The Fanzines of Trek -- in situ

[Neopeius]

At least one person has expressed interest in an analysis of the fanzines contemporary to the original showing of TOS to gauge fan reaction. Since FANAC has lots of 'zines, and as I have a collection of all the (known) extant Trekzines from the 60s, I might as well log what I found out for the edification of my fellow Trekkies.


There was some buzz in September 'zines about how well-received the two Trek pilots were at Tricon (1966's Worldcon in Cleveland). The first one shown was "Where no Man has Gone Before" followed the next day by a black and white print of "The Cage".

In November:

From Horib 4:

"THE PLICKS: "Fantastic Voyage" of course had magnificent special effects, but it had about as much Plot as "Touring Lake Winnebago with Rod and Camera." For me, then, a mitigated flop. The Star Trek pilot that did not sell was fine. The one that did...well, those ball-bearing eyeballs just.don't get me. Pat and I missed the screening of Time Tunnel but made a point to watch it on the Home Screen, and thought it less bad than most fans whose opinions we’d heard."

From Yandro 165:

A long exhortation from Juanita Coulson (worth reading) to write letters to save Trek. The following page reprints Ellison's letter from THE COMMITTEE (and the details about its creation can be found in Harlan's book on the making of "The City on the Edge of Forever".

James Torren from Amelia, Ohio, writes in the lettercol that he thinks Trek is "pretty good" but that if they've got teleportation, why do they need starships [Coulson gives a long, reasoned explanation].

Fred Clarke of Elwood Park, Illinois, says he's "nuts about the show" and that it's "as close to films as you can get.")

Kay Anderson of Albuquerque, NM, says they get Trek on Saturday nights in their market. She says she's a Trek fan, but when she tells "real" SF fans that, they look at her funny. Kay goes on to say she thinks Shatner chews scenery but he's light years better than Jeff Hunter. She also likes Nimoy's Spock, particularly how he's stopped smiling so much.


That's November 1966. I'll be back later today with December.

 

[Kor]

Interesting observations there from the early years.

... "THE PLICKS: "Fantastic Voyage" of course had magnificent special effects, D bub Xt had about as much Plot as "Touring Lake Winnebago with Rod and Camera." ...

I was wondering exactly what "D bub Xt" was. Looking at the document, it appears that was some kind of text encoding error or something, since that sentence actually says, "...effects, but it had..."

Kor

 

[Daddy Todd]

Juanita Coulson would go on to some prominence in Trekfandom, editing one of the earliest Star Trek fanzines (ST-Phile) and writing fanfic (one of her fan stories was reprinted in ST: New Voyages). Her husband, Robert "Buck" Coulson, was never as big a fan of the show as Juanita. There was quite a lot of coverage of Trek in Yandro in 66, 67, 68 & 69. It's worth skimming those issues to find contemporary reactions among the wider SF fan community.

Juanita went on to a minor career writing science fiction novels, mostly for Del Rey.

 

[XCV330]

At least one person has expressed interest in an analysis of the fanzines contemporary to the original showing of TOS to gauge fan reaction. Since FANAC has lots of 'zines, and as I have a collection of all the (known) extant Trekzines from the 60s, I might as well log what I found out for the edification of my fellow Trekkies.


There was some buzz in September 'zines about how well-received the two Trek pilots were at Tricon (1966's Worldcon in Cleveland). The first one shown was "Where no Man has Gone Before" followed the next day by a black and white print of "The Cage".

In November:

From Horib 4:

"THE PLICKS: "Fantastic Voyage" of course had magnificent special effects, D bub Xt had about as much Plot as "Touring Lake Winnebago with Rod and Camera." For me, then, a mitigated flop. The Star Trek pilot that did not sell was fine. The one that did...well, those ball-bearing eyeballs just.don't get me. Pat and I missed the screening of Time Tunnel but made a point to watch it on the Home Screen, and thought it less bad than most fans whose opinions we’d heard."

From Yandro 165:

A long exhortation from Juanita Coulson (worth reading) to write letters to save Trek. The following page reprints Ellison's letter from THE COMMITTEE (and the details about its creation can be found in Harlan's book on the making of "The City on the Edge of Forever".

James Torren from Amelia, Ohio, writes in the lettercol that he thinks Trek is "pretty good" but that if they've got teleportation, why do they need starships [Coulson gives a long, reasoned explanation].

Fred Clarke of Elwood Park, Illinois, says he's "nuts about the show" and that it's "as close to films as you can get.")

Kay Anderson of Albuquerque, NM, says they get Trek on Saturday nights in their market. She says she's a Trek fan, but when she tells "real" SF fans that, they look at her funny. [Note: it is unlikely the entire fan community rallied to save Trek…] Kay goes on to say she thinks Shatner chews scenery but he's light years better than Jeff Hunter. She also likes Nimoy's Spock, particularly how he's stopped smiling so much.


That's November 1966. I'll be back later today with December.

thanks for sharing that. I really love to see those old mimeo, ditto and hecto zines. Yandro was almost semi-pro (maybe it was?).

 

[Daddy Todd]

thanks for sharing that. I really love to see those old mimeo, ditto and hecto zines. Yandro was almost semi-pro (maybe it was?).

I don't think the Semiprozine designation existed for most of Yandro's history. Maybe right towards the end, when the Coulson's were managing an issue or two a year (Juanita got really busy with her professional writing career, leading to months or even years between issues.)

And it was always mimeoed, save the last two issues -- one in 1984, and the last one in, apparently, 1991.

But I don't believe it would've qualified anyway. Circulation was never big enough, and I don't think they ever paid for content. It was hugely influential, and nominated for multiple fanzine Hugos, even winning the silver rocket in 1965.

 

[Neopeius]

I don't think the Semiprozine designation existed for most of Yandro's history. Maybe right towards the end, when the Coulson's were managing an issue or two a year (Juanita got really busy with her professional writing career, leading to months or even years between issues.)

And it was always mimeoed, save the last two issues -- one in 1984, and the last one in, apparently, 1991.

But I don't believe it would've qualified anyway. Circulation was never big enough, and I don't think they ever paid for content. It was hugely influential, and nominated for multiple fanzine Hugos, even winning the silver rocket in 1965.

Juanita's an inspiration, to be sure. My 'zine's been nominated three times and I hope we someday get the rocket as well!

Alright -- on to December. Glad you folks are enjoying this.

 

[Neopeius]

In December. The first effort to "Save Star Trek" climaxes and resolves. In an earlier thread, we discussed the number of letters actually generated by this campaign, and also the results thereof. I've interceded commentary throughout regarding this first great fan mobilization.

From Dynatron 30 (Albuquerque-based 'zine):

Roy Tackett, the editor, writes a page about how he's gotten the letter from The Committee like "everybody". His reply to the impassioned plea to "save Star Trek" was:

"I think I'll sit this one out."

He likes Trek, thinks it's decent (not Hugo-worthy and with lots of plot holes) and he read The Committee's letter at the Albuquerque SF group's fan meeting. But he thinks the whole move is a cynical attempt by a bunch of stf (scientificition) writers to keep alive a market that they can write for and make money.

Bob Vardeman reviews a bunch of SF shows on TV. Re: Trek, specifically "The Man Trap" (not to be confused with "The People Trap", a 1966 Italian production of Robert Sheckley's short story, later a novelization of the movie):

"This one has fairly believable acting by hero number one, Capt James Kirk (William Shatner) and the distinct possibility that hero number two, Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy) will develop into a convincing alien.' The script was very good, for a TV show, and even though Van Vogt wasn’t credited, the premier was a mixture of

Black Destroyer type monster (that seems nice until it kills a dozen or so) and "Asylum" with Dreegh type vampire that sucks salt from, its victim's body). It looks as if Star Trek might turn into a Voyage of the Space Beagle. The special effects were pretty standard with the only notable thing being the view of the planet from space. This scene was highly reminiscent of Bonestell's work. ADVICE: warm up the old boob-tube for this one."

He pans everything else on TV, including all of the Irwin Allen shows (I agree with his assessments) but he has fun things to say re: reruns:

"Locally televised reruns; THE OUTER LIMITS which had its high points and its low points but on the whole is worth seeing again. ADVICE: Do not, under penalty of midnight telephone calls, criticize Harlan Ellison's scripts in your fanzine.

Also in view again is THE TWILIGHT ZONE which is mostly fantasy with a few worth watching again. Charles Beaumont's scripts were usually good and a few by Rod. Serling can be classed as excellent."

[Note that, when that was written, it was becoming known that Beaumont was terminally ill and that Jerry Sohl had ghosted some of his last scripts.]

"Roytac" generally agrees with Vardeman:

"...If the fantasy fad lasts another year or so we might end up with a couple of good shows. Of those currently on the air, the best of the lot is Star Trek. The producers of that one seem to have some acquaintance with stf which is more than can be said for the rest."


From Nyrarlahotep 4:

[Did you know that Tricon was not the first showing of Trek? It actually debuted right here in San Diego. From Ed Wood's Westercon (July 4th weekend, 1966) report:]


"The second pilot film of the new TV series, Star Trek, was shown; it was almost first-rate. Note that I said almost...the production values (acting, sets, models etc.) were very good but the ideas were little improved over the average mundane movies or TV shows. According to Earl Kemp, the " first pilot was really way out in its originality. Well, I disagree with a lot of Kemp's ideas, but I can't really judge something I haven't seen."

[I'm not sure where Kemp saw the first pilot, if he did at all or just heard about it from Gene or someone.]

[BTW, you can find Bjo Trimble's art in this one. She's been a force for fandom since the beginning of the decade – she organized a caravan to Worldcon in '61.]


From Rally 14 (a Southern 'zine):

[Basically a repeat of the "save Trek" we saw in last month's Yandro.]

"It's not perfect, but it's damn good for TV."

"Can we accomplish something for once? I dunno, but today I wrote four explicit notes myself supporting STAR TREK. Are you enough of a sf fan to do half that? I hope so; I hope so...... "


From Degler 158 (a New York 'zine), 12-2-66:

[Save Star Trek.]

Also, "Now I called Lester Del Rey (who had given permission to use his name on the letterhead) , and as usual, Lester had a few biting remarks about Star Trek. However, he did inform me that Gene Roddenberry was giving this project silent support."

[Note: Here's an example of a Committee Member being lukewarm about the letter campaign…]

"I'd advise all fans to give this your support; with thousands of letters rolling in, I'm sure that NBC would hesitate to cancel Star Trek."

[Note: Estimation of response in the thousands, not tens or hundreds of thousands.]


From Degler 159, 12-9-66:

"Star Trek has suffered from friendly s-f writers looking for a piece of the action to the tune of $12,000, and as a result the reception there is a lot cooler than it was 6 months ago. A few s-f writers are still doing scripts for Star Trek, but on the whole the show is now using hollywood writers, primarily. Only established writers with specific ideas for shows should approach the show, and only then through a recognized Industry agent, whenever possible."

[Info taken from the SFWA Bulletin for November '66 by permission of Damon Knight (then President). ]



From Yandro 166, 12-30-66:

"Well someone out there in the nebulous land populated by "They" is listening to me. In the letter column this issue, Buck mentions we received a nice long letter from Roddenberry, and as further part of my bandwagoning, I wrote to Mort Werner, chief something or- other in charge of programming at NBC; mostly I was complaining about NBC scheduling a rerun for STAR TREK on December 22 [they reran "What are Little Girls Made of", but I sandwiched my complaints between compliments in my best psychologist manner. Back came a very prompt and very polite letter thanking me for my interest, promising me STAR TREK would have a new script come December 29, expressing pleasure that I enjoyed the show, and explaining that network series had to do reruns for various reasons: -bad scripts, illness of a star, weather, etc"

...Well, from previews shown last week, I will admit it looks as if STAR TREK may indeed have some weather in the December 29 episode — but up till now they have been the most weatherless show I've ever seen. Every episode has involved the interior of the ship or obviously painted backdrops or papier mache rocks drumbled all over Desilu's sound stage. We studied that "weather" excuse, and decided maybe one of Desilu's doors got blocked by a mud slide — or maybe some of the cast and the camera crew got the flu driving thru a cloudburst on the way to the studio. I do see Werner's point, and I'm pleased he took the time to write, but that particular word stood out like a very sore thumb."

Juanita Coulson


[Note: someone on TBBS noted that folks in TVland at the time were ignorant of how TV shows were made. Clearly Juanita is clued in, though she doesn't mention "Miri" or the back lot.]


Juanita adds later:

"Star Trek" appears to be saved. Goodrich and Sieger both quoted VARIETY to the effect that it had been scheduled for the rest of the -season, and we have a letter from Gene Roddenberry giving more details. (This will also be in the next issue, unless Roddenberry refuses permission to publish, an unlikely event.) The letters are helping. Keep on writing now and then."

[Of course, a helpful person on TBBS clipped an October 11, 1966 paper that said Trek had gotten the full season already! But it may not have been common knowledge. Certainly Gene was hoping it wasn't…]


From Alex Panshin (already a pro by then, and someone who has appeared on the Journey):

"I'm beginning to think that science fiction is not really suited to television. That TV sf-that I have seen has mainly been basically... low like TWILIGHT ZONE, or basically stupid like almost any program you care to name. Low budgets and the popular nature of TV - which is to say the limited audience for difficult ideas - are enough to make good sf really impossible. And I have to say I suspect any medium whose vision of the future is to dress characters in lame''or velours and stop there. I don't think there is any future for sf in TV, so I can't say I'm particularly moved by Harlan Ellison's frantic appeal for help. I guess I just don't care if STAR TREK dies."

Juanita responds:

"I dunno — anyone' who could look over the stories nominated, for the next Nebula Award and then complain about stf on tv just doesn't think the way I do, If this crap is the best written stf of the year, I'll take STAR TREK any old day."


Jay Kay Klein:

"Well - surprised to receive a note from you. Of course, STAR TREK is an important subject. Yes, I received a letter from Harlan (and "The Committee"), and I took notes at the recent STAR TREK - six sponsors, which I will mention when I write. I think I will write NBC in NYC - I dunno if writing Desilu direct is a good thing - looks like a "put up" job. Also, even if we have a write-in campaign now, these characters (sponsor's ad agencies) look to a, steady flow of letters - and not from the same persons."

He goes on to talk about the economics of ad companies. He ends with:

"Having watched STAR TREK with great admiration, I was immediately struck by the thought this can’t last! As a matter of act when I sent Gene Roddenberry some photos he'd requested, I told him I thought the production was excellent, and only hoped its excellence didn't get in the way of its continuance."


Buck responds:

"Well, we have & letter from Roddenberry (which I'll publish if I get permission), saying the letters helped, and Sieger and Goodrich both mentioned "that according to Variety the Show has been scheduled for the rest of the season. (Surprised me; I never had any real hope that the show would be saved at all.) You have one very important point — sponsors and ad agencies look for a steady flow of letters.

Okay, the current crisis is past. Anyone who want to keep the show on, get it renewed, for next season, etc, keep writing. You wrote some letters;- fine. Write another one, now. .You don't need to write every week, but once a month or so won’t kill anyone."


Gene DeWeese says:

"Somebody-must be confused. Did you notice the last Tv Guide (Dec 17-23) that the "programming head of NBC" was predicting a long run for STAR TREK?

Well,- I didn’t get a whole lot of work done for AC last week, but... If everyone who accepted a card/cards sent them in, STAR TREK got about 45. If everyone who said they'd have their friends and relatives also write in on their own cards did, they got maybe 60. Plus half a dozen from ourselves.

As for the "posters", who knows? I got two up at Harouette, two at UWM a couple at Harnishfegger, one over the stf section of City News, and one in the middle of the stf section of the public library. (That last one may not have lasted long; I just taped it up to a shelf at eye level and left it. I suspect the first person in authority who say? It took it down) At the newstand, I got the owner's permission...)

How about STAR TREK this week? I thot it was one of the best they've had. At least the most "believable", insofar as the "battling with and defeating the aliens" went. They didn't have to depend on luck or legislation, but actually won legitimately, unlike "The Menagerie" and "Corbomite" epidodes. The Romulan ship, tho, did bear an unfortunate resemblance to a German submarine. But that's nitpicking.

The thing that probably jarred a lot of people who expect happy endings was the death of the prospective bridegroom. I must check tomorrow with one guy at work whose wife used to hate "EAST SIDE, WEST SIDE because they didn't have happy endings."

[East Side, West Side was a great show, by the way…]




So the timeline for SAVE STAR TREK appears to be very short – Harlan rallies the troops in latter November, and Trek is already "saved" by the end of December. Gene says "the letters helped" which makes no sense since the show was already set for the season the prior October.

[Ain't no way, as a fan asserts in early January '67, that nearly a million letters got sent in that month's time, in this first letter-writing campaign.

[And that's December! I'll be working on January today and talking about the articles that have come out as of January 12. Perhaps I'll make it a bimonthly update.

 

[ChallengerHK]

In 1997 I was researching an academic piece and looking for examples of pre-TMP zines. I had a lot of trouble finding large amounts of this material (including a memorable exchange with Ann Crispin, who wrote to me saying "You can't borrow mine!" when I had never asked her to :-) . I was finally put in touch with Ming Whatne, curator of the Corellian Archives. I spent a couple of weeks in Santa Barbara (what I do for research), researching in the Archives, helping her come up with a way to organize it, and interviewing her.

Her memory was that Trek fans were not particularly welcomed into SF fandom, but that their numbers quickly became overwhelming. After the WorldCon viewing and Asimov's vocal support, most organizations realized that there was little they could do to keep Trek fans separated, according to Whatne.

 

[Neopeius]

In 1997 I was researching an academic piece and looking for examples of pre-TMP zines. I had a lot of trouble finding large amounts of this material (including a memorable exchange with Ann Crispin, who wrote to me saying "You can't borrow mine!" when I had never asked her to :-) . I was finally put in touch with Ming Whatne, curator of the Corellian Archives. I spent a couple of weeks in Santa Barbara (what I do for research), researching in the Archives, helping her come up with a way to organize it, and interviewing her.

Her memory was that Trek fans were not particularly welcomed into SF fandom, but that their numbers quickly became overwhelming. After the WorldCon viewing and Asimov's vocal support, most organizations realized that there was little they could do to keep Trek fans separated, according to Whatne.

Right. That's why I think the second letter campaign had to have to dwarfed the first. There just weren't enough lit SF fans (not counting that a decent number of them didn't like Trek) to launch a big campaign, and there was no mobilization of Trek fans at large in the first campaign.

I think I'm done for now after the following two 'zines, which likely would have arrived by January 12:


Haverings 25

[Editor received the Committee letter.]



Science Fiction Times 438 (probably written at the end of December)

[Editor received the Committee letter. Save Star Trek!]


The first Trekzine, Vulcanalia, is probably out, but I'll give it the benefit of the doubt and wait another week. Yandro won't be here till the end of the month.

This week, we'll continue the tradition of reading fanzines before the Trek episode airs at 8:30. If anyone is interested in joining, drop me a line.

[Edit: In the February issue of the prozine Galaxy, editor Fred Pohl laments that Trek has probably already been canceled by the time the magazine hits the newsstands (late December/early January).

His editorial was likely written in late November/very early December, right after getting Ellison's Committee letter. I'd say he was overselling the disaster to increase turnout, but it doesn't read that way. It sounds like he genuinely expected any fan attempt to save the show would be too feeble to make a difference.]

 

[BK613]

From Rally 14 (a Southern 'zine):

[Basically a repeat of the "save Trek" we saw in last month's Yandro.]

Except that the publisher explicitly states that four letters came from him and he exhorts others to do at least half that much. To quote:
"Can we accomplish something for once? I dunno, but today I wrote four explicit notes myself supporting STAR TREK. Are you enough of a sf fan to do half that? I hope so; I hope so...... "

 

[Neopeius]

Except that the publisher explicitly states that four letters came from him and he exhorts others to do at least half that much. To quote:
"Can we accomplish something for once? I dunno, but today I wrote four explicit notes myself supporting STAR TREK. Are you enough of a sf fan to do half that? I hope so; I hope so...... "

For sure. I'm not trying to say that no one was active in the first campaign. After all, there was the fellow who reported as much as 66 letters sent. Just that even if everyone in the SF fan community wrote four letters apiece, that wouldn't amount to 100,000 letters, much less a million.

 

[BK613]

For sure. I'm not trying to say that no one was active in the first campaign. After all, there was the fellow who reported as much as 66 letters sent. Just that even if everyone in the SF fan community wrote four letters apiece, that wouldn't amount to 100,000 letters, much less a million.

Well, you could try setting aside the presumption and following the data where it goes.

 

[J.T.B.]

Thanks for posting. These are great to read; I have only come across a small sample of this kind of thing in my life. It's wonderful to see the kind of informal vernacular writing that you'd rarely see in "professional" published material. Strong historical value there.

Is this from your collection Neopeius? If so, have you considered putting any on archive.org ?

I was wondering exactly what "D bub Xt" was. Looking at the document, it appears that was some kind of text encoding error or something, since that sentence actually says, "...effects, but it had..."

The OCR caught the top of the "R" on the next line and read it as "D". The "bub" looks like just a misread of "but" but I have no idea where the "X" came from.

 

[Neopeius]

Thanks for posting. These are great to read; I have only come across a small sample of this kind of thing in my life. It's wonderful to see the kind of informal vernacular writing that you'd rarely see in "professional" published material. Strong historical value there.

Is this from your collection Neopeius? If so, have you considered putting any on archive.org ?



The OCR caught the top of the "R" on the next line and read it as "D". The "bub" looks like just a misread of "but" but I have no idea where the "X" came from.

Yeah, I did lousy OCR. I'll clean it up at some point. I'm glad you're enjoying it!

These are not mine -- Fanac has a lovely collection, and I've linked all the cited mags. It's worth reading them for all the other SF coverage too!

As for the Trekzines, I have some good friends with a digital archive of all extant copies (which is most of them). I don't have permission to freely distribute them, but I will be summarizing as they come out.

 

[J.T.B.]

Yeah, I did lousy OCR. I'll clean it up at some point. I'm glad you're enjoying it!

I know, sometimes it feels like OCR cleanup is not much easier than just transcribing in full!

 

[Noname Given]

So the timeline for SAVE STAR TREK appears to be very short – Harlan rallies the troops in latter November, and Trek is already "saved" by the end of December. Gene says "the letters helped" which makes no sense since the show was already set for the season the prior October.

^^^
The GR comment makes perfect sense since GR wants to keep whatever fanbase he has engaged and active in keeping the show going. Telling the truth with a response like (hypothetical):

"I appreciate the letter campaign, but it didn't make any difference as the show was already picked up for a full season..."

Would come back to bite GR if/when he wanted to mobilize another letter writing campaign. The truth here would not suit any future goals GR had at that time.

 

[Neopeius]

Well, you could try setting aside the presumption and following the data where it goes.

Okay. Let's do that.

These are the facts:

1) The letter campaign lasted a month or so. (initiated latter November; first report of "nearly a million letters" in early January)
2) The letter campaign was instigated by Harlan and his "COMMITTEE" and aimed at the existing fan community, specifically the folks running fanzines and clubs.
3) Response was strong but not universal, with some fans sending multiple letters, and some saying "bah, humbug." There were enough SF fans looking down on Trekfans that Trekfans noted it.

Now the disputed points:

a) The first campaign was not a general one. The participants in the first campaign were spurred on by Harlan. The folks who participated would have done so at the urging of Harlan or the fanzines or clubs to which he sent letters. It's possible that some people may have been spurred to action by actions of club members -- there's at least one person who reported putting up signs at colleges and other places with SFnal/Trekkish interest. We have no evidence that these efforts bore fruit.

There's no evidence that the Trek community at large was activated, or even that there was much of one in late '66 (the very first Trekzine came out in January '67).

Do you have evidence to the contrary?


b) The SF fan community was not very large.

i) Through 1966, Worldcon membership never broke 1000.
ii) Regional con crowds were much smaller -- in the dozens, sometimes hundreds.
iii) The fanzine subscription lists suggest there were, at most, a few thousand active fans.

Do you have evidence to the contrary?


Based on the evidence that:

I) The campaign was short;
II) The campaign was aimed at a community of a few thousand people;
III) That the community did not universally support the campaign;
IV) The lack of indication that any outlet received a lot of letters (as opposed to the second campaign, which elicited admission from the network that they got more than 100,000 letters -- note, this is still an order of magnitude less than a million);

I conclude that the first letter campaign could not have generated a million letters. They'd have been hard pressed to generate 10,000 letters.

 

[Neopeius]

^^^
The GR comment makes perfect sense since GR wants to keep whatever fanbase he has engaged and active in keeping the show going. Telling the truth with a response like (hypothetical):

"I appreciate the letter campaign, but it didn't make any difference as the show was already picked up for a full season..."

Would come back to bite GR if/when he wanted to mobilize another letter writing campaign. The truth here would not suit any future goals GR had at that time.

Of course you're right. What I meant was "Gene's comments were disingenuous."

 

[BK613]

@Neopeius I'm still waiting for data from you that the community is as small as you claim. Not suppositions but data like fanzine subscription numbers, number of clubs and membership numbers, etc. Not vague pronouncements that one has to take on faith.

(BTW, there was no claim of a million letters in Jan, 67, just a fan speculating on a number which he explicitly says he doesn't know.)

 

[Neopeius]

@Neopeius I'm still waiting for data from you that the community is as small as you claim. Not suppositions but data like fanzine subscription numbers, number of clubs and membership numbers, etc. Not vague pronouncements that one has to take on faith.

No. I've been spending dozens hours collecting all the info I can, and the best you have is "nuh uh."

How about you prove to me that the fan community was as large as you claim.

(BTW, there was no claim of a million letters in Jan, 67, just a fan speculating on a number which he explicitly says he doesn't know.)

Good. Sounds like we agree that a million is too high. That's something!

And I lied. I did some research for you. Analog's distribution was ~145,000 per month, a little under half of whom were subscribers. It was by far the biggest mag, the others having circulations under 100,000, closer to 50,000. And there was cross over, so one can't just add them all together.

This gibes well with ACE having average sales runs of 40-70K.

So one could guess that the dedicated reading community of SF fans was 100-200K. That's a lot of people, though a drop in the bucket compared to nearly 200,000,000 Americans.

As for what percentage of those were active fans who could have heard Harlan's plea? It's going to be a percentage, and then many of those will actively ignore it. The only mag that mentioned the Committee letter was Galaxy, which would have hit the stands in latter(?) December. Readership for that one was ~50K.