Ziff-Davis threw Browne something of a budget for FANTASTIC,
as it was meant to be a semi-slick successor to their dying
pulp line (which included AMAZING STORIES, FANTASTIC
ADVENTURES [which soon merged with FANTASTIC], and MAMMOTH
DETECTIVE), and the first year of FANTASTIC had excellent
design and handsomely saturated color covers. AMAZING was
retrofitted simultaneously, and had its own ghosted materials
(a parody of the Jack Lait
& Lee Mortimer [city-name] CONFIDENTIAL mapbacks entitled
"Mars Confidential" being the most obvious). TALES OF THE SEA
was in the same format, apparently.
Likewise the "Spillane" issue of FANTASTIC apparently was
their bestselling.
I dunno...the face-sketches were so amateurish in both
magazines that I wonder if anyone could've done them...and I
would suggest that the early FANTASTIC covers were, if
anything, even handsomer than the early MANHUNTs I've seen.
TM
-----Original Message----- From: Dick Lochte [mailto:
dlock@ix.netcom.com]
That issue of Fantastic -- Nov-Dec., 1952 -- also has stories
by Richard Matheson, whose short bio says he was making
"fancy airplane parts out in Los Angeles" at the time, and
Cornell Woolrich ("The Moon of Montezuma"). In addition to
gathering a pretty good assortment of writers, Howard Browne
also used the same unnamed artist who provided Manhunt with
its pen sketches of authors. The story illustrations had that
Manhunt look, too. Cover is a magnificently garish
wrap-around of a blonde in a red peignoir being attacked by
little demons with sharp spears that are dripping blood from
a dead guy on the floor. A real beauty.
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