Friday fanzine excerpt: Anita B. Kimble's poem

Here's a lost poem from the past. Fifty-five years ago, in summer 1968, the short poem "Hindsight" was published in the 22-page one-shot fanzine "Moonshot" (FAPA 124).

The eight-line poem, which begins "When love has come and died away," was penned by Anita B. Kimble. There are some folks with that name who come up on Google searches, but none that I can 100% tie to being the author of this short piece, so it's a mystery. Perhaps some readers can help out, so that we can more properly credit the author.

Here are some of the other names of creators, many well-known with that era's fanzine community, tied to "Moonshot." I think they can serve as our best possible leads to learn more about Anita: Rick Sneary (The Hermit of South Gate), Len Moffatt, June M. Moffatt, Gail Van Achtoven, Jeremy Konigsberg, Don Fitch, Stan Woolston (J. Stanley Woolston), Ed Cox, Lois Lavender, Ethel Lindsay, Dean A. Grennell, Scott Kimble, Deedee Lavender, Roy Lavender, and Cathy Konigsberg.

Fanzine flashback #4: 1966's "The Twilight Zine"

Where do the years go? I launched the "Fanzines" subcategory in 2014 with a bounty of potential material in the hopper, but I never really got any momentum going. Maybe these posts are just too work-intensive. Maybe I got distracted by other ephemera baubles. There were some blogging interregnums over the years, too. 

Time for another go at it.

By way of reintroduction, here's an excerpt from what I wrote in April 2014: 

"Blogs are amateur-driven exchanges of information, ideas and comments (and often a lot of silliness) and, as such, are descendants of the amateur press associations of the late 19th century and, even more directly, the science-fiction fanzines that sprang up starting around 1930 and had their print heyday from the 1950s through 1970s. ... Indeed, 21st century bloggers aren't doing anything new. We're just continuing a decades-old form of idea-sharing and interaction on a digital platform. As an ephemera collector, historian of the obscure and fan of science fiction and fantasy, I have gathered a modest collection of 20th century fanzines over the past few years. But it's no fun keeping them under plastic and stuffed in a drawer. I am launching this occasional series to share and celebrate the work of these amateur fanzine editors and publishers whose passion and creativity blazed the path for the zebibytes of geek culture and conversation that now reside in cyberspace."

And so here is Fanzine Flashback #4, which I hinted at with a post earlier this month.

At a glance

• Title: The Twilight Zine
• Issue: No. 19 (No. 1 had been in January 1960)
• Date: "This issue of TZ is being produced on August 5, 1966, and will come out as soon as we have ready its accompanying masterpiece, Appalling Stories."
• Primary theme: Clubzine of the MIT Science Fiction Society. A 2014 article on MIT News explains that when freshman Rudolf "Rudy" Preisendorfer founded MITSFS in 1949, members would pass their books from dorm room to dorm room in a small plywood box. "Things have changed a bit in the last 65 years," the article states. "(MITSFS) maintains what is believed to be the world’s largest open-shelf collection of science fiction."
• Pages: 30 (not including covers)
• Size: 8½ inches by 11 inches
• Binding: 3 staples, now rusty
• Cost: 25 cents, or free in exchange for articles, artwork or LoCs (letters of comment)
• Editors: Cory Seidman & Leslie Turek
• Editors' location: Elmhurst, New York, but soon to be Cambridge, Massachusetts
• Artwork: Steve Stiles (cover and Page 3); plus Statton, Dorr, Schulz and Suford
• Typing & financing: Cory Seidman
• Data processing: Leslie Turek
• Mimeographic consultant: Erwin S. Strauss
• Mimeographic trainee: Edwin W. Meyer, Jr.
• Contents page motto: "Air-conditioning is a way of life."
• Provenance: I bought this for $1 at the York Emporium sometime prior to April 24, 2014

Contents

• Fit the First, editorial
• The Wanderer's Tale by J. Speiser
• Poetry Corner/Puzzle Department by Doug Hoylman
• Notes of the History of Machina by Cory Seidman
• A Possible Explanation of the Term Santaclara Drug by Tony Lewis
• A Fable, or Perhaps Not by Doug Hoylman
• Vergeltungsflotte by Ed Meyer
• Economy at NASA by Dick Harter
• Randomitude by Cory Seidman, DAVe Vanderwerf and Filthy Pierre
• The Bride of the Son of the Ghost of MITSFS by the Society
• Grassman by Cory Seidman
• Fecal Point by DAVe Vanderwerf
• Graphemics by the readers
• What Ever Happened to Good Ol' by DAVE Vanderwerf

Looking inside

Notes and thoughts on some of the articles in The Twilight Zine No. 19:

• In "Fit the First," written by Seidman, he offers some reflections on the summer of 1966 in Elmhurst, which is a neighborhood in Queens. Seidman writes first about the heat: "One this rare day of coolth, I pause to take stock and look back over this summer of grueling, not to say gruesom, heat. For the benefit of posterity, this was the July it was going into the nineties in New York two days out of three." (There's no hyperbole here. The summer of 1966 stood as New York City's hottest summer, by average daily temperature, until 2010. The average high in July 1966 was over 90° F. The New York Times reported that the city had more than 1,100 heat-related deaths that summer.)
• Seidman then goes on to defend the borough of Queens, despite its less-than-glamorous status as the "borough of cemetaries," in his words. For several pages, he lists the notable sites of Queens, such as Jackson Heights, Ozone Park and Flushing (at which point he campaigns to call the baseball team the Queens Mets). Ultimately, though, he gives up and agrees that Queens is far from compelling, especially compared to the other boroughs of New York City.
• The headline for RANDOMITUDE has MIT underlined. It represents an attempt to explain some of Twilight Zine's "more fundamental jokes and references." To that end, there are long lists of things that are random vs. things that are non-random (in other words, specific). So, Stranger in a Strange Land is non-random, while "all other Heinlein" is random. But then the lists get very strange, and clearly the rest of us will never get whatever in-jokes were happening at MIT in 1966. For example, the Fifth Amendment is non-random and the Eleventh Amendment is Random. James Buchanan is listed under both categories ("he's so random, he's non-random). ... 
• Additional aside: In the aforementioned 2014 MIT News article, then-MITSFS Vice President Laura McKnight states: "Since MITSFS is so old, we have a lot of basically 50-year-old in-jokes that nobody remembers the origin of." Those jokes include the library's collection of bananas, which could still be checked out by members as of 2014. “Be warned that we have a digital electronic checkout system, and if you return the banana late, it will fine you,” McKnight said.
• 
  Vergeltungsflotte is a piece of short fiction. Here's a sentence: "Now all that could be seen through the viewports were the flickering tendrils, of the sub-c field, but altogether too soon they would disclose the ships of the pursuing fleet as the Bilitus was forced back into normal space somewhere in the void between the stars." (An illustration from the story is shown at right.)
• "Economy of NASA" is a short bit of satire, providing a line-item list of how NASA was able to "save" $200,000 by spending $199,999.99 in order to figure out how to achieve those savings. Among the expenses toward this goal were "Cost of the time spent by Center Director to initiate the program," "Salary for administrator of savings program," "Cost of printing posters," and "loss of time spent on reading posters." 
• There's more humor in "Fecal Point," including this "news item": "JRR TOLKIEN has been slapped with a $20,000,000 suit for damages, says Skyrack, our well-known English counterpart. The plaintiff, Bilbo Baggins, claims that all of those books Tolkien has written were, in fact, written by him."
• Finally, Graphemics consists of the aforementioned LOCs (letters of comment). The long first letter is by Harry Warner Jr., and is dated May 26, 1966. It that touches on Warner's role as a fannish historian (he wrote the books All Our Yesterdays and A Wealth of Fable on the topic), microfilming, British science fiction magazines, Tolkien fans, Upper Volta and much more. The reader letters take up 9 of the issue's 30 pages.

Steve Stiles 1966 zine illustration

I really want to get back to reviewing and writing about old sci-fi and fantasy fanzines. It's one of those things I've never had much momentum with on Papergreat over the years. But it's loads of fun to dive into those typed and mimeographed issues.

Now sitting atop the pile, I have the August 1966¹ issue of The Twilight Zine (No. 19) that I'd like to write about before the end of this month. Edited by Cory Seidman and Leslie Turek, it's the clubzine of the MIT Science Fiction Society (@mitsfs on Twitter).

As a little preview of a full post about The Twilight Zine, here's an illustration by Steve Stiles (1943-2020) from Page 3 of issue No. 19. Stiles also did the cover, so stay tuned for the upcoming post!

Footnote

1. Historical context note: On August 26, 1996, NASA released the first photograph of the Earth as seen from the noon, snapped by Lunar Orbiter 1. Coincidentally, I began rewatching the 1998 miniseries From the Earth to the Moon last night.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

1974 fanzine advertisement for Paragon Illustrated

This advertisement appears on the inside back cover of the Spring 1974 issue (Vol. 2, No. 4) of Omnifan, a digest-sized fanzine that dealt with "mystery, adventure & fiction." I'm sure I'll get to a full rundown of it one of these days.

The advertisement is for Paragon Illustrated. It's a magazine that appears to have been published in fits and starts, and with different formats, between 1969 and 1975. Some information can be found at the Grand Comics Database. Some high-profile artists were involved, and the few issues that exist are listed for high prices (between $30 and $100) on eBay. Paragon Publications is now known as AC Comics and Wikipedia has this to say about early magazines such as Paragon Illustrated: "The company's early titles were cheaply published black-and-white comics. Though the company published several titles simultaneously, they were only able to produce a total of three issues a year, since nearly all writing, inking, and editing on the comics was done by Bill Black himself during this period."

Here's what the advertisement touts for the 44-page, $1 issue of Paragon Illustrated:

• DREAM WALKER — an unusual graphic experience by William Black
• MIKE ROYER's centerfold of PHANTOM LADY and color back cover of the SILVER SURFER
• DR. FATE — in-depth Golden-Age article by Martin Greim
• THE GIRL FROM LSD VS ALIZARIN CRIMSON by William Black (color front cover and strip)
• 3 full-page FANTASY illustrations by the fantastic STUART SMITH
• CAPTAIN MARVEL - DON NEWTON - SPIRITS OF THE DEAD - ROGER CORMAN - DUNWICH HORROR - BOB COSGROVE - and Horror fiction ... all in PARAGON 3!

Fanzine flashback #3.5b: Fantasy Advertiser from 1948

Here's some more about the 70-year-old issue of Fantasy Advertiser that I first wrote about on Sunday. (If you put #3.5 and #3.5b together, you'll essentially have one full post in this series — a post that should have been #4.0 — but now I've gone and zotzed the numbering of this series for good. Oh well. Future archivists will just have to deal with it.)

First up, some information about editor Norman E. "Gus" Willmorth. In the August 1944 issue of Futurian War Digest, which is fully available online, Willmorth provides this autobiographical insight:

"First, due entirely to natural causes I was born. Way out west where men are men and fantasy fans grow. Being a precocious child, I learned to read at an early date and have been at it since. Having cut my eye teeth on fairy tales of the type foisted on to children, I cannot give the exact date at which I began to enjoy the Exalted Literature, but I can remember THE WONDERFUL ADVENTURES OF NILS as well as selected portions of Grimms and Anderson. I would say that it was in the early thirties that I, situated more or less in the backwoods away from the general civilisation of the world, encountered my first science-fiction magazine. Enflamed by this chance reading I more of less forsook the classics in my search for more of this consuming what of Wells, Verne, Poe et al, that I was able to lay a hand to. From about '34 on my reading of S-F mags was more or less steady — the diet consisting of Astoundings because that was the only mag other than Argosy that was sold at my particular newstand (there was only one in the town). About the time Wonder became thrilling we moved to Chelan, Wash., where in the course of time I became familiar with and collected others of the fantasy family. Here I organised a small fan club — The Lake Chelan Fantasy Fictioneers, with myself as nominal head. And my magazine collection spread over the whole of the county. ...

"Then the army intervened and I moved from active fandom into active service. Aside from a short period in which I was stationed in Los Angeles proper, I have been more or less out of touch with fan activity in the United States since that time. However, arriving upon these English shores, I pitched in for some serious fanning, grasping as it were the fleeting hand of opportunity as it was raised to knock. Here I've been several places and did several things. I cannot claim to have been the most active figure in the islands, but I tried to keep up with the hurly burly of the rest of the crowd anyway. And shall some more, Ghu Willing."

Ghu, if you wondering and didn't click on the link, was the first fannish deity (called ghods) and was created by Donald Wollheim and John B. Michel in 1935.

You can read more about Willmorth's time in England during World War II, when he brought UK and U.S. sci-fi fans together, at this link.

* * *
Moving along, this issue of Fantasy Advertiser isn't entirely advertisements. Here's a bit about some of the articles and news items included:

• In a lengthy editorial that touches on numerous topics, Willmorth implores U.S. readers to send extra copies of fanzines to the United Kingdom, where readers are hungry for them. He also congratulates Gerry de la Ree, co-publisher of Loki, for his recent marriage.
• A full-page advertisement promotes the July 1948 second issue of The Moon Puddle, produced by Chad Oliver and Garvin Berry out of Galveston, Texas. According to Fancyclopedia 3, only one issue of this zine was published, so it's possible this is an advertisement for an issue that never came to fruition. If it was published, it would have included articles titled "The Vicissitudes of A.E. Van Vogt," "The Shaggy BEM," "Ghastly Patrol," and "Ghosties, Ghouls, and Gravin!" The Letters Editor was listed, tongue in cheek, as Abdul Alhazred.
• R.A. Elcun has a short column noting other current fanzines, including The Fabulous Faust Fanzine, Fantasy Review, The Fanscient, Sparx, Fan Artisan, Shangri-La, Macabre, The Sydney Futurian, Spearhead, Tympani, and Canadian Fandom.
• Julian Parr has a two-part article focusing primarily on German-made fantasy films.
• Earle Cornwall pens an obituary for writer and journalist W. Paul Cook, who had died in January 1948.
• And John Newman provides a two-page summary of the Whitcon, a UK convention that was held at the White Horse on Fetter Lane in the Holborn district of London and which featured a bookshop tour, rare magazines and illustrations, and A. Bertram Chandler as the guest of honor.

* * *
Finally, here are some advertisements and other images from within this issue of Fantasy Advertiser. The third item is a cartoon by artist Bill Kroll, who is credited just as "Kroll" here.

Fanzine flashback #3.5: Fantasy Advertiser from 1948

(It's been a redonkulous 174 weeks since the last installment of this series. This will only be a partial treatment, though, so I'm not counting it as full-fledged #4.)

Fanzine flashback #3.5: At a glance

• Title: Fantasy Advertiser
• Issue: Volume III, No. 2
• Date: July 1948
• Primary purpose: Articles and numerous advertisements
• Pages: 24
• Size: 5.5 inches by 8.5 inches
• Binding: Two staples
• Planographed by: John S. Swift Co., Inc.
• Printed in: St. Louis, Missouri
• Price: 10¢
• Editor: Gus Willmorth
• Awesome cemetery-themed cover artwork: Henry Ernst
• Description: "'The Amateur Professional for Professional Amateurs', published bi-monthly at 1503-3/4 12th Avenue, Los Angeles 6, California, by Gus Willmorth as a service to fantasy fans everywhere."
• Advertising rates: Ranged from 50 cents for a small ad to $5 for a full page.

Sampling of advertisements

• King Bros. Books of San Francisco was selling Beyond the Wall of Sleep, by H.P. Lovecraft, for $30. (That's $310 in modern dollars! If this, however, is indeed the Arkham House edition, it would have been a bargain at that price. Depending on the condition, it now sells for between $500 and $2,000.)
• Will Sykora, a "scientifictionist" and "science hobbyist" living in Long Island, promised to answer all letters sent to him.
• In a full-page ad, Ernst Schwartz of Tiny Novels Inc. in Lake Placid, New York, promised one free book with every order of 10 or more books. The free book would be The Pocket Book of Short Stories, The Pocket Book of Science-Fiction, or Oliver Twist. Also, if you ordered more than 20 books, the price dropped from 40 cents per book to 33 cents per book.
• 
  Gorgon Press of Denver, Colorado, was selling a limited edition of 1,000 copies of Moonfoam and Sorceries by Stanley Mullen (illustrated by Roy Hunt). The cost was $3.
• Volumes being sold by The House of York included Mistress Masham's Repose by T.H. White (89 cents), Star of the Unborn by Franz Werfel ($1.39), and The Beast of the Haitian Hills by Philippe & Pierre Marcelin ($1).
• Paul Skeeters of Pasadena, California, was offering his full run of Astounding Science Fiction from January 1930 through July 1948 for $150.
• The Devil's Foot Book Shop in Providence, Rhode Island, in a full-page advertisement, had offerings including John Silence by Algernon Blackwood, The Lords of Ghostland by Edgar Saltus, The Sorcerer's Apprentice by Hans Heinz Ewers, and The Fallen Race by Austyn Granville. Most books were priced between $5 and $10.
• E.A. Martin of Hartford, Connecticut, was looking for someone who would sell him issues 4, 5, and 7 of the Fortean Society's "Doubt."
• Joseph B. Baker of Chicago was selling A Treatise of Ghosts, described as "written in French by the Learned FATHER NOEL TAILLEPIED of the Order of the Capuchins, and now first translated into English. With an introduction and commentary by Montague Summers." Price was $7.50.
• Interplanetary Games of Fulton, New York, was selling, for just $2, Interplanetary, a "game of astronomy" in a "De Luxe Set" with "108 Beautiful Plastic Pieces." Immediate delivery was guaranteed.

1969 Ramada Inn newspaper ad to honor Apollo 11 moon landing

I thought this would be a cool item to post in conjunction with this week's dazzling flyby of Pluto by NASA's New Horizons probe.

Shown above is a Ramada Inn newspaper advertisement that came on the heels of the July 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing. The advertisement was reproduced in the September 1969 issue of Luna Monthly, a sci-fi fanzine based out of Oradell, New Jersey.

The advertising copy states: "SOON ON THE MOON! Meanwhile Back on Earth ... RAMADA IS 27,795 ROOMS LONG AND 250 INNS WIDE!"¹

And the Luna Monthly caption states: "One of the most imaginative ads which appeared in the newspapers in connection with the Apollo 11 moon landing, illustrating a complete Lunar Hotel, as designed by Ramada Inns. Units in the complex are inflated, set on telescopic legs, and joined by flexible tubular corridors. Ramada anticipates opening this Lunar Hotel by the time the first commercial flights to the moon begin."

Does anyone remember or know anything about this advertisement? My cursory Google searches didn't find anything.

The 32-page staplebound issue of Luna Monthly, in addition to providing coverage of the 1969 Trieste Film Festival², book reviews and a listing of upcoming sci-fi book releases, contains a lot of news and commentary about the moon landing. Some of those tidbits:

• David Charles Paskow, in a short essay, writes: "Let us not forget Willie Ley, a man whose dreams encompassed the conquest of the moon, but whose life ended so tragically short of the realization of this dream."³
• "Planetariums and space science museums around the country were playing to full houses with special programs tied in to the moon landing. An interesting sidelight was the report a few days before takeoff that the Hayden Planetarium in New York City had lost some 50,000 reservation forms for trips to the moon and other planets collected in 1950."
• "Among the more interesting publicity gimmicks are the free Rand McNally moon map from Brillo, available for 2 boxtops or labels and postage."⁴
• "The McDonalds chain had 5 million moon maps for distribution at splashdown."
• "And the U.S. Government is offering 12 full color 11" x 12" lithographs of the moon trip for $1.75, and a single 16" x 20" of Man on the Moon for $1.00."

Finally, what would a self-respecting 1969 sci-fi fanzine be without some Star Trek content? This issue has articles titled "Star Trek Goes to Church" by Chris Steinbrunner and "Humans and the Vulcan Ideal" by Sherna Burley. Plus, there is this cool caricature of Spock...

Footnotes
1. That would be an average of 111 rooms per hotel, which seems like a lot but I guess could have been feasible.
2. Some of the films noted in the Luna Monthly recap of the 1969 Trieste Film Festival are Le Dernier Homme, A Time of Roses, Tu Imagines Robinson, Az idö ablakai (Windows of Time), and The Illustrated Man.
3. Paskow himself died in 1971, but his contributions live on in the Paskow Science Fiction Collection at Temple University.
4. It's unclear to me whether Brillo's promotion was for a moon map or moon globe. This photo and article on Worthpoint indicate that a globe was available at some point. But I don't know if that's what you got for just two boxtops and postage.

1971 advertisement for issue #2 of "Balthus" fanzine

Here's a neat piece of ephemera, just in time for Halloween.

It's a classy, seven-inch-by-nine-inch advertisement for the second issue of Jon M. Harvey's "Balthus" fanzine. I found it tucked away inside a copy of David A. Sutton's July 1971 fanzine "Bibliotheca: H.P. Lovecraft."

Harvey, of Cardiff, Wales, only published four issues of "Balthus" — two in 1971 and two in 1972. It is documented online only briefly, at Fancyclopedia 3 and the British Fanzine Bibliography. In 1975, Harvey served as editor of a 24-page publication titled Cthulhu: Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos.

The flyer, however, provides a nice amount of detail about what he had planned for "Balthus" #2. Here's the text:

If you like folk-lore, the supernatural, horror and the fantasy of Abraham Merritt then the second issue of BALTHUS is for you! The contents of this issue consist of:

THE ETERNAL HUNTSMEN, a look at some of the many legends surrounding the lore of the Wild Hunt by Jon M. Harvey. Illustrated by Rick Scollins.

THE SMUGGLERS OF PENROSE, a ghost story from old Cornwall by Sarah L. Eneys.

ASH SHADOW, a short fictional horror by Mark Adlard. Illustrated by David Lloyd.

ABRAHAM MERRITT, a look at the man and his works written and illustrated by Brian J. Frost.

ASHES TO ASHES; printed separately from the rest of the magazine it contains an edited selection of letters on the first issue of BALTHUS.

Cover illustration by Jim Pitts; an adaptation from Clark Ashton Smith's "The Maker of Gargoyles".

Price per copy is 20p (60c). Reduced rates for bulk orders. There are a few copies of the first issue available also priced 20p. The second issue will be out late October, so order copies from:

jon m. harvey, 18, cefn road,
cardiff cf4 3hs

If any of that piques your interest, as of this writing, one copy of "Balthus" #2 is available from an AbeBooks UK seller.

Fanzine flashback #3: 1963's "Pot Pourri" by John Berry

Previously on "Fanzine flashback"
Fanzine flashback #1: 1964's "Con" by Christopher Priest
Fanzine flashback #2: 1964's "Hobgoblin" by Terry Carr

Flashback #1 also includes, toward the bottom, a list of all the vintage fanzines that I plan to feature in this fledgling series.

And now for the third installment...

Fanzine flashback #3: At a glance

Title: Pot Pourri
Issue: No. 30
Date: July 1963
Primary theme: Humorous fiction
Pages: 20
Size: 8 inches by 10 inches
Binding: Four staples
Editor: John Berry
Editor's location: Number 31, Campbell Park Avenue, Belmont, Belfast 4, Northern Ireland
Cover artwork: Arthur "ATom" Thomson (1927-1990)

Background: About John Berry

Although Berry wasn't as famous as the first two fanzine editors featured here (Christopher Priest and Terry Carr), he was quite well-known on the zine scene during the 1950s and 1960s.

Fancyclopedia 3 states that "John E. Berry discovered fandom while serving as an English policeman in Belfast."¹ Berry published numerous fanzines, including The Loneliness of the Long Distance Goat Herder. In 1960, he won the Skyrack poll for best fan writer.

With regard to Pot Pourri, there were 52 issues published between 1958 and 1968. ZineWiki² has a short history of the fanzine that contains this anecdote:

John Berry specialized in humourous fan writing. He recounts in Relapse giving Walt Willis the first issue: "When I gave Willis my first issue he observed, with raised eyebrows and slightly flared nostrils ... 'Er, John, this is rather a mundane title.' This was a truly wonderful moment for me, but I successfully concealed my emotion. You see, Irish Fandom in the fifties and early sixties was the epicentre of magnificent puns and verbal activity, pure spontaneous wit, and Walt Willis was the guiding genius. But he’d missed this one! Northern Ireland has always been religiously orientated ... the title is pronounced ‘po-poor-ee’ (according to my dictionary, anyway). The 'T' is silent. Hence, my title was a pun on 'Popery'! Even James White, a Roman Catholic, missed it – or did he? Maybe they collectively chose to ignore my unsubtle word-play, feeling sorry for my effort, an Englishman becoming involved in Irish religious affairs on an international scale."

Berry died of cancer in 2011, according to Fancyclopedia 3.

About this issue

Pot Pourri #30 contains a single tale, on 16 single-spaced typed pages, titled "The Return of the Goon." The humorous tale is a James Bond parody featuring fanzine-related plot points and a protagonist who uses a "plonker" (toy gun that shoots suction-cup arrows) as his weapon of choice.

The story, with its silly mix of James Bond espionage and womanizing and its absurd clues from the world of fanzines, isn't half bad. In addition to plonker, here are some other neat words and phrases Berry employs:

• trilby — a narrow-brimmed hat
• hobnail boots — boots with nails inserted into the soles to increase durability
• egoboo — a sci-fi fandom/fanzine word that means "ego boost." [As in: "All of those Supreme Court justices emailing me about how much they enjoy Papergreat was a huge egoboo."]

I'll leave you with this short excerpt from "The Return of the Goon":

"When the house was empty, I couldn't restrain the temptation any longer. I went to the Lumber Room, took off my smoking jacket and purple corduroys, and put on the G.D.A. outfit. I looked at my reflection in the mirror. Yes ... the whole vista came before my eyes ... the reflection in the mirror changed ... I saw myself as I had been years before, a dashing defective³ ... plonker in hand .... hmm ... I wondered ... where exactly was the plonker? I searched feverishly through the remains of the rubbish in the trunk ... yes, there it was, red with rust. I recalled I had oiled it, but with the passing decade...

"I fitted a plonker in the barrel ... put the plonker in the specially prepared inside pocket of the trench coat, then backed away from the mirror. I had to test my draw ... once a lightening draw, enabling me, at my peak, to shoot off five plonkers before the first one splatted home. Always with dead accuracy."

Footnotes
1. Fancyclopedia 3 also states in the John Berry entry that he "was known for playing ghoodminton with an exceedingly physical and violent style." And what was Ghoodminton? It "was a fannish equivalent of badminton; the only place you could play it was in the attic of Oblique House, the [Walt] Willis home at 170 Upper Newtownards Road in Belfast. The net was stretched between a printing press and a chair; a decrepit shuttlecock and two squares of cardboard were only equipment there was only one enforced regulation for the game: you couldn't throw heavy objects at your opponent."
2. ZineWiki is "an open-source encyclopedia devoted to zines and independent media. It covers the history, production, distribution and culture of the small press." It was created by Alan Lastufka and Kate Sandler in 2006.
3. I'm not sure if that word was supposed to be "detective."

Fanzine flashback #2: 1964's "Hobgoblin" by Terry Carr

Previously on "Fanzine flashback"

This series debuted earlier this year¹ with a look at a 1964 issue of "Con" authored by Christopher Priest. That post also included, toward the bottom, a list of all the vintage fanzines I plan to feature in future posts. Check it out to see what's ahead.

And now for the second installment, the cover of which is shown above...

Fanzine flashback #2: At a glance

Title: Hobgoblin
Issue: No. 12
Date: January 1964
Primary theme: Book reviews
Pages: 10
Size: 8½ inches by 11 inches
Binding: Two staples
Editor: Terry Carr (1937-1987)
Editor's location: 41 Pierrepont Street, Brooklyn, New York, 11201
Artwork: William Rotsler (1926-1997)
Duplicating services: Ted White and QWERTYUIOPress

As it went with researching "Con," I was surprised to discover that the talented people associated with "Hobgoblin" were pretty famous within the greater sci-fi world. In general, I was expecting these fanzines to be the work of people who were fairly obscure in the sands of time. But that hasn't been the case. Maybe that will change moving forward.

Background: About editor Terry Carr

Terry Gene Carr had an impressive and far-too-short life as an author and editor in the world of sci-fi publishing. He was on the verge of his 27th birthday when this issue of Hobgoblin, which he wrote entirely by himself, was published in 1964.

According to Wikipedia, he began working on fanzines as early as 1949. He went on to work at Ace Books as an editor of novels and anthologies. He also wrote a handful of books, including 1963's Warlord of Kor, which has a pretty rockin' cover.

Notably, Carr is also credited with commissioning the first novel by William Gibson.

The Internet Speculative Fiction Database has an excellent summary of the works with which Carr was associated.

Two other items of interest regarding Carr:

• The Eaton Fanzine Collection at the University of California Riverside, which is absolutely amazing and contains more than 100,000 zines, "grew out of the collections of four prominent fans: Terry Carr, Fred Patten, Bruce Pelz, and Rick Sneary."
• You can read an editorial on the development of fanzines that Carr wrote for Entropy #1 in 1964 here.

Background: About artist William Rotsler

William "Bill" Rotsler was an artist, author, sci-fi convention stalwart, sculptor and filmmaker whose career enthusiastically touched on everything from Star Trek to sexploitation films.

During his lifetime, he won five Hugo Awards for Best Fan Artist.

Rotsler was reponsible for the title of Harlan Ellison's short story "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream." The title was taken, with permission, from the caption of a Rotsler cartoon featuring a mouthless rag doll.

Here is The Internet Speculative Fiction Database's voluminous page on Rotsler.

There is an annual Rotsler Award in his honor and memory.

Looking inside Hobgoblin

This zine is packed to the gills with short books reviews by Carr and just one additional small illustration by Rotsler. There are 8½ pages, featuring 23 reviews of a diverse range of fiction and non-fiction. Here are excerpts from some of them:

• The Land That Time Forgot and The People That Time Forgot, by Edgar Rice Burroughs: "Burroughs was a pretty bad writer, and he couldn't plot worth a hill of beans either — he'd throw his characters into impossible situations and have them solve everything halfway through a book, then go off on a new tangest [sic] thereafter. This didn't exactly make for classic unity of plot. His characterization was often ludicrous."

• Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen:² "I approached these about half-convinced that no matter how good they might be I'd find them enjoyable primarily only as period-pieces, and I can't recall the last time I was so delighted to be wrong. They're immensely enjoyable novels, charming, witty, droll, and completely absorbing."
• One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey: "A very well-reviewed first novel, but a bit overrated, I think. ... Kesey's prose is often too perceptive and well-stated for his hung-up and largely uneducated narrator. ... There's also a shallowness of characterization throughout the book which considerably limits its effectiveness. Kesey's characters are almost all good ones, but they have all the depth of a good class-A Hollywood movie, which isn't nearly as much as the book deserves. Still, the story is fascinating and suspenseful, and the individual scenes come to life with feeling and often high good humor."
• The Violent Bear It Away, by Flannery O'Connor: "This is one of those Southern novels about God and sin and guilt and like that. It's interesting, and strikingly well written at times ... worthwhile reading, I think. But Flannery O'Connor has an irritating fascination with symbolism, and she overdoes it at almost every turn."
• Trent's Last Case, by E.C. Bentley: "One of the classics of the detective novel, and quite deservedly so. The book is an ingeniously set up double-triple-switch mystery, told in the leisurely style of the early part of this century. (It was first published in 1913.)"
• The Lost Pharaohs, by Leonard Cottrell: "The book is just a hodgepodge of interesting things about ancient Egypt, and while that's fine as far as it goes I'd hoped for something better."
• The Blue Nile, by Alan Moorehead: "A fascinating book, a companion to Moorehead's earlier THE WHITE NILE. ... The material is interesting in itself, but Moorehead's writing is the factor which makes the book a must. He has an unerring eye for what's interesting, and the ability to bring people and places to life on the page."

Finally, here is the (wacky) credits section from the bottom of Page 10 in its entirety:

"This has been HOBGOBLIN #12, January 1964, published for SAPS and Redd Boggs by Terry Carr, 41 Pierrepont Street, Brooklyn, New York, 11201. Illustrations by William Rostler, fandom's answer to Albert Schweitzer (who never asked). Superb mimeography by Ted White and QWERTYUIOPress. This Is Not A Rameses II Project. Arthur Thomson for TAFF! A bas les Coventranians. Remember the Alamo, the Maine, and the Rooster That Wore Red Pants."³

Footnotes
1. My apologies for taking so long between posts in this series. That is not my intent, moving forward. I want to be deliberate about setting up a schedule for writing about these cool zines.
2. I TOLD you his book reviews were diverse. I wonder what Carr would have thought of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.
3. According to Fancyclopedia 3, which quotes 1944's Fancyclopedia 1, "The Rooster That Wore Red Pants" is "a sorta gag line plugged, frequently in parafrazed form, by Walt Liebscher [1918-1985]. According to [Bob] Tucker, the symbol originated in a dirty story, but it was 'distinctly minor fare.'"

From the readers: Confederama, sci-fi covers, postcards and more

We're long overdue for a dive into the dandy reader comments from recent months and weeks...

Recalling the Civil War with 3 miles of electrical wiring and 650 lights: Brad Watson writes: "When I was a kid — 6-12 years old (1965-71) — my family would visit Chattanooga every summer. One of the reasons for this pilgrimage is that I was obsessed with all things Civil War and Abraham Lincoln. I remember my parents taking me to the 'Confederama' and thinking how cool it was! All those individually painted toy soldiers and train layouts. Wow! I AM 55 now and I'd love to see it again! I can then come home and play with my HO scale Civil War train 'The General' and some Civil War soldiers. It would be like being a kid again. Sorry Southerners, but I made sure the North always won. I think I'm the reincarnation of Lincoln, who was the reincarnation of Benjamin Franklin."

Cheerful Card Company can help you earn extra money for the holidays: Anonymous writes: "I am 58 and sold these cards for many years when I was younger and had regular customers who wanted imprinted cards. When I stopped selling them, I still had people calling me back for years hoping I would start again. Great memories!"

[Read MANY more memories of Cheerful Card Company in this March 28 post.]

Fanzine flashback #1: 1964's "Con" by Christopher Priest: Harry Bell caught a mistake by me: "Just a small point: contrary to 'At a glance,' Dick Howett did the artwork, not Dick Howlett."

Thank you, Harry! And that's not a small point. That's a big error on my part, and there's no excuse, because the printed name Howett was staring me in the face the entire time I wrote this post. I have gone back and fixed the name throughout. And I see, now that I'm searching under the correct name, that he was a published artist, per The Internet Speculative Fiction Database.

Thanks again, Harry, for your attentiveness and for taking the time to write.

In which my wife comes up with a new category of ephemera: My wife writes: "I am not only chuffed at the presence of these lists on Papergreat, I'm ecstatic that on further reading, I realized the second list contained notes about pineapple rum. While I don't drink and can't have pineapples, I'm excited for people who can."

Full disclosure: I had to look up the word chuffed.

Book Cover: "Invaders of Earth": This one received two comments.

Bart Ingraldi of Papersleuth.com writes: "I hope those cages have a transparent barrier. Those bars are kinda far apart. I love the campy cover art of the period, thanks."

Barry Dearling writes: "That looks like a real blast from the past. Love those fifties outfits, lol. But I do have a nostalgic side that loves all this old kind of B-movie material. I have always liked science fiction, and am always on the lookout for new exciting writers. My Kindle collection continues to grow!"

Mystery real photo postcard: Well-dressed girl and chair: Yan Pak writes: "So interesting when see an old postcard with human photo. I often wondering what a fate has/had this human, how does he/she now or was. Girl on photo is pretty! I wish a good in all her moments!"

A postcard mailed in 1910 and some Sunday night reading: Andy writes: "Interesting. I have several postcards with the PCU [Post Card Union of America] stamp on them (a paper or ink stamp indicating that the card is being sent as part of a PCU sanctioned exchange) and have tried to find out a little more about the organization, without success. It would be interesting to see the magazine, if any exist, but I've drawn a blank on that so far as well."

The Perry Pictures: Robert E. Lee: Ed writes: "I think that Perry Pictures was still in business in 1958 when I moved from Malden. The side street was near Malden Square and I went there frequently to get pictures for various school papers. It was fun and an experience going through the catalog."

Illustrations of Pennsylvania's orphanages, circa 1880: Lance Anderson writes: "Thanks for posting. The full PDF of the book is found here. Through this book, I learned that my great grandfather Richard Anderson was a resident at Mount Joy School for Soldiers Orphans from 1868 through 1872. His father John (my great great grandfather) was KIA on May 16, 1864. The building is still standing and being used to hold several apartments: 205 N. Barbara St., Mount Joy, PA 17552."

Nostalgia: Five TV movie intros that kids these days will never experience: Bart Ingraldi writes: "Million Dollar Movie — my gosh, I had to rewatch that intro a dozen times. A great piece of nostalgia! WOR and I grew up together."

Card from Wayside Gospel Crusaders in Lancaster: Anonymous writes: "Today purchased a gorgeous 1940s porcelain sign quoting Matthew 11:28 from Wayside Gospel Crusaders. Way cool piece of history."

Pics from the past #1: A trio of men: Sandi writes: "Weekend at Bernie's, vintage version?"

Which is an inappropriate transition to...

* * *Baby mystery remains unsolved

On May 12, I published a post with the jokey title "Authentic vintage postcard of Chewbacca holding a York baby." It was supposed to be a lighthearted look at an old postcard.

But, afterward, there were questions about whether this was actually a postmortem photograph.

At this point, there is still no definitive answer. And there is probably no way to ever have a definitive answer.

Here's a summary of the points made during the debate:

• My mom, who I agree with: "Not to spoil your fun with the York Chewbacca baby, but this might actually be a post-mortem photograph ... aka 'dead baby picture.' It was something some grieving parents did during this era. ... Sorry, but this is definitely a post-mortem photo. If you look closely at the eyes in the closeup ... you can see the irises are artificial and the baby's real eyes are looking up and you can only see the bottoms of them. Plus, a baby would never have stayed still long enough for a photograph."
• Sandi: "It looks like a christening picture to me. That baby is pretty bright eyed. And I always suspected that Chewie loved babies .. .he has a gentle heart, despite his burly, furry bigness."
• The Thanatos Archive Twitter account: "Well, I have good news — that photo is not post-mortem!" [The Thanatos Archive features Victorian Era post-mortem and mourning photography. So it's a bit of an expert source on this topic.]
• Anna Krentz, a student of Photographic Preservation and Collections Management at Ryerson University: "Sometimes it is hard to tell but I personally don't think it's post-mortem — retouching around eyes is very common in this period, especially on lighter coloured eyes. Babies absolutely could and did sit still long enough for clear photographs, there are millions of examples — in fact I have a very similar looking photograph of my great-grandmother ca. 1890, and she most definitely lived beyond that! Also the 'Chewbacca' cloth makes it more likely the baby is alive, as it is almost certainly there to conceal the mother holding the baby and keeping it quiet enough to stay still. With a deceased baby there is no need to hide the mother, you can simply pose the baby. Post-mortem photography was of course fairly common, as you say, but it isn't a conclusion you can leap to on the basis of retouching and staying still."

What do you think? My two cents is that the original image could not have been large enough for the photographer to do that precise level of retouching of the eyes after the fact. I think those irises were put in before the picture was snapped, which means...

(Here's a link to the full scan, which you can magnify.)

* * *One last thing: Praise from Russia

This morning, I got an unexpected email from Sergey in Russia, who had received a postcard from me through Postcrossing:

"Thanks a lot for this postcard! Your blog is a real treasure for me — it has so many interesting information! From recipes to different mysteries and illustrations — all what I like. Your blog necessarily will be one of my favourite pages! You have very careful handwriting. Stamps are great too. Thank you! I hope you have a happy summer too!"

Aww! Thanks, Sergey! You have a wonderful summer, too!

Fanzine flashback #1: 1964's "Con" by Christopher Priest

Preface

Blogs are nothing new. I mean, they're really nothing new.

Blogs are amateur-driven exchanges of information, ideas and comments (and often a lot of silliness) and, as such, are descendants of the amateur press associations of the late 19th century and, even more directly, the science-fiction fanzines that sprang up starting around 1930 and had their print heyday from the 1950s through 1970s.

In an article for Asimov's Science Fiction fabulously titled "Thought Experiments: How Propeller-Heads, BNFs, Sercon Geeks, Newbies, Recovering GAFIAtors, and Kids in the Basements Invented the World Wide Web, All Except for the Delivery System," the late Roger Ebert once wrote:

"[W]e were online before there was online. It is perfectly obvious to me that fanzines were web pages before there was a web, and locs were message threads and bulletin boards before there was cyberspace. Someday an academic will write a study proving that the style, tone, and much of the language of the online world developed in a direct linear fashion from science fiction fandom–not to mention the unorthodox incorporation of ersatz letters and numbers in spelling, later to influence the naming of computer companies and programs. Fanzines acted uncannily like mimeographed versions of Usenet groups, forums, message boards, and web pages — even to such universal design strategies as IYGTFUI (If You’ve Got the Font, Use It)."¹

Indeed, 21st century bloggers aren't doing anything new. We're just continuing a decades-old form of idea-sharing and interaction on a digital platform.

As an ephemera collector, historian of the obscure and fan of science fiction and fantasy, I have gathered a modest collection of 20th century fanzines over the past few years. But it's no fun keeping them under plastic and stuffed in a drawer. I am launching this occasional series to share and celebrate the work of these amateur fanzine editors and publishers whose passion and creativity blazed the path for the zebibytes of geek culture and conversation that now reside in cyberspace.² (For a list of other fanzines that I plan to write about, see the bottom of this post.)

Fanzine flashback #1: At a glance

Title: Con
Issue: Volume 1, No. 1
Date: August 1964
Primary theme: Science fiction
Pages: 20
Size: 8 inches by 10 inches
Binding: Three staples
Publisher/editor: Christopher M. Priest
Publisher's location: "Cornerways," Willow Close, Doddinghurst, Brentwood, Essex, United Kingdom
Artwork: Dick Howett
Duplicating services: Charles Platt

List of contents³

• Introduction
• "A Star is Calling Earth"
• CONsum-er
• Extrapolation in SF
• D.o.U.I.
• Purge — a short story by Philip Harbottle
• The Lights in the Sky
• CONscience
• CONnotations

Background: About Priest and "sercon"

This isn't going to happen with every fanzine that I review, but it turns out that Christopher McKenzie Priest, who was born in 1943, went on to become a very successful author in the years after he published Con.

You might know him best as the author of the award-winning 1995 novel The Prestige, which was adapted into an excellent movie starring Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman. But that was hardly the British author's only notable work. He has won the British Science Fiction Association (BSFA) award for best novel four times — in 1974 for Inverted World, in 1998 for The Extremes, in 2002 for The Separation, and in 2011 for The Islanders.

He has his own website and, ironically, blog. And his Wikipedia page is here.

And so it will be partially within the context of knowing that Priest went onto a successful career that we examine this issue of Con.

We also know, thanks to an article in THEN, Rob Hansen's history-in-progress of British science fiction fandom, that Con came along at a time in fanzine history when a wave of sercon — "serious and constructive" — publications were beginning to emerge. Hansen writes of "the new wave" in the mid 1960s:

"Chris Priest published his first fanzine, CON, in August 1964. The second, and final, issue appeared the following February. CON carried amateur fiction by such as Charles Platt, fannish anecdotes by Priest, and the like. Overall, it was considerably more accomplished than some of its contemporaries and when reviewing the first issue in LES SPINGE 14, Jim Linwood called it: 'one of the best first ishs for many years, displaying a maturity that is usually reached only by the fourth or fifth ish'."

Looking inside Con

The 50-year anniversary of this fanzine's publication is quickly approaching. In the introduction, which also features artist Dick Howett's sketches of both himself and Priest (shown at right), Priest lays out his vision:

"This is the first edition of CON, and this is the fourth introduction written for it. The previous three have been left at the wayside, scrapped as new thoughts have taken shape on editorial policy. With the first issue of a magazine, particularly an amateur one, it is to tread a perilous path to be dogmatic about editorial aspirations; and yet every magazine must have a definite plan of some kind to follow.

"CON's policy is rather difficult to describe, yet somewhat simpler in execution. ... Occasionally it will discuss sf in serious tones, at times it may be fannish -- but most of the time it will attempt to print articles which although not directly connected to sf, will be written in a manner that should interest the science fiction reader, fan or otherwise."

Unfortunately — and as we will see with numerous vintage fanzines that are discussed in the coming months — there were many obstacles to successfully publishing on a regular basis. Priest had a vision for his magazine, but, according to this British fanzine bibliography (and confirmed by Hansen), only two issues of Con were ever published: this one and a second one in February 1965.

This first issue has an interesting mix of content, and I believe Priest succeeded in his goal of making it compelling for readers with a general interest in both science and science fiction.

"A Star is Calling Earth," a two-page article written by Priest, discusses 61 Cygni and the (somewhat daft) belief of two Russian scientists at the time that one of its stars was "attempting to contact Earth by transmitting powerful radio or light beams in its direction." The scientists tried to weave the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa and the 1908 Tunguska event into their convoluted theory of attempted contact by alien races.

Priest has a healthy dose of skepticism for the theory: "There a number of holes in the story that underline the needlessness of immediate action." And yet he also leaves the door open for further investigation: "Perhaps the Russians are correct then. Perhaps there is a race of extra-terrestials trying to contact us. But does it not occur to you that they are going about it in a heavy-handed way? What can the mentality of a race be, that they use a weapon of inconceivable power to call us. One is reminded of a man who, on getting no replay to his front-door knock, kicks down the door to ensure he is heard!"

Moving along, in the "CONsum-er" essay, Priest presents the 1=2 algebraic paradox (which is discussed here, if you're interested) and offers "any currently-published science fiction paperback ... to the first person to pinpoint the fallacy." It's a neat little change of pace.

Moving along... "Extrapolation in SF" is a critical essay by Priest that mentions works by Frederik Pohl, Robert Sheckley, Arthur C. Clarke, Fritz Leiber and others. ... D.o.U.I. stands for "Department of Useless Information" and includes trivial tidbits such as "The moon's distance from the earth increases by five inches every sidereal year." ... And "Purge," the short story, takes up five pages and has some minor parallels to the tale of the X-Men, which first began appearing in the comics in September 1963, about a year before this fanzine was published. The story's author, Philip Harbottle, has also gone on to have a successful and interesting career in science fiction. (See his biographical entries on DarkFantasy.org and The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.)

There are more essays by Priest in the fanzine's final pages. "CONscience" considers the mysteries of our solar system, including the rings of Saturn, the axial tilt of Uranus and the contradictions of Pluto. And "The Lights in the Sky" is part-speculative and part-philosophical in nature, focusing on star-gazing and space travel. Priest writes:

"Today, as interplanetary flight is being planned and man will leave the atmosphere at last, navigation will come to depend more and more on the art of celestial course-plotting. ... But were were to go out in space, what would we see? Out in space there is no atmosphere to distort our view of the stars. To date, no man has really been outside the Earth's atmosphere; including those men who achieve orbital flight. What will be seen, once we're well away from our plant? Will the stars, as forecast by prominent astronomers and scientists, shine forth in a new blaze of unprecedented glory? Or will they fade to apparent invisibility, lost in the reaches of airless space — their rays of light dissipated by the incredible distances travelled?"

I bet Priest has loved living through everything from Voyager to Cosmos to the Hubble telescope to Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Finally, "CONnotations" is a long closing statement from Priest. A few excerpts:

• "It will be obvious by now that CON is not a frivolous magazine, and perhaps this is a major fault. The overall effect seems to be, on a quick re-appraisal, one of overwhelming seriousness. Let me say at this point that this was not the intention, and it is a genuine hope that subsequent issues will change this."
• "With with exception of the short story, the entire contents of this first issue have been written by me. Although this is fairly usual state of affairs with new fanzines, it cannot go on. Only so much can be written by one person, because after a while the standard of work goes down and lapses into hack-work. Outside CONtributions, therefore, are requested."
• "On the subject of fiction, by the way, CON will publish one short story each issue, for which the contributing author will be paid in cash. I am, evidently, one of those rare people who think that amateur fiction-writers should be encouraged."
• "CON, like many other fanzines, is only produced on an irregular basis. ... To earn a copy, write a letter of comment, send me a shilling for each copy you want, send me your fanzine, or else make friends with me."

Finally, I should also note that Con contains at least a dozen illustrations by Howett. This is the one that appears on the back cover...

* * *
Other fanzine issues to be featured
Each of these will have its own future installment. If you know anything about one of these fanzines or editors, contact me at chrisottopa@gmail.com.

• Karma, No. 2 (August 1961); publisher Earl Noē, associate editor Timothy J. Dumont; Fort Worth, Texas
• Wizard, No. 1 (May 1966); coordinator Alma Hill; Boston, Massachusetts
• Loki, No. 7 (no date); publisher and editor Dave Hulan, art editor Katya Hulan; Van Nuys, California
• The Odd One, first annish (anniversary) issue (late 1950s); publisher Clayton Hamlin, art editor Tim Dumont; Bangor, Maine
• Fafhrd, Vol. 1, No. 1 (May 1955); published and edited by Ed Cox (Hermosa Beach, Calif.) and Ron Ellik (Long Beach, Calif.); art editor Howard Miller
• Umbra, No. 13 (April 1956); published and edited by John Hitchcock; Baltimore, Maryland
• Hobgoblin, No. 12 (January 1964); "published for SAPS and Redd Boggs by Terry Carr"; Brooklyn, New York
• Troll Chowder, No. 1 (September 1962); written and published by Terry Carr; New York, New York
• The National Fantasy Fan, Vol. 21, No. 3 (June 1962); edited by Albert J. Lewis; Los Angeles, California
• The Twilight Zine, No. 19 (August 1966); edited by Cory Seidman and Leslie Turek; Cambridge, Massachusetts
• Omnifan, Vol. 2, No. 4 (Spring 1974); published and edited by David Anthony Kraft; Saint Michael, North Dakota
• Pot Pourri, No. 30 (July 1963); printed and published by John Berry; Belfast, Northern Ireland
• Warlock, Vol. 1, No. 3 (March 1964); published by Larry Montgomery; Anniston, Alabama
• Amra, Vol. 2, No. 44 (October 1967); published by "the Terminus, Owlswick, & Ft Mudge Electrick Street Railway Gazette" and serving as "the official organ of the Hyborean Legion"; Eatontown, New Jersey
• Amazing, Thrilling, Sexy, Astounding, Analog, and Dry Dull Boring Scientific Fact Neffer Stories, Vol. 1, No. 1 (June 1961); published by "the Fan Hillton"; Los Angeles, California
• Salamander, No. 3 (July/August 1962); published by Fred Patten; Los Angeles, California
• Fadaway (formerly The Monday Evening Ghost), Vol. 3, No. 3 (early 1960s); published by Bob Jennings; Nashville, Tennessee

Footnotes
1. I highly recommend that you read the rest of that article by Ebert. It's filled with anecdotes about how fanzines influenced him and his experiences publishing his own fanzine, Stymie. You might also enjoy a shorter, related piece that Ebert wrote in 2008, titled "Fanzines Beget Blogs." Finally, I love that young Ebert labeled his own fanzines (see a picture here). You can read more about that in this 2013 remembrance written by "The Editors" of RogerEbert.com.
2. I don't know if it's actually true that there are zebibytes of geek culture on the internet. My wife might. But it just seemed like an equally impressive and humorous word to use there. So I did.
3. Given the fanzine's title, it's labeled as the "CONtents."