlay cover for Brennan’s ‘Slime’.

 

 

 

[sacentaur]

Fox did some work for Marvel in the 60's, and I think his efforts are just great.

 

Geez, Matt Fox WT - something else to add to my list for the Vintage Paper show coming up in a few weeks.

 

[Annihilus]

The later years of Weird Tales can’t match the glory of what went before but still have much to offer. Many late-1940s issues boast phenomenal Matt Fox covers- this time (July 1949) with the versatile Fredric Brown contributing the lead novelette. The 1950s brought one final writer into the Weird Hall of Fame. Even though Joseph Payne Brennan only had four yarns in WT (well the mag folded just as he was revving up) he continued in that vein enough to fill several hardback volumes with two from Arkham House shown below. ‘Nine Horrors’ 1958 Utpatel jacket, dedicated “To the memory of Weird Tales”, includes the four from WT. ‘Stories of Darkness and Dread’ 1973 with DJ by Denis Tiani contains more fine weirdies with a memorably grim SF finale, ‘The Dump’.

Also pictured via image from web is the March 1953 WT with Finlay cover for Brennan’s ‘Slime’.

 

It's funny you should bring up Brennan - I was just checking out Stories of Darkness the other day, but wasn't really familiar enough with him to take a chance. I might have to take a second look. Nine Horrors looks like my kind of book tho!

[detective35]

Hi BZ,

 

I know Frank very well. I have seen his collection a number of times. 99% of all his Weird Tales are in the condition of the ones you posted, including the #1, 2, etc., ec., all the bedsheets etc. It is mindboggling. He turned down $160,000.00 for the run. All his pulps are in grade and he was a stickler on page quality.

He was not deep in hero pulps (except Doc Savage), and he sold his Spicy's Spicy's 15+ years ago, but everything else is killer. Of course I have gone through and traded for anything that I needed from his Shadows years back, but he wasn't real heavy on the Shadow either.

 

Dwight

Edited March 11, 2011 by detective35DF

[Theagenes]

I'm sure you guys have seen these many times before, but I just acquired my very first two copies of Weird Tales (both with great Hannes Bok covers) and containing my favorite Lovecraft Story of all time: The Case Of Charles Dexter Ward (Parts I & II). Not the earlier or more expensive issues, but the story and the covers make me

 

Two down, half a bazillion to go!

 

 

 

 

Gorgeous copies!

[Theagenes]

The later years of Weird Tales can’t match the glory of what went before but still have much to offer. Many late-1940s issues boast phenomenal Matt Fox covers- this time (July 1949) with the versatile Fredric Brown contributing the lead novelette. The 1950s brought one final writer into the Weird Hall of Fame. Even though Joseph Payne Brennan only had four yarns in WT (well the mag folded just as he was revving up) he continued in that vein enough to fill several hardback volumes with two from Arkham House shown below. ‘Nine Horrors’ 1958 Utpatel jacket, dedicated “To the memory of Weird Tales”, includes the four from WT. ‘Stories of Darkness and Dread’ 1973 with DJ by Denis Tiani contains more fine weirdies with a memorably grim SF finale, ‘The Dump’.

Also pictured via image from web is the March 1953 WT with Finlay cover for Brennan’s ‘Slime’.

 

So "Slime" came out in '53 and the film The Blob was a few years later. I wonder if it was inspired by Brennan's story or if it's just a coincidence.

[Annihilus]

The later years of Weird Tales can’t match the glory of what went before but still have much to offer. Many late-1940s issues boast phenomenal Matt Fox covers- this time (July 1949) with the versatile Fredric Brown contributing the lead novelette. The 1950s brought one final writer into the Weird Hall of Fame. Even though Joseph Payne Brennan only had four yarns in WT (well the mag folded just as he was revving up) he continued in that vein enough to fill several hardback volumes with two from Arkham House shown below. ‘Nine Horrors’ 1958 Utpatel jacket, dedicated “To the memory of Weird Tales”, includes the four from WT. ‘Stories of Darkness and Dread’ 1973 with DJ by Denis Tiani contains more fine weirdies with a memorably grim SF finale, ‘The Dump’.

Also pictured via image from web is the March 1953 WT with Finlay cover for Brennan’s ‘Slime’.

 

So "Slime" came out in '53 and the film The Blob was a few years later. I wonder if it was inspired by Brennan's story or if it's just a coincidence.

 

I thought the same thing, especially after seeing the 1953 WT cover - it appears that it wasn't entirely a coincidence according to this article:

 

Linky

 

Brennan's stories, though scarce and mostly out-of-print today, are widely considered by horror fiction enthusiasts to be classics. His best-known story, "Slime", follows a protoplasmic life form as it ascends from its home deep within the ocean and begins to prey upon coastal residents of a small New England town. Not only has this story been re-published more than any other Brennan story, many modern horror authors seem to have borrowed heavily from it, authors such as Dean Koontz in his novel Phantoms, which features a remarkably similar creature, and Stephen King in his short novellette The Raft, which also features a blob-like, water-dwelling organism.

 

Probably the book that borrows most heavily from "Slime", possibly to the point of plagiarism, is Night of the Black Horror (1962) by Victor Norwood (U.K., 1920–1983). This is a novel-length work; but for its first few chapters, the events and many of the descriptions parallel Brennan's work almost paragraph by paragraph, although the precise wording is often changed. After that it follows its own plot-line, separate from Brennan's work.

 

Brennan brought a lawsuit against Paramount for copyright infringement in regards to their release of the film, The Blob (starring Steve McQueen), and apparently received a minor settlement, however, according to a watered-down version of the court proceedings, since the pulp magazine Weird Tales was not named in the suit, Brennan's claims lacked a substantive weight.Les Daniels stated in his book, Living in Fear, that since "Weird Tales was legally defunct, the author has gone virtually unrewarded".

[BangZoom]

...I just acquired my very first two copies of Weird Tales (both with great Hannes Bok covers) and containing my favorite Lovecraft Story of all time: The Case Of Charles Dexter Ward (Parts I & II). Not the earlier or more expensive issues, but the story and the covers make me

 

 

 

 

Congratulations on your purchases

 

 

 

 

[BangZoom]

The later years of Weird Tales can’t match the glory of what went before but still have much to offer. Many late-1940s issues boast phenomenal Matt Fox covers- this time (July 1949)

 

 

 

 

The later issues have their own special charm.

 

I think this cover by A.R. Tilburne is pretty nifty.

 

 

 

Weird Tales (September 1943)