{"id":6743,"date":"2013-04-30T02:11:12","date_gmt":"2013-04-29T23:11:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tentaclii.wordpress.com\/?p=6743"},"modified":"2013-04-30T02:11:12","modified_gmt":"2013-04-29T23:11:12","slug":"the-fannish-activity-of-louis-c-smith-1928-1944","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/2013\/04\/30\/the-fannish-activity-of-louis-c-smith-1928-1944\/","title":{"rendered":"The fannish activity of Louis C. Smith, 1928-1944\/6"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lovecraft correspondent Fred Anger planned an index to Weird Tales<\/em> and an edition of Lovecraft\u2019s Fungi from Yoggoth<\/em>, both with Louis C. Smith. It seems that Smith has long been a minor and almost total mystery to Lovecraftians. But he can now be fairly easily traced through his fannish activities, although his birth and death dates, and his post-war occupation, remain elusive.<\/p>\n

John Cheng\u2019s book Astounding Wonder: Imagining Science and Science Fiction in Interwar America<\/em> (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012) names Smith as… \u201cLouis C. Smith on the Berkeley-Oakland side of San Francisco\u201d and details on page 217 some of Smith’s early fannish involvement…<\/p>\n

   \u201cIn 1928 Aubrey MacDermott, Clifton Amsbury, Lester Anderson, and Louis C. Smith on the Berkeley-Oakland side of San Francisco Bay began meeting monthly as the Eastbay Science Correspondence Club (ESCC). Raymond Palmer, originally a Chicago SCC member, suggested a national merger [with his own organisation and they became the] Eastbay Scientific Association, merged into one club under a constitution drafted by Dennis, Clements, and A. B. Maloire of Chehalis, Washington.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cheng appears to be drawing here on Joseph L. Sanders\u2019s Science Fiction Fandom<\/em> (1994), although I am unable to access his footnotes.<\/p>\n

Harry Warner Jr.\u2019s book All our yesterdays: an informal history of science fiction fandom<\/em> (1969) noted on page 59 and 67 respectively that…<\/p>\n

   \u201cLouis C. Smith had dozens of custom-bound volumes that he entitled \u2018Fantastic Fiction….\u2019 and that \u201cLouis C. Smith kept a card index in the thirties that contain facts on more than a thousand books\u201d but that is all I have been able to access online.<\/p>\n

Evidently Lovecraft was not dealing with a couple of vapid star-gazing schoolboys. Smith was serious about bibliographic undertakings.<\/p>\n

Smith also contributed letters to the Jerome Siegel (1914-1996) fanzine Science Fiction<\/em>, and had a letter in the very first issue in November 1932.<\/p>\n

Smith had an article or letter in the August 1934 issue of The Fantasy Fan<\/em>, in which he noted that \u201cA. Merritt is of French Huguenot ancestry\u201d. Smith and his friend Fred Anger provided \u201cAn Interview with E. Hoffman Price\u201d published in The Fantasy Fan<\/em>, December 1934.<\/p>\n

Smith contributed an article on \u201cPhillip M. Fisher, Jr.\u201d to Fantasy Magazine<\/em>, August 1935. In 2011 this was due to be reprinted as an introduction to the book Strange Ocean Vistas of Philip M. Fisher<\/em> (George A. Vanderburgh\u2019s Lost Treasures from the Pulps<\/em> #12) but this is a volume that although prepared seems to have been delayed.<\/p>\n

An article \u201cPhantasy’s Trend\u201d by Louis C. Smith appeared in The Phantagraph<\/em> fanzine of February 1936. <\/p>\n

The Futile Press\u2019s The Science Fiction Critic<\/em> (December 1936\/January 1937, \u201cVolume One, Number Six\u201d) contained work by a \u201cFrederik and Louis C. Smith\u201d, the Smith item titled \u201cFantasiana\u201d. One wonders if the \u201cFrederik\u201d was Smith\u2019s friend Fred Anger. It seems likely he was. The Science Fiction Critic<\/em> fanzine was edited by Claire P. Beck, and that particular edition was the first issued from her new address at Lakeport, California. <\/p>\n

Smith had a column titled \u201cFantastica\u201d in the fanzine Helios<\/em> (Oct-Nov-Dec 1937). <\/p>\n

According to the online The FictionMags Index<\/em> Smith had letters published in Weird Tales<\/em>: \u201cFeb, Dec 1933, Dec 1934, Aug 1935, Nov 1936\u201d.<\/p>\n

Smith had a column published in the Tesseract<\/em> fanzine: December 1936; and January 1937 (titled \u201cAuthorsophy\u201d, stated as being… \u201ca column by Louis C. Smith which quotes Edmond Hamilton, E. E. Smith and others\u201d); and March 1937; and October 1937 (titled \u201cScience in Fiction\u201d). Tesseract<\/em> was apparently the product of The Science Fiction Advancement Association of San Francisco, with which Smith was presumably involved since he was evidently living in the city. In 1941 Smith was noted in a SF fanzine as living in San Francisco…<\/p>\n

   \u201crecent news from America is that that eternal infernal bibliography-in-preparation bug has now bitten old-time fan Louis C. Smith and Fantasia<\/em>-editor Louis Goldstone, both of San Francisco.\u201d (Futurian War Digest<\/em>, 1941, No.14).<\/p>\n

This quip probably refers to Smith’s venture with co-editor Jack Riggs, on a 28 page index of SF pulp stories: Unknown Index: Fantasy Fiction in Three Sections, Table of Contents, Index of Titles, Alphabetical List of Authors<\/em>, Berkeley, Calif., 1944 or 1946. A book record at Worldcat describes this work as an… \u201cIndex to the 39 issues of Unknown<\/em> and Unknown Worlds<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"index\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The cover of this work actually gives us an address: \u201c1620 Chestnut Street, Berkley-2- California\u201d<\/p>\n

However, this may have been Jack Riggs rather than Smith\u2019s address, since the 1941 Fanzine Yearbook in section two of Le Zombie<\/em> (January 1942) gives the title and address of Smith\u2019s own fanzine:<\/p>\n

   \u201cTELLUS    Louis C. Smith, 1845 Prince Street, Berkeley, California. Mimeographed; monthly; two; 16 pages; 10 cents.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tellus<\/em> is in the Special Collections Department, University of Iowa Libraries… “Tellus<\/em>. Nos. 1, 2 (1941), 3 (1942), 4 (1943), 5 (1944), 6 (1945)”<\/p>\n

This fanzine run might be usefully inspected for any article by Smith remembering his contact with Lovecraft or his circle. It might also give biographical details for his friend Fred Anger.<\/p>\n

Smith’s home was also a venue for weekly fannish SF meetings in his city, according to a footnote to an article in Astounding Science Fiction<\/em> in 1942 (Volume 28, Issue 6, page 110)…<\/p>\n

   \u201cEvery single member is an Astounding<\/em> SF fan, which isn\u2019t as astounding as it may seem. We meet every Friday evening at 1845 Prince Street in Berkeley with Louis Smith as director.\u201d<\/p>\n

All goes rather quiet on the Louis C. Smith front after this. But in 1971 a paper was presented to the first Popular Culture Association National Conference (East Lansing, MI, April 8-10, 1971) by a Louis C. Smith, titled \u201cJohn Clark Ridpath and Popular History – Neglected and Forgotten\u201d. Ridpath was a popular historian 1869-85. It might suggest that Louis C. Smith became a academic or more likely an academic librarian, since he obviously had the bibliographic bug in him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lovecraft correspondent Fred Anger planned an index to Weird Tales and an edition of Lovecraft\u2019s Fungi from Yoggoth, both with …<\/p>\n

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