Eat It--Strangers!
| Open Letter | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Eat It--Strangers! |
| From: | William L. Hamling |
| Addressed To: | The Stranger Club, fandom at large |
| Date(s): | Printed December 1940 |
| Medium: | |
| Fandom: | Science Fiction |
| Topic: | Fandom and Profit, Stardust |
| External Links: | Hosted online by fanac.org |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Eat It--Strangers! was a 1940 essay printed in Fanfare. William L. Hamling, the editor of Stardust, accused the Stranger Club of maligning his zine by calling it commercialized and the stories "rejected tripe".
Excerpts
First of all, the back room hob-nobs say that STARDUST is not a fan magazine because it publishes fiction -- and rejected tripe at that! All right, wise guys -- how many of the magazines you read don't publish fiction! And you can bet your bottom dollar that the fiction the fan magazines publish has since its origin from the respective author's pens, seen the rounds of all the major publishing houses! Just to mention a few of the fan mags that publish fiction: SPACEWAYS, FANTASCIENCE DIGEST, SCIENTI-SNAPS, THE SCIENTIAL, etc. And we can go even further to say that there are some fan magazines that publish fiction exclusively!! E.g.:HORIZONS, POLARIS, etc....
Hamling cited several stories that had been printed in Stardust and also accepted by major publishers like Amazing. He added that while most stories he printed had been rejected, some quality sci-fi stories were rejected by one publisher and then accepted by another:
Example: Nelson Bond sold a 40,000 word novel to the BLUE BOOK magazine, at a damn good wage. Well believe it or not, but this story, Exiles In Time, was rejected by AMAZING STORIES!!!! So what!!! ---Strangers, go hide your heads in the pickle barrel...
It is claimed that STARDUST'S circulation is composed of 200 active fans. In the first place I never knew there were that many active fans! Can you name them for me? But to continue, STARDUST'S circulation is not dependent on fandom proper. It it were there wouldn't be any STARDUST.
Hamling attributed his circulation of 1000 to the fact that he'd advertised Stardust in Popular Mechanics, Startling Stories, and sent out regular circular postal cards. He added that he also sold it on some major Chicago newsstands.
The truth of the matter is, that if I depended on the sole support of the active fans for the life of STARDUST, there would not be any STARDUST. Damn it! Do the Strangers think I am a walking mint? That I can lay over $75.00 per issue on the line out of my own pocket? Hell no!...STARDUST was founded to fill a niche long vacant in fandom. That of a printed, de luxe fan magazine. To do this a number of things had to be accomplished. I knew that I would have to attract a a larger audience than immediate fandom to meet expenses. I did. My 1,000 subs, if the MIT wizard [Earl Singleton] can multiply, are equal to about $75.00 per issue. This money, with an occasional ad bit, has to pay for the publication, mailing, (which comes to $20.00 alone) and advertising. I am not making money. I never intended to make money. I don't ever intend to do so with the magazine! I can't!!
...I have tried to give fandom a magazine it would cherish. I have tried to raise the fan magazine a little higher in the publishing field -- to give an atmosphere to our great organization. I have tried to please both the active fans and passive fans. The passive fans demand stories, the active fans demand articles. I give you both. I give you illustrations, science articles, fan pictures and biographies. What the hell else can I give!
Hamling mentioned having printed the convention program for Chicon I at a loss, and added that the Convention Committee had pocketed about $20.00 apiece from the con profits (confirmed by Bob Tucker in his 1965 account The First Chicon).[1] He was also publishing Bizarre (formerly Scienti-Snaps) for Jack Chapman Miske, again at a loss.
Why do I do these things then?BECAUSE I AM A FAN! I AM TRYING TO DO WHATEVER I CAN FOR FANDOM. MONEY DOESN'T MEAN ANYTHING TO ME -- I'M LOSING IT! And what do I get called for my labors?--a shyster!!!!! You fellows ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Could you do what I am doing? If not, shut up.
Beat It, Hamling
Treasurer Earl Singleton responded in a short essay titled Beat It, Hamling, countering that he alone had written the op-ed that left Hamling so enraged, and the article wasn't meant to represent the entire club.
Let's quote Hamling: "pickle barrel, pickle barrel"--no, that's not it--here it is: "I never intended Stardust to have 3/4 of the magazine devoted to idle chatter and gossip..." Thus Hamling characterizes fan material. Woe betide!Earl Singleton: Beat It, Hamling. Fanfare issue 5 pg. 8 (Dec. 1940)
Singleton corrected Hamling's math in several places and pointed out that by his own admission, only one of fandom's five "big names" had ever subscribed to Stardust. He added that Stardust's failure was the only final proof needed of its quality. Singleton also added that Hamling had only attended Chicon I for five or six hours, which was odd since Hamling was a fan and lived in Chicago. This was because Hamling, a con committee member, had fallen out with the members of the Illini Fantasy Fictioneers who made up the main committee.
As to Hamling's report that Mark Reinsberg came to him for the convention booklet, which he happily printed at a loss, Singleton said, "You may believe his version of the Chicon Booklet thing if you wish to; there are other stories floating about...if they were entirely false, they wouldn't have gotten started." Bob Tucker's The First Chicon says that the booklet was actually jeopardized over a case of antisemitism, and Jack Speer's Fancyclopedia named Hamling outright as the perpetrator.[2][3]
References
- ^ Bob Tucker: The First Chicon, pg. 5. Tau Ceti Reprints no. 2, May 1965.
- ^ Bob Tucker: The First Chicon, pg. 4. Tau Ceti Reprints no. 2, May 1965.
- ^ William L. Hamling on Fancyclopedia. Text quoted from Jack Speer's first edition (1944).