THEN #1, covering the 1930s and 1940s was published in March 1988. The letters on that issue were in the following one, published in March 1989, and are reprinted below.

I read THEN with a growing sense of delight and - dare I say it? - wonder. Not only is it well written (which we expect from you) and informative (which it is, relentlessly so) it is also breathtakingly exciting. It read like a thoroughly professional history with a very high 'page turnability' quotient. I was so deeply impressed by this fruit of such an obvious labour of love that when I arrived home after midnight I rooted out THE STORY SO FAR from my pile of as yet unread CONSPIRACY memorabilia and did not go to bed before I had read it. If you want to realise just how high praise that is, I have to get up at 5am to get to work. I'm still feeling the effects of lack of sleep, and still think the sacrifice was worthwhile.

Don't beat about the bush, Martyn, did you like the issue or not?

I haven't got a lot of comments on THEN. I find the whole thing rather more interesting than I would have expected from a simple glance at the cover. But you do a number of things that make it more interesting: you put the fannish events into the context of British society and history; you trace, as much as possible, how each event influenced the next; you show the connections with US fandom; you give (especially in the introduction) some feeling for the methods of historical research (which I find pretty interesting...if I were ever to do fanhistorical research , I'd come to you for advice).

So I hope you can continue THEN right up to present days, and I hope you inspire some energetic US fan to pick up where Harry Warner left off, though I'm afraid that US fan history is a far more diverse affair, and might actually take a number of people, concentrating on a number of cities, interests, etc., to do right.

Maybe, and I'd certainly be interested in seeing (say) Moshe Feder do a history of New York fandom (NY and LA being the only two US cities I can think of with a large enough body,of writings about their activities over the years to make such a task relatively straightforward, if arduous), but I remain unconvinced that it's not possible to write a history of US fandom to the present day. True, you couldn't possibly cover every aspect of US fandom as it currently exists, but then why try? In much the same way that when I reach (say) the formation of the modern British Fantasy Society I'LL relate its beginnings to the point where it clearly became a separate entity then explain that its story from there on is a tale for another time (and for someone else to write), so the story of US

fandom can be told. Remember who you're writing for and concentrate on fanzine fandom, the major conventions and clubs, and the major developments beyond these that have affected them. Still a big task, but still easier than trying to cover the filking, costume, media, and single-author fandoms that have proliferated over recent years. By all means mention them, and when they became distinct entities, but remember that they are distinct entities (albeit sharing common roots with us) and their stories belong in distinct and separate works. You mention Harry Warner, Jerry, who by coincidence is our next writer....

Even though I am a lapsed fanhistorian, I still love to read about fandom's past as long as someone else does the work. Obviously, you've done an exceptional amount of hard work.

If I'd been doing this history of early British fandom, there are only two things I would have done differently. For one thing, I wouldn't have done it as conscientiously and painstakingly. The other difference: I would have sneaked in somewhere a boast about the fact that British fanzines of the 1930s and 1940s were so superior intellectually and in the literary sense to fanzines produced elsewhere in the world. I remember clearly how when I used to write a lot of articles for fanzines, I thought nothing of sending a contribution to an American fanzine but felt as if I were intruding where I didn't belong if I sent one to a British fanzine. The general level of writing in British fanzines was so much better in syntax and organisation and spelling.

But surely that was mainly due to the average age of fans in Britain being higher than the average for America, Harry? There may have been some differences conferred by our different educational systems, but for the most part I can't say as I noticed as great a disparity during my research as you seem to be suggesting.

Couldn't agree more and, yes, it would be neat to discover that Cosmos Club film. Getting whoever had it (if it still exists) to do an audio-tape commentary and then getting both combined on a

video-tape would be A Good Thing. However, when even such a recent home movie as the one Chris Priest and Dicky HoWett took of early-1960s London fandom no longer exists the chances for a film from the 1940s surviving seems remote. Of course, I've only got Priest's word that the film has been destroyed. Given the youthful gaucheness it doubtless displays he might have his own reasons for - ah - fibbing about this.

THEN #1 was everything I could have hoped for. This is far more informative than either Moskowitz or Warner have been on the subject of British fanhistory, and I eagerly look forward to future issues.

While nothing may have come of the Nazi engineers' investigation of the possibility of launching V-1's at the US coast(s), the Japanese certainly were present on the Pacific coast. I don't know if you got to see them during your visit here, but around the entrance to San Francisco Bay there are ruins of many fortifications put up in the '30s and '40s. There's little observation bunkers built into the sides of hills on the Marin County headlands, just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. The ruins of concrete pads where cannon and other artillery were once mounted are also much in evidence. Huge rusting steel doors opening into hillsides behind which armaments were once stored dot other hillsides nearby. My boys loved to come and play their kid games amidst these military ruins when they were much younger.

As to Moskowitz and your musings about THE IMMORTAL STORM, I suspect he'd probably be interested in seeing THEN. Sam is one of the two charter members of FAPA still active in the group (Jack Speer is the other) and last year, when I was digging up names of other charter members to see who was still alive - because FAPA had decided to send copies of the 50th anniversary (200th) mailing to all who were alive and could be located - I had occasion to correspond with Sam about the whereabouts of these elders. He was most helpful and quite cordial about it.

SAM MOSKOWITZ
Newark, NJ, USA.

First, let me express my deep appreciation for sending me a copy of THEN. I have read it through once, uncritically, and my initial reaction is positive. I found a lot of interesting material, particularly in the latter portion with which I was not quite as familiar as the earlier, and I liked the narrative style which keeps one reading, preferring it to the encyclopedic format. If you turn out a second volume you should include an index of both volumes which would greatly enhance its value, making it a reference as well.

If and when it's completed, revised, and published in a single edition, I will, but doing it before then is an effort which might deter me from finishing.

My attitude towards the Hayes Group was because they were a correspondence club and that is why they joined up with the ISA in the USA, because that was also a correspondence club. The fact that they got together interested parties and dreamed about putting out a fan magazine and involved themselves with a drama company that was putting on a play, does not make them, at best, any more than a precursor of the more active Science Fiction Association that later actually was an influential group.

I think it might be of interest to explain why there were so many British letters in the American SF mags, and from South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand as well. The unsold returns were being used as ballast in ships from the United States to those nations and the magazines sold to outlets like Woolworths by the pound, who in turn sold them at very low rates. Very few of the other English- speaking countries bought the magazines at full price from the ITS. The more foreign letters they got, the lower their circulations, that is paid circulations.

If you mentioned AMATEUR SCIENCE STORIES and Carnell's POSTCARD PREVIEW I missed it. The first ran Clarke's first fiction. The latter, launched with the issue of 21st October 1939, was intended to keep British fans informed of the latest SF news under wartime conditions.

No. I didn't mention them (can't name every fanzine published without the narrative becoming unruly), but for those interested the former was edited by Doug Mayer and saw three issues between Oct'37 and March'38., while the latter (listed in the Roberts Bibliography as POSTAL PREVIEW) saw 22 'issues', the final one appearing in September 1940. Actually. both of these should have been mentioned and will be in any future version of this history.

Actually. I too have correspondence from a number of people of that period who responded to THEN #1. Here are a few of them, beginning with....

You ask for corrections, so here goes. Ref pages 17/18, I was never a visitor to the Flat - in mid-teens I couldn't afford the fare from Hampshire to London. My first trip was a special one, to the '39 convention, and I had to leave before the end to catch my train back. There was some comment that Fantacynic could not be me because he referred to events taking place after my departure; but I did have a good stringer in John Burke. I'm fairly sure that SATELLITE was in the first place John's individual enterprise, only later becoming the Liverpool SFA's organ. We were all surprised when it became the national organ, it (and John himself) having been gadflies to the bovine corpus of SFA HQ.

I think your memory may he playing tricks on you regarding the status of SATELLITE, Sam. I took the story of the formation of Liverpool SFA directly from the first issue, where it was stated quite clearly that John Burke and Dave McIlwain (the co-editor on the first three issues) had been charged with producing the club's organ, ie. SATELLITE.

RON HOLMES
Derbyshire, UK.

I will put you in the picture on my own introduction into Liverpool fandom. I appeared just after the introductory stage when Eric Frank Russell, Les Johnson, etc., had created the group and it was about to fall apart. EFR never again came to a meeting (too busy at his job) and Cleator was on his way south. I can recall Les complaining about EFR that he had pinched one of Les' plots for a story, designated 'Meat-Eaters of Metropolis' by Les, and about cannibalism which, apparently, EFR used in a published story. Meetings at the Hamilton Cafe had come to an end.

With Les setting up an office in the centre of Liverpool it became possible to use it as a meeting place in the evenings. He then invited all local people on the SF Service books to attend, which included me, and I did. So out of this new arising we had Les and Abe Bloom (who was something of a partner) together with Dave McIlwain and John Burke - then me - as the basis of the group. Les Heald came later, and several others came in and out vaguely. LesJ worked not very far away in the Liverpool Corporation Education Office, Burke's father was a police inspector, LesH was a clerk in a civil engineering firm.

This went on for roughly a year-and-a-half until LesJ knew he was about to be called up (probably early-1940) when I took on the job of dismantling the office and transferring all the books to his home. No more meetings after that. I'm surprised you cannot find a record of the SFS address because there must be letter heads about, and he had adverts in the two promags.

ERIC WILLIAMS
West Sussex, UK.

I guess my fan activities fizzled out when I got married in 1962, and then left London for Sussex twenty years ago. Now and again I journeyed up to South Norwood to visit my old friend G.Ken Chapman and heard bits of news from him, but more and more my literary interests were spreading and SF took only a small part of my time. When Ken died my only link was Les Flood, who acted as my agent (more out of old friendship than any money I earned him), and when he gave up the agency my last remaing thread was INTERZONE. So, really, the door on the past closed some time ago and your History has had a very pleasant, yet sad, effect on me. All the names of provincial fans we used to bandy about! Mayer, Hanson (such a soft, gentle chap, but brainy as hell), Rosenblum, Mcllwain and Burke. Of course, my clearest memories are of the London men: Bill Temple, who I collaborated with a couple of times in our tyro days; 'Ego', of whom I remember asking why vision could not be put onto tape like sound and being told scornfully that the frequency and amplitude and all that stuff made it utterly impossible; Frank Cooper, who was the most persuasive talker I have ever encountered; and lovely old John Beynon Harris whose charm and quaker manners resisted all the demoralising rough stuff and language going on in the White Horse; Carnell, of course, with that tazz above a broad smile and unflagging zeal in the SF cause; Walt Gillings, quiet of Speech but steel in resolution; oh, and everybody! Even Harry Kay, who outclassed 'Ego' for egoism but never flagged despite all the chaff he received. I don't think anyone thought they were making history, but the way you write it up it seems to make it all hang together in a grand panorama of struggle. If you ever write Part 2, you must let me have it. But hurry up; I'm 70 and might not be around in another ten years.

Here it is, Eric, and only a year after the first part! I found your descriptions of early fans fascinating, since actual descriptions of fans are few and far between in early fanzines. One of the reasons I use so many quotes rather than merely summarising what they contain is for the 'voice' it gives to people who might otherwise remain ciphers to modern readers. Any more impressions you'd care to share on early fans would be welcomed. So Arthur Clarke was actually wrong about something. Amazing. It's like discovering that Santa doesn't exist.

Went delving into an old plastic bag of letters today - mostly late '50s, but I found a letter from Paul Enever, 10th March '53, where in commenting on George Clements, who sent out one issue of VOID and then folded it, he says "VOID got 12 subs in all plus two 'exchanges'. Lord love us! If our old FANTASIA had gotten FIVE subs to any one issue we'd have had to have worked overtime to type enough copies! No doubt about it, the younger generation of faneds are 'spoonfed and spineless'!" This confirms that FANTASIA did exist, anyway, that it was typed, and it was apparently on a sub. basis where only subscriber's copies were typed -- no extras.

A few footnotes to THEN, especially on the mental attitude of fans at the outbreak of war. I don't think Christian principles - turning the other cheek and the like - really entered into consideration. It was a time when some fans sin- cerely felt that the next war would be the End. Consider the scenario:

We were living in a time when the last World War was only 20-odd years in the past, when millions of families had lost someone in the trenches, and when you went shopping on Saturday afternoons you'd see a small procession of crippled veterans outside Woolworths and other big stores, chests bedecked with medals, begging.

There were dozens of books forecasting war in the near future (EXODUS AD, DAY OF WRATH, AIR-GODS' PARADE, WHAT HAPPENED TO THE CORBETTS, PLAGUE OVER LONDON etc.,) Even in the mundane sphere there was a hulluva lot of emotion - I have a cutting here from News of the World 2nd Oct 1938, reporting "How Prime Minister Saved Europe from Deluge of Blood".,."A still more amazing demonstration followed as the Prime Minister, filled with emotion, resumed his seat. He was seen to be in tears, and no wonder, after the tremendous strain which had been placed upon him for many weeks...."

So to some it was stone cold certain that a war would lead to the collapse of civilisation. If the explosives didn't get you the poison gas would, and if you missed the poison gas you'd be killed by the plague which would follow large- scale death. A lot of leading fans were to testify that they were willing to endure anything rather than contribute to that collapse.

'Anything'? Don't forget that the facts concerning the Nazi purges were obscure. In those days the globe was large and Czechoslovakia, for instance, was as far away as Turkey is today. There were a few lone voices crying 'War!' who were thought suspect - Churchill, for instance, who was probably in the pay of the munitions manufacturers; Claude Cockburn, who was issuing a duplicated 'zine giving the inside stuff to members of the diplomatic corps, but he was a Communist - but amongst the public as a whole there was only what might be described as a dull resentment that this Hitler was upsetting things in far- away Europe. Some thought he was mad, some thought he was, fiendishly clever; overall there was fear.

One reads of soldiers going off to fight WW1 with a jingoistic laugh; when WW2 eventually arrived the mood was as sombre as that of any '80s fan facing a nuclear holocaust.

Before the war, science fiction was magazines. Pocket books, were nearly non- existent, and no publisher would be mad enough to contemplate a series which was specifically SF. Books of "Wellsian scientific romance" were rare. So the fan spent his 3d or 4d (don't forget that before the 'teen-age revolution' this might have been 1/20th of his weekly income) on American SF magazine, and made contact with others through the letter columns: No University groups, and THEN lists the number of clubs.

During the war a few emasculated magazines were allowed; these had serials and many of the stories missing and, most importantly from the fan's point of view, no letter columns. This, more than anything else, stopped British fandom dead in its tracks. For a number of years the only influx of new fans was through chance meetings. It was in this atmosphere that the Science Fantasy Society was formed, and it ran. for two or three years until magazines (British as well as American), with letter columns and Operation Fantast adverts, and local clubs, took over Spreading The Word. You have a quiet smile at the original Slater concept of the SFS, but in fact it turned out to be quite as casually organised as most other clubs, and for a short time after the war had a vital role to play. From then on. the acceptance of SF by publishers and the general public meant that the dreadful sense of isolation of a fan slowly vanished.

"The six-year interruption-led to a signifigant change of outlook ...for the present they were content to remain as they were..." you say of the '46/'47 meetings at the White Horse. True, and it puzzled me at the time. Later, I realised that with lives disrupted by the war, the older fans - Carnell, Chapman, Williams, etc. - were content to try and build up their personal relationships, inside and outside fandom, but had lost the proselytising urge which was still characteristic of Gillings (tho' he was strictly sercon) and us newer fans.

This resulted in a sort of division at those London Circle meetings, where the pros and would-be pros - Carnell (editor and agent), Gillings (ditto), Chapman (sideline in antiquarian SF selling), Williams, Youd, Clarke, etc. (budding authors) would be talking word-rates and editorial requirements etc., in one half of the room, and the faans (self and other members of the SFS, etc.) would be swapping magazines, playing darts, and talking fan stuff in the other half. A few - Bulmer, Temple, Tubb, and a few others - floated between, the two camps. At conventions, tho', we all worked together.

JOSEPH NICHOLAS
Pimlico, London.

Thank you for the copy of THEN. Despite all my reservations about your approach to the business of "doing history", I found it a genuinely riveting piece of work. I picked it up yesterday evening, intending to do no more than flip through it before dinner, but then found that I couldn't put it down again, and in the event read it right through to the end. This is, if nothing else, a testament to your narrative skill'. the ability to sieze your readers and keep them interested to the end.

You remarked in your letter in THE CAPRICIAN #2 that "we ought to do a lot more research and Get Our Facts Right". A vital part of doing research, and of getting the facts right, is itemising your sources, so that others have the opportunity to check into them as well - and, having checked them, review the use you've made of them and, by thereby validating your evidence, confirm the truth of your story. This is basic historical methodology - yet something you ignore. I can't imagine why. Having done all this research, having brought together in one place all this information, it is surely in your own interests to provide a thoroughly detailed, footnoted and cross-referenced list of your sources.

My original reasons were twofold. First, since a fair bit of this material was drawn from what may well be the only copies of some publications that still exist (in Vince`s collection) it seemed to me that that limited the scope of those following after to check my sources and make use of them. Second, I saw what I was writing as a 'popular' history rather than a work with the discriminating rigour of professional historiography and, more importantly, didn't want to tackle something I felt might interfere with my momentum and perhaps stop me from getting any further.

As you will have already noticed, source notes for the '30s and '40s are provided this issue. Those for the '50s have to wait for next issue since the text they cover, at 71 pages, will make them longer than I want to include in what is already one of the longest fanzines to appear in Britain in the last ten years (only Bridges' "Sheffield telephone directory" of a few years back was longer, I think - and possibly FANZINES IN THEORY & IN PRACTICE).

Actually, those who weren't commited pacifists didn't have much to say on the topic at all - when they were called up they went off to war with scarcely a murmur. You're right about the inadequacy of my coverage of pacifism in British fandom,of course. For more general background on 1930s pacifism - particularly the PPU, which was the largest pacifist organisation of the time and the one favoured by fans - see info in the preceeding UPDATE, which will be incorporated in the next draft. With regard to Rosenblum's own reasons for becoming a pacifist, it's impossible to say specifically since he never.(so far as I've been able to discover) went into print with them. However, I think the reasons Vince lays out in his letter are pretty close to the truth, particularly as I recently read a book (THE PEOPLE'S WAR by Angus Calder) that explains the fears of intelligent people of the time in strikingly similar terms.

Unavoidably to some extent, I'm afraid, though I will try and smooth out the transitions when I next revise it.

Thanks for THEN - an impressive bit of research. I don't know if there would be any old fanzines worth your while looking at in the Science Fiction Foundation's library, but it might be worth a visit. Julian Parr's fanzine collection ended up there. Possibly there might even be some of those missing FUTURIAN WAR DIGESTs.

Alas, no. There are.fanzines that went out with FWD, most notably what looked to be a complete set of Webster's THE GENTLEST ART, but FWD itself was poorly represented. Unfortunately, the Foundation's fanzine collection is a random grab- bag of British and foreign fanzines of the last fifty years, and though arranged alphabetically by title are not really of much use to the serious researcher. However, given the prozines I had to plough through when researching the '50s the Foundation is an absolute godsend (and will continue to be when I get stuck into the 1960s). It's amazing to think that such an invaluable resource exists on little more than enthusiasm and fresh air. The North-East London Polytechnic has provided it with a room and enough money to pay

for someone to run it on a part-time (3-days a week) basis, that someone being the ever-helpful Joyce Day, but that's about it. They have no funds for expanding their activities or even for buying new books, relying as they do on the generosity of publishers and individuals. The question of how to dispose of the convention surpluses that often arise is a thorny one, but I couldn't see too many people objecting to a portion of such surpluses being used to obtain books on the Foundation's wants list since the more comprehensive its coverage of SF the greater the service it offers to those who may one day want to make use of it, fans included.

When last I was there, Joyce Day asked me to appeal in particular for two issues of NEW WORLDS they need to complete their collection. So if you want to find a good home for issues 182 and 214 then get them to Joyce at:

North East London Polytechnic, Longbridge Road, Dagenham, Essex, RM8 2AS.

WAHF: Mal Ashworth, Dick Lynch, Sid Birchby, Ken Cheslin, Ethel Lindsay, Eric Bentcliffe, Brian Aldiss (whose account of his first contact with fandom from that letter is used on p.92), John Newman, Syd Bounds, Ted Chapman (of the SF Foundation) who reports a comment by Arthur C.Clarke: "I've also received THEN no.1 - British fandom in the '30s and '40s, which I read with fascinated interest as there were all sorts of things I did not know at the time". Mike Moorcock, Harry Turner, Don Allen, Jim Cawthorn, Alan Sullivan, Tony Chester, Skel, Steve Holland, Terry Jeeves, and Chuck Harris: "I found THEN absorbing and easy to follow and look forward eagerly to the next vital instalment... there, waiting in the wings 'The man who was to have the most impact on fandom ~n the 1950s had already taken his first steps .towards contacting his fellow fans...'. YES! YES!! YES!!! I had already joined The Universal Musketeers and written a werewolf story ...oh...you mean??? SHIT ...eclipsed by Willis again... is there no justice, no recognition? Am I doomed to be a fannish footnote remembered only for my filthy eavesdropping quotes on the back pages of "-"? Seriously, I hope that when you get around to it, you highlight Walt's effect, not only as a creative fan but as a teacher. He took a succession of sow's ears and transformed them into writers: I don't just mean James and Bob either. Clarke, Bulmer, Brunner. Jackson, The Benford Twins. Dozens more were all. influenced and encouraged by him. We used to joke in "-"... 'if we don't publish it, we criticise it free', but he really did offer constructive criticism to anybody who showed the slightest promise. I remember that one of my eternal werewolf stories, about weretigers just for a change - he was reduced to praising the names of the characters, but any sort of encouragement was manna from heaven, and a source of comfort to the tender young flower I used to be. This, I feel, was just as important, as the way he transformed fandom and made it fun rather than the stodgy sercon mess it once was, and today's trufans owe everything in fandom to Willis and Hoffman. (Apart, of course, from a lot of dirty Eavesdroppings that they owe to me)."
15 March '89