Flex Mentallo Posted January 21, 2015 Share Posted January 21, 2015 FH was cool all right, & those are 3 great covers. In SF, they called it the ‘Campbell Astounding’ era, but time has shown just how vast the contributions from Planet Stories & WT, AS, FA, SS, & TWS are. This Eric John Stark masterpiece (Fall 1949) got to be one of the top five novellas, and Allen Anderson chimed in with a gorgeous cover. And the shortie from Ray (Sum 1946) is one of his best… Being an ardent collector of Planet Comics - and Fiction House comic titles in general - , I'm ashamed to say that I've somehow never quite managed to get round to the pulps. But I'm delighted to see you guys post them! I love the black and white illo above (as well as the fantastic Anderson cover). Do we know the artist? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 21, 2015 Share Posted January 21, 2015 Alexander Leydenfrost Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flex Mentallo Posted January 21, 2015 Share Posted January 21, 2015 Alexander Leydenfrost Thanks Pat - I've not come across him before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 21, 2015 Author Share Posted January 21, 2015 This is Leydenfrost's bio from Wikipedia: Alexander Leydenfrost (Baron Sandor Leidenfrost) (18 March 1888, - June 1961) was an Hungarian-born American industrial designer and illustrator. He was a baron in the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, with his family title dating back to the 16th Century. Upon moving to America in the 1920s Leydenfrost altered the spelling of his name in an attempt to correct the mispronunciation of his name, and also changed his name from Sandor to the American equivalent, Alexander. Leydenfrost studied at the Royal Academy of Fine and Applied Arts of Budapest. In 1919, he was appointed as a professor of 'industrial design' at the Royal Joseph Technical University, also in Budapest. Middle European financial and ethical collapse forced him to emigrate to the United States in 1923 where he began working for the well known artist-illustrator William Andrew Pogany, designing stage sets and painting large murals, as well as being a featured regular in Magazine publications. In 1929, Leydenfrost went to work for world-renowned Industrial Designer Norman Bel Geddes, developing Toledo Scale designs and also the re-design of the Chrysler Airflow. He was also involved with the design of the 1939 World's Fair Pavilion for General Motors. In 1939 Leydenfrost turned from his career as an industrial designer to that of a professional illustrator-artist. He briefly worked for the science fiction magazine Planet Stories before being signed by Life magazine. Life needed someone who could illustrate unfolding events in Europe and Leydenfrost's photo-realistic style filled the need. He continued to illustrate for Life throughout his career, in addition to other major magazines including Skyways, Liberty, Look, Popular Science and Esquire.Despite the small body of work he created for Planet Stories, many science fiction enthusiasts consider his artwork for that magazine to be that publication's finest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 21, 2015 Author Share Posted January 21, 2015 Cover illo by Alexander Leydenfrost Planet Stories (Spring 1942) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 21, 2015 Share Posted January 21, 2015 Nice! and here, scanned from my copy of Robert Lesser's Pulp Art, is a superb one of those 'photo-realistic' jobs... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 22, 2015 Author Share Posted January 22, 2015 The letter columns in Planet were plenty funny. Yeah. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 22, 2015 Share Posted January 22, 2015 (edited) Let’s put the time machine in overdrive and go back at least 111 years. This looked to be interesting, and the price was attractive, and it’s another of the spate of late 19C tales about Atlantis, so I bought. THE CRYSTAL CITY UNDER THE SEA by Andre Laurie (pseudonym of Paschal Grousset) Translated from the French ... by L. A. Smith ... London: Sampson Low, Marston & Company- first was 1896, this one has no date save a 1904 gift inscription. It has 22 inserted plates with illustrations by George Roux. Laurie was an associate of Jules Verne who wrote the first drafts of a couple of novels that Verne rewrote and published (by agreement) as by Jules Verne. He also wrote his own books including this tale of Atlantis. George Roux also illustrated many Verne books. The image here (my Crystal City is solid enough but looks like it wouldn’t like the full splayed out position of scanning) was garnered online from a Verne book, ‘An Antarctic Mystery’ (The Sphinx of the Glaciers was the French title). Interestingly, Verne wrote this one as a sequel to Poe’s early and only novel, ‘The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym’. Edited January 22, 2015 by pcalhoun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 23, 2015 Author Share Posted January 23, 2015 You certainly turn up some nice books. Checking my collection, the only Andre Laurie item that I can find is the story A Month in the Moon which was serialized in the February - September 1897 issues of The Argosy. I have the February and March issues, but unfortunately my early issues of Argosy are boxed up and not readily available so... I'll post a photo of A FLOATING CITY by Jules Verne instead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 (edited) That is very pretty. There was a dealer used to show up at the Antiquarian Book Fair in SF who dealt exclusively in old Verne editions. Talk about a magical booth. By the time I actually resolved to buy something he was gone... You must have your collection well indexed if you could find the Laurie listing without access to the mags. Story is probably 'The Conquest of the Moon' (1889) where (from Currey site): "Financiers attempt to exploit the resources of the moon. They magnetize a mountain in the Sahara to pull the satellite into close proximity of the earth. However, through miscalculation, their observatory is drawn from the earth to a lunar valley from which they later escape, descending to earth via parachute." Laurie's final novel sounds fascinating...'Spiridon the Mute' about an intelligent human-sized ant (1907). It seems not to have been translated into English, but here's (web) pics from French edition. The last image seems to be a reversal of the cover - nice! Edited January 23, 2015 by pcalhoun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjum12 Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 You certainly turn up some nice books. Checking my collection, the only Andre Laurie item that I can find is the story A Month in the Moon which was serialized in the February - September 1897 issues of The Argosy. I have the February and March issues, but unfortunately my early issues of Argosy are boxed up and not readily available so... I'll post a photo of A FLOATING CITY by Jules Verne instead. ....My God, that's a beautiful edition ...... they truly don't make them like they used to. Did you have to use the scaffolding to retrieve that one..... or do you keep the better volumes on the lower level...... ? GOD BLESS.... -jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u ..... not to change the subject ..... but if any of you feel like posting any NC Wyeth illos from the Scribner's Children's Classics I'm all eyes........ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 gosh the old book I'm reading just reminded me of BZ's Verne... "She read from an old book, bound with rich plush, whose leaves were vellum, edged with artful garniture and lettered richly with crimson ink — a precious relic of old literature, saved from those vandal flames which burned the stored knowledge of the world to ashes at Alexandria. The characters were Phoenician, and told the story of that race to which we owe our modern alphabet; whose ships, a thou- sand years before the Christ, went freighted with letters, seeking baser commerce, to every shore of the wide world. She read by the red firelight, and the ruddy glow fell vividly on the pictured page, the rich dress outlining her full form and the swarth beauty of her face. It was the story of an old race — no library has it now — the story of their rise, their glory, and their fall." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjum12 Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 gosh the old book I'm reading just reminded me of BZ's Verne... "She read from an old book, bound with rich plush, whose leaves were vellum, edged with artful garniture and lettered richly with crimson ink — a precious relic of old literature, saved from those vandal flames which burned the stored knowledge of the world to ashes at Alexandria. The characters were Phoenician, and told the story of that race to which we owe our modern alphabet; whose ships, a thou- sand years before the Christ, went freighted with letters, seeking baser commerce, to every shore of the wide world. She read by the red firelight, and the ruddy glow fell vividly on the pictured page, the rich dress outlining her full form and the swarth beauty of her face. It was the story of an old race — no library has it now — the story of their rise, their glory, and their fall." ..... Hamilton Rare Books was one of my favorite shops in the universe here in Williamsburg...... such beautiful old books.... but he shut down and went full internet. My only problem with rare books is that I mostly don't know what I want until I see it. GOD BLESS... -jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 23, 2015 Author Share Posted January 23, 2015 You must have your collection well indexed if you could find the Laurie listing without access to the mags. My checklists are basic bare-boned listings whose only function is to help me keep track of what I have in my collection. However, I do have a ton of reference books that are helpful in providing detailed information about the various subjects of which I have an interest. Here are a few of them. Index to the Science Fiction Magazines 1926-1950 An Index on the Weird & Fantastica in Magazines Science-Fiction The Gernsback Years by Everett F. Bleiler Science-Fiction The Early Years by Everett F. Bleiler (I found the Laurie info in this book) The Pulp Magazine Index Vols. 1 - 3 by Leonard A. Robbins Mystery, Detective, and Espionage Fiction Vols 1 & 2 The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy by Donald H. Tuck The Complete Index to Astounding / Analog by Mike Ashley The Guide to Supernatural Fiction by Everett F. Bleiler The Best of Blood 'N' Thunder Vols 1&2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 23, 2015 Author Share Posted January 23, 2015 Laurie's final novel sounds fascinating...'Spiridon the Mute' about an intelligent human-sized ant (1907). It seems not to have been translated into English, but here's (web) pics from French edition. Wow!!! I'd love to read that story. The illustrations are spectacular. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flex Mentallo Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 Laurie's final novel sounds fascinating...'Spiridon the Mute' about an intelligent human-sized ant (1907). It seems not to have been translated into English, but here's (web) pics from French edition. Wow!!! I'd love to read that story. The illustrations are spectacular. Totally amazing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BangZoom Posted January 24, 2015 Author Share Posted January 24, 2015 Let’s put the time machine in overdrive and go back at least 111 years. This looked to be interesting, and the price was attractive, and it’s another of the spate of late 19C tales about Atlantis, so I bought. THE CRYSTAL CITY UNDER THE SEA by Andre Laurie (pseudonym of Paschal Grousset) Translated from the French ... by L. A. Smith ... London: Sampson Low, Marston & Company- first was 1896, this one has no date save a 1904 gift inscription. It has 22 inserted plates with illustrations by George Roux. Pat, I found a tale about Atlantis in Stanton A Coblentz's "The Sunken World" (Summer 1928 Amazing Stories Quarterly). From Wikipedia: Stanton A. Coblentz (August 24, 1896 – September 6, 1982) was an American author and poet. He received a Master's Degree in English literature and then began publishing poetry during the early 1920s. His first published science fiction was "The Sunken World," a satire about Atlantis, in Amazing Stories Quarterly for July, 1928. The next year, he published his first novel, The Wonder Stick. But poetry and history were his greatest strengths. Coblentz tended to write satirically. He also wrote books of literary criticism and nonfiction concerning historical subjects. Adventures of a Freelancer: The Literary Exploits and Autobiography of Stanton A. Coblentz was published the year after his death. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 24, 2015 Share Posted January 24, 2015 have the MJ version that one (2nd row from top 4th from left). ps- your 'reference library' great. save for my MJ index I have none of that as I've always marshalled my small fundage into the books, pulps, and comics themselves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 24, 2015 Share Posted January 24, 2015 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted January 24, 2015 Share Posted January 24, 2015 (edited) BZ- (or anyone) HELP, please. the 11/47 WT contains poem 'Atlantis' by Coblentz. would love to see it. thanks. Pat Edited January 24, 2015 by pcalhoun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
