Foreword by Kay Price
An Introduction by the Author
Arfstrom, Jon
Bloch, Robert
Brackett, Leigh
Brennan, Joseph Payne
Counselman, Mary
Elizabeth
De Camp, L. Sprague
Derleth, August
DeVet, Charles
Hamilton, Edmond
Jacobi, Carl
Johnson, W. Ryerson
Leiber, Fritz
Long, Frank Belknap
Moore, C. L.
Nixon, Raymond B.
Price, E. Hoffmann
Roemer, Theodore
Ronan, Margaret
Saari, Oliver
Shea, J. Vernon
Simak, Clifford
Thompson, Tommy
Walton, Evangeline
Wandrei, Donald
Wellman, Manly Wade
Williamson, Jack
Wollheim, Donald
Other Books by the Same Author
During one of our late night talk session, Donald Wandrei told me he sold his first story, "The Red Brain," to Weird Tales magazine in 1927. Although it was rejected the first time by Farnsworth Wright, the editor of Weird Tales, fellow pulp author H. P. Lovecraft had advised the younger writer to wait five or six months and submit it again. HPL added Wright’s memory was poor, probably from the Parkinson’s that plagued him, and a second submission would probably do the trick. Wright apparently did not remember the initial attempt, and upon reading this submission was so impressed, he published the story.
"Tomorrow, Tao Fa [E. Hoffmann Price] hits town," Mary Elizabeth Counselman wrote me 40 years ago. Ed Price made several what he called "safaris," to visit fellow pulp authors all over the U. S. and I was always lucky to be included by visits from both these masters of the macabre. MEC (Miss Counselman) continued her epistle: "I’m following his progress from New Orleans by sound—women screaming, or squealing as the case may be: men yelling and cursing and firing shotguns… Will let you know about his visit, unless my husband gets him first!"
I was fortunate to have known so many of the "pulpsters" and each through unusual channels: Robert Bloch because Wandrei called him every week and made me play "Rhapsody in Blue" on the piano for him; Carl Jacobi whom I first met while tricks or treating at his house on a long ago Halloween night; August Derleth because he rejected my story and called it "the worst story I’ve ever read (I was 15);" and Charles DeVet because Andy Decker and I found a geographical error in one of his novels. And most of the pulpsters followed because of similar reasons over a long period of time.
Come share these memories with me. The subjects are some of the finest people I’ve ever met.—Jack Koblas