Wed 10 Aug 2022
2022 50th Anniversary PulpFest Convention Report, by Walker Martin.
Posted by Steve under Collecting , Conventions , Pulp Fiction[22] Comments
by Walker Martin.
(Dedicated to the memory of Ed Kessel, Rusty Hevelin,
and Nils Hardin.)
50 Years! I attended the first Pulpcon in 1972 with my wife and we are among the very few survivors of this great, life changing convention. I say “life changing” because it seems that my entire life has revolved around pulp, book, and art collecting. Almost all my yearly vacations were scheduled to coincide with the convention dates and the show often overshadowed other major events in my life.
Though I started collecting in 1956 when I bought my first SF digest off the newsstand(I still have that issue of Galaxy), my collecting interests really increased a lot due to my attendance at Pulpcon and Pulpfest. My fondest memories are involved with this show and I’m still enthusiastic about collecting pulps and books even though I’ve been at it for 67 years. I may not need many wants anymore but I love collecting and attending the shows and talking to the many friends I’ve made over the years. It’s true that many of them are no longer with us but the memories live on.
When Eleanor and I took the two day trip to St Louis in 1972 we were newly married and I drove a Volkswagon Beetle with no trouble at all. 50 years later, I no longer can drive long distances, but I have some good friends that do the driving. I think the great white rental van days are over, and this time Matt Moring of Steeger Books drove us in his big pickup truck. The storage area was just large enough for all the pulps and books that we bought.
I was on the Pulpfest 50th anniversary panel and talked about the first convention. How Ed Kessel, the organizer, kept nervously taking off his hair piece. During the convention half the time he had hair and half he was bald. When he realized that he lost $500 putting on the show, he said that he would not do another one. But Rusty Hevelin saved Pulpcon by seeing that the convention continued each year.
This year there were almost 400 rabid collectors in attendance and around 100 tables. But 50 years ago there were less than 100 in attendance and around a dozen tables. What saved the convention in 1972 was Nils Hardin bringing in over a couple thousand pulps from the Fred Fitzgerald collection. Fitzgerald, who lived near St Louis in Festus, Missouri, died in the 1960’s and his widow advertised that his enormous collection was up for sale at her house. Price was cover price! Ed Kessel, Earl Kussman, and Nils Hardin drove out and while Ed and Earl cherry picked SF and Hero pulps, Nils bought extensive runs of Argosy, Bluebook, Short Stories, Adventure, Complete Stories, Top Notch. Not to mention all sorts of detective pulps.
Many of these pulps I obtained often had Fred Fitzgerald’s name on the cover and words circled inside in blue and red ink. In fact when I was drafted into the army, I spent time at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri and I used to date a girl in Festus. She was divorced with two children and I met her at a dive called Whiskey-A-Go-Go. Little did I know that a mother load of pulps were in the small town. If I had known then I would gladly have dumped her and carried on a bookish romance with the pulps.
(Ed Hulse and Walker Martin in photo to right.)
We had some stellar guests at the first Pulpcon. How’s this for some names: Graves Gladney, the Shadow cover artist; Leigh Brackett, the SF writer, and Edmond Hamilton, her husband and also a SF writer. 50 years later in 2022 we had no guests, mainly because all the pulp writers and artists are long gone.
On the 50 Years of Pulfest panel we had several other collectors, each one representing a different decade.
1970’s–Walker Martin and Jack Cullers
1980’s–Don Hutchison(I believe Don is our oldest attendee at 91)
1990’s–Tony Davis
2000’s–Bill Lampkin and maybe also William Patrick Maynard. I forget since I was so excited to be talking about Pulpcon #1.
2010’s–Sara Light-Waller
Prior to the panel we had Pizza at Pulpfest, sponsored by many of the dealers. I tried to control my beer drinking since I was on the panel right after the pizza party and I seem to remember talking about some risque events that occurred at the early Pulpcons. Sorry if I offended anyone.
(Paul Herman with wife of artist Samson Pollen in photo to left.)
Following the 50 Year panel, Dave Saunders gave another one of his excellent discussions on a pulp artist. This year it was about Nick Eggenhoffer, who was the main illustrator for the western pulps and in my opinion, the best. Then we had Ed Hulse and Garyn Roberts talking about Dime Mystery, followed by Morgan Holmes on Robert Howard and Fiction House. Then a FarmerCon panel followed by King of the Royal Mounted, a serial.
Pulpfest is known for its great programming and in addition to the evening programs, there were also afternoon panels, all of which I missed since I can’t tear myself away from the dealer’s room. Once a collector, always a collector. Then Friday night we had Robert Deis and Wyatt Doyle talking about George Gross and his career as an artist for the men’s adventure magazines, followed by Ed Hulse and Will Murray talking about the hardboiled west. Also discussions of Fiction House comics, Planet Stories, and Meteor House.
Saturday Rick Lai was awarded the Munsey Award for his books and essays on the pulp magazines. He’s been at it for decades. We then had the auction which mainly consisted of magazines from the Carl Joecks Estate. Over two hundred small lots. Not much I wanted to bid on until the end when Samson Pollen’s art came up for bid. Unfortunately I developed leg and knee pains and had to leave the auction early. As I limped out I cursed getting old but I guess that’s better than the alternative.
Issue #31 of The Pulpster was the usual impressive job done by William Lampkin the editor and Mike Chomko, the Publisher. There were several articles on Fiction House at 100 and also articles on slabbing pulps, Dime Mystery, Church of Satan, William Lindsay Gresham, The Avenger, Zane Grey, and Rusty Hevelin. By the way, the slabbing of pulps in plastic is coming but I was glad to see no examples yet in the dealer’s room. I believe books and pulps should be read and cared for, not treated like the comic books as investments.
I had my usual table and sold many cancelled checks made out to pulp authors. Also sold DVD’s and miscellaneous pulps. Several years ago, Matt Moring traded me a cover painting from People’s Story Magazine for February 10, 1922, which is a hundred years ago. I celebrated the event by finding the magazine at Doug Ellis’ table. Thanks for finding it Matt!
I also bought 25 issues of Mammoth Detective, one of the crazier titles. I seem to remember having and reading these issues decades ago. Time to reread them! I also found six issues of Black Mask from the Joe Shaw era without covers. Time to reread them also. I almost bought several pieces of original art but I talked myself out of buying art since I don’t have any wall space left.
Making their debut at Pulpfest were several books such as George Gross Covered by Bob Deis and Wyatt Doyle, Pulp Power, a big coffee table book full of Street & Smith pulp covers, and the usual big selection of Steeger Books new releases. Matt Moring of Steeger Books has passed the 600 book mark I believe and should be in Ripley’s Believe It or Not. The books are all in the Black Mask Library series:
Jerry Frost by Horace McCoy
Cellini Smith by Robert Reeves
The Human Encyclopedia by Frank Gruber
Jerry Tracy by Theodore Tinsley
It Happened at the Lake by Joseph Shaw
This was a great Pulpfest, one of the best and you are missing an excellent time out if you miss it in the future. The Pulpfest Committee does an outstanding job and I have to thank Jack and Sally Cullers, Mike Chomko, Barry Traylor, Bill Lampkin, William Patrick Maynard, and Sara Light-Waller. There were other volunteers also that deserve thanks, and to Paul Herman for providing the photos you see above. I hope to see some of you next year!
August 10th, 2022 at 6:05 pm
Walker,
Another great Con Report, as usual. It was a terrific few days and it’s over way too fast!
Happy to see you bought that PEOPLE’S pulp to go with your painting. Having the pulp to go with the art is a MUST! I had no intention on buying art at this show, but when I saw the Pollen piece that I liked last year (and got a much better price than I was quoted last year) I had to pull the trigger.
Like you say, when you’re a collector, you collect. Now we can look forward to the Harvey Con in Nov. And lastly, a big THANK YOU! to
Steve for posting these reports for everyone to see.
August 10th, 2022 at 6:20 pm
Paul, I was interested in the Pollen art in the end of the auction but I had to leave and therefore I missed out. But I’ve run out of wall space anyway!
August 10th, 2022 at 9:01 pm
Envious as always.
August 10th, 2022 at 9:59 pm
Thanks David, it’s a lot of fun and keeps you feeling younger.
August 11th, 2022 at 12:44 am
Walker, I love these convention posts of yours. Sadly, between my newish balance and knee problems and my life-long social anxiety disorder I’ll never be able to attend. But I’m very glad you make me almost feel I’m there.
August 11th, 2022 at 7:01 am
Rick, I’m sorry you cannot attend the pulp conventions. I’m sure you would enjoy them but I’m glad you like the reports. I started them over a dozen years ago because I felt that we needed to discuss and talk about these conventions because back then there was not much being said about them at all.
August 11th, 2022 at 8:39 am
An excellent report. Thanks! It was nice to see you there, Walker.
August 11th, 2022 at 9:05 am
And thank you Robert(and Wyatt Doyle) for the excellent book on George Gross and the great five issues of Men’s Adventure Quarterly! I’m looking forward to issue #6.
August 11th, 2022 at 2:46 pm
Great report! Not almost like being there, but it will do. Next year for sure at Windy City (I know I have said that before).
August 11th, 2022 at 3:22 pm
Thanks Michael, hope to see you there!
August 11th, 2022 at 4:14 pm
Hey Walker, another fine report, and thanks! Any progress in finding some of the issues of Sea Stories, etc. that you still need?
August 11th, 2022 at 4:23 pm
Howard, no luck on the 5 Sea Stories I still need out of the 118 issues. The biggest find was the issue of Peoples in 1922 I needed since I have the original cover painting and I had to pay a premium price to get it.
In fact buying the 25 issues of Mammoth Detective was sort of a desperation buy since I once had them all many years ago. But they still managed to publish some excellent novels: three of the Howard Browne Paul Pine detective novels and one by Roy Huggins. All excellent hard boiled novels influenced by Raymond Chandler. Some of the issues had over 300 pages!
August 11th, 2022 at 4:50 pm
Your usual fine report, Walker. I always enjoy reading them.
I have one correction to make: we had about 140 dealers’ tables at this year’s convention. Given that we had 71 dealers in attendance, we needed every single one of them.
August 11th, 2022 at 6:42 pm
Thanks for the correction Mike. It was a fabulous convention and a must attend event for any genre reader or collector. Hope to see you next year.
Next up, Bordentown Pulpadventurecon on November 5!
August 12th, 2022 at 3:10 pm
Great report, Walker. It’s always fun to read them, even if I’ve attended, but better yet, if it’s one that I missed.
August 12th, 2022 at 6:55 pm
Bill, I hope you don’t miss many in the future. You are needed on the Committee and as editor of The Pulpster!
August 17th, 2022 at 12:24 am
Great report. I felt like I was looking into a book store, great stuff in the windows but can’t reach out and touch. Next best thing was reading this. Missed the gang. Maybe next year.
August 17th, 2022 at 8:25 am
Sai, I’m glad to hear from you. It’s been awhile. Hopefully you can visit the US next year.
August 18th, 2022 at 1:08 pm
Walker,
Great Report. It’s so valuable for me as one of the younger attendees to get this account of the history and the heritage of pulp collecting. I love hearing the stories, keep doing what you’re doing!
August 18th, 2022 at 2:46 pm
Believe it not, Bryce, many years ago when I attended Pulpcon, there was very little being written about the convention. That’s one of the reasons I started writing these annual reports on Pulpfest, Windy City, Pulp Adventurecon. I’ve been doing it for over a dozen years now.
August 29th, 2022 at 4:35 pm
Another excellent report Walker. Plus, a walk down memory lane.
August 29th, 2022 at 7:01 pm
Barry, it’s been 50 years since the first Pulpcon in 1972 but it seems like only the other day. I sure wish I could return and do it all over again and see my old friends.