The following posts cover the programming planned for PulpFest 2011, starting on January 20 and running through August 1, 2011.
Rare Shadow Films to Be Screened
Jan. 20, 2011 – This year PulpFest celebrates the 80th anniversary of the launch of The Shadow, a Detective Magazine that changed the course of pulp history by creating the vogue in rough-paper publications devoted to a single character. Coincidentally, 2011 is also the 80th anniversary of The Shadow’s celluloid debut. The character was featured in six short subjects released to theaters between the summer of 1931 and the spring of 1932. PulpFest, in conjunction with Anthony Tollin’s Sanctum Books, has obtained copies of three Shadow featurettes — including the first — and will kick off its anniversary celebration of The Shadow Magazine by screening them on Thursday evening, July 28th.
Advertised as Shadow Detective Mysteries, these two-reel short subjects (running approximately 20 minutes each) followed the format of The Detective Story Hour, the weekly radio program that began in July of 1930 and dramatized stories from Street & Smith’s Detective Story Magazine. Created for this show, The Shadow originally served as each episode’s narrator, not its protagonist. His sinister tones and sepulchral laugh—provided by actor Frank Readick — were those Walter Gibson described in his early Shadow novels.
The radio program’s surprise success not only led to The Shadow’s retooling as a pulp-magazine hero, but also to his visualization by filmmakers eager in those early “talkie” years to capitalize on the popularity of characters whose adventures traveled over the ether waves. The Detective Story Hour was licensed for screen adaptation less than a year after it began.
Like the individual radio episodes, each Shadow Detective Mystery was based on a yarn from Detective Story Magazine. The first featurette, “A Burglar to the Rescue,” was adapted from a Herman Landon story of the same title, which appeared in the November 1, 1930 issue of the pulp. Shot in New York City, it starred Thurston Hall, Charlotte Wynters, and Frank Shannon—all of whom would make their marks in Hollywood, the latter as “Dr. Zarkov” in the Flash Gordon serials. The Shadow, seen as a cloaked figure whose silhouette flitted across walls, was voiced by radio’s Readick. Fortunately, this two-reeler is one of the three we’ll screen at PulpFest.
The other two featurettes we’re running, “House of Mystery” and “The Circus Show-up,” are based on Detective Story Magazine yarns by Judson P. Phillips and Leslie T. White respectively. “Burglar to the Rescue” was screened some years ago at a Hollywood-based film festival shortly after it was discovered and preserved; to date, it has not been exhibited elsewhere. “House of Mystery” and “The Circus Show-up” have not been shown in any public venue since being preserved. PulpFest 2011 attendees will be the first to see these short subjects since their 1932 theatrical engagements.
The PulpFest committee thanks Anthony Tollin, publisher of The Shadow and Doc Savage reprint series, for his support of this undertaking, which is certain to generate lots of buzz as convention time draws near. Additional details will be posted on the PulpFest website as they become available. For more information about these Shadow short subjects, please visit the Sanctum Books website.
Pictured above is the November 1, 1930 number of Detective Story Magazine, with cover by John A. Coughlin. Note the “The Magazine On the Air” label featured on the issue.
The Shadow on Radio
June 14, 2011 – Almost a full year before his first appearance in the pulps, The Shadow debuted as the mysterious narrator of The Detective Story Hour, a CBS radio program sponsored by Street & Smith. A ghostly-sounding storyteller with a sinister voice, the character soon had listeners visiting their neighborhood newsstand to ask for “that Shadow detective magazine.” Bowing to popular demand, Street & Smith created The Shadow, a Detective Magazine, and the hero pulp genre was born.
On Friday evening, July 29, popular culture historian Martin Grams continues PulpFest’s salute to the 80th anniversary of the first hero pulp by presenting a fascinating slideshow about the radio program that inspired the pulp magazine. Drawing on twelve years of independent research, Martin will offer a fascinating look at The Shadow radio show and explain how it became one of the most recognized and well-known radio programs of all time.
Martin Grams is the author of The Shadow: The History and Mystery of the Radio Program, 1930-1954. His presentation will start at 7:10 PM in the sixth-floor programming area set aside for PulpFest 2011 at the Ramada Plaza Hotel and Conference Center.
Wild American Pulp Artists
June 19, 2011 – What do illustrators Emery Clarke, Robert Harris, and Milton Luros have in common? They were all born in 1911 and later worked for the pulp magazine industry.
Clarke and Harris are remembered best for their front cover art on Doc Savage Magazine, while Luros is known for his detective and men’s adventure magazine covers. On Friday, July 29, PulpFest will celebrate the 100th anniversaries of these artists’ births with a look at their lives and work.
“Wild American Pulp Artists” will be presented at 8 PM in the sixth-floor programming area set aside for PulpFest 2011. The speaker will be David Saunders, a leading expert on pulp art and author of numerous articles on pulp artists for Illustration Magazine.
David is also the author of Norman Saunders, a biography and appreciation of his father, the superlative pulp artist. His latest book is H. J. Ward, the most complete examination of the great cover artist for the Spicy pulps. In addition to his writing, David is an accomplished artist whose work appears in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and other museums and public buildings. He has taught at Yale, Oberlin, and other colleges worldwide and created PulpFest’s Munsey Award.
Doc Savage Magazine for December 1936, with cover by Robert G. Harris, illustrating Lester Dent’s “The Vanisher.”
Meet the New Fictioneers–Duanne Spurlock
June 23, 2011 – They were called scribes, word slingers, hacks, and penny-a-worders. But perhaps the most favored term, especially among the men and women who labored for the bloody pulps, was fictioneer — a fiction writer, especially a prolific creator of commercial or pulp fiction.
Join PulpFest as we celebrate today’s fictioneers — the authors writing the new pulp fiction. Duane Spurlock will get things rolling on Friday afternoon, July 29 at 1 PM. Duane has written tales featuring Ki-Gor, the Jungle Lord, for both Wild Cat Books and Airship 27. In “A Quiet Night in the Dark in La Plata, Missouri, 1942,” a surprise visitor shares an astonishing story with Doc Savage author Lester Dent, leading to deadly consequences in the writer’s quiet rural town. His humorous Western, “Pretty Polly,” has recently been turned into an e-book by Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Duane is also an award-winning book illustrator. You can read more about Duane’s work by visiting his blog.
To start this year’s salute to “The New Fictioneers,” Duane will be reading from “Shalimar Bang and the Bad Luck Baedeker,” a contemporary pulp adventure about a gang of idiosyncratic heroes, and “Space Detective at Hell Gate,” which concerns a private eye who battles invaders from outer space that hope to make slaves of Earth’s population and steal the planet’s mineral wealth. He’ll also be available for questions, critiques, autographs, and old-fashioned schmoozing.
Meet the New Pulp Heroes of Wayne Reinagel
June 24, 2011 – The Shadow! Doc Savage! The Avenger! The Spider! G-8! Operator #5! Along with countless others, they were the great pulp heroes, the original crimefighters and adventurers who helped millions of Americans weather the grim years of the Great Depression and the dark days of World War II.
At PulpFest 2011 on Friday, July 29, you’ll have a chance to meet and listen to Wayne Reinagel, the creator of four new champions of pulp justice — Doc Titan, The Darkness, Guardian, and The Scorpion. Wayne wrote and illustrated Pulp Heroes: More Than Mortal, Pulp Heroes: Khan Dynasty, and Modern Marvels: Viktoriana. These “Steampulp” novels combine Victorian Age characters, such as Sherlock Holmes, Allan Quatermain, and the Frankenstein Monster, with Wayne’s own Pulp Era heroes.
Beginning at 2 PM, Wayne will read from both Khan Dynasty and Modern Marvels as part of PulpFest‘s continuing salute to today’s word-slingers known as “The New Fictioneers.” He’ll also be available for questions, critiques, autographs, and more.
FarmerCon at PulpFest
June 28, 2011 – As reported previously, PulpFest 2011 is pleased to welcome the members of FarmerCon VI to this year’s convention. An annual gathering for fans of Grand Master of Science Fiction Philip José Farmer, please visit the PulpFest programming area on Friday evening, July 29, at 10:30 PM for a salute to this celebrated author.
Michael Croteau, creator of The Official Philip José Farmer Home Page, will get things started by explaining the origins of FarmerCon and why it is happening this year at PulpFest. Following Michael’s introductory remarks, Win Scott Eckert will discuss the December 13, 1795 meteor strike in Wold Newton, England, that resulted in a “nova of genetic splendor” — the Wold Newton Universe.
Changing gears, Dr. Art Sippo will delve into A Feast Unknown, the author’s controversial novel that featured thinly veiled versions of Tarzan and Doc Savage.
Tying into PulpFest‘s 80th anniversary salute to The Shadow Magazine, Rick Lai will investigate the character’s ties to the Wold Newton Family and other “secrets” that Farmer knew about the first great pulp hero, The Shadow. Will Murray will close out Friday evening’s programming by reminiscing about interviewing Philip José Farmer in 1990 for Starlog Magazine.
The first British printing of Philip José Farmer’s controversial novel, A Feast Unknown, published in 1975 by Quartet, with cover art by Patrick Woodroffe.
The New Pulp Fiction
July 1, 2011 – Over the last five years, interest in pulp fiction has revived among some of today’s finest writers. With more publishers producing new pulp fiction, a genre most thought dead or long forgotten is being reborn. Our New Pulp panel will explore this renaissance and what it portends for the genre’s future.
That contemporary pulp fiction is alive and healthy is evidenced by the six writers who will appear on “The New Pulp Fiction” panel: Bill Craig, creator of the Hardluck Hannigan seres; Wold Newton expert and popular yarn spinner Win Scott Eckert; Airship 27 and Black Coat Press author Greg Gick; Wayne Reinagel, creator of the Pulp Heroes and Modern Marvels series; Art Sippo, author of Sun Koh: Heir of Atlantis; and Duane Spurlock who has written “A Quiet Night in the Dark in La Plata, Missouri, 1942” and other stories.
“The New Pulp Fiction” will be moderated by Airship 27 editor-in-chief Ron Fortier, and will be held in PulpFest‘s sixth-floor programming area at 1 PM on Saturday afternoon, July 30. Audience participation is very welcome.
Steampunk at PulpFest
July 6, 2011 – Join Munsey nominee Garyn G. Roberts at 7:30 PM on Saturday, July 30, in the PulpFest programming area for a discussion of “Steampunk in the Days of Dime Novels and Pulp Magazines.” A longtime pulp fan, Roberts teaches at Northwestern Michigan College, and edited The Prentice Hall Anthology of Science Fiction and Fantasy.
Garyn’s presentation will investigate the roots of what is today a very popular science fiction category – Steampunk. A throwback to the scientific romances characterized by zeppelins, steam men, monstrous dynamos, mad scientists, and more, some of today’s leading Steampunk writers include James P. Blaylock, William Gibson, China Miéville, Tim Powers, Cherie Priest, Neal Stephenson, and Bruce Sterling.
Professor Roberts will begin with a brief discussion of Jules Verne and H. G. Wells, the two authors who built the foundation of the movement. He will then turn to the dime novels and story papers of the late nineteenth century. These featured such proto-Steampunk characters as the Steam Man of the Prairies, Frank Reade, Jr., and Jack Wright. With the dawn of the twentieth century, pulp magazines began to supplant dime novels and story papers as the leading source for popular fiction. Early examples of Steampunk appear in periodicals such as Argosy, The All-Story, Weird Tales, and the numerous magazines published by Hugo Gernsback, the “father of science fiction,” including Amazing Stories, Science and Invention, Wonder Stories, and Air Wonder Stories.
“Steampunk in the Days of Dime Novels and Pulp Magazines” will be informative, entertaining, and a feast for the eyes, featuring many front-cover images from dime novels, story papers, and pulp magazines. It is not to be missed!
Our illustration is the October 23, 1903 issue of Frank Reade Weekly Magazine. The cover artist is unknown.
C. L. Moore, First Lady of Science Fantasy
July 9, 2011 – After editor Farnsworth Wright had finished reading an unsolicited manuscript entitled “Shambleau,” he closed the Weird Tales office in honor of “C. L. Moore Day.” For the next six years, Catherine Lucille Moore contributed her own brand of sensual, colorful adventures to “The Unique Magazine,” featuring her interplanetary rogue Northwest Smith or Jirel of Joiry, one of the first female protagonists of sword-and-sorcery fiction.
A correspondent of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert Bloch, Moore married writer Henry Kuttner in 1940. Together, they collaborated on many stories. Among her rare non-collaborative efforts following her marriage are “Judgment Night,” “There Shall Be Darkness,” “The Children’s Hour,” and “Vintage Season.” She wrote for Astounding Science-Fiction, Startling Stories, Strange Stories, Thrilling Wonder Stories, and other magazines.
Haffner Press has several volumes of C. L. Moore’s works in production, and editor/publisher Stephen Haffner will offer a 45-minute presentation on the life and career of this respected author, featuring many never-before-seen photographs, images of rare editions, and maybe a word from Ms. Moore herself. Stephen’s well-informed picture of this pioneering writer of science fiction and fantasy will be presented Friday, July 29, at 9:40 PM in the PulpFest programming area at the Ramada Plaza Hotel and Conference Center.
Win Scott Eckert and the Daughter of Bronze
July 12, 2011 – One of the founding members of the New Pulp movement, Win Scott Eckert is co-author, with Philip José Farmer, of the Wold Newton novel The Evil in Pemberley House, concerning the daughter of a certain bronze-skinned pulp hero. Win also edited and contributed to Myths for the Modern Age: Philip José Farmer’s Wold Newton Universe, nominated for a Locus Award in 2007. His latest release is the critically acclaimed Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World, published by Black Coat Press. He has also written tales featuring many adventure and pulp hero characters, including Zorro, The Avenger, Captain Midnight, The Scarlet Pimpernel, The Green Hornet, and Fu Manchu.
As part of PulpFest’s ongoing salute to today’s word slingers known as The New Fictioneers, Win will read from The Evil in Pemberley House and “Happy Death Men,” his contribution to Moonstone Books’ forthcoming The Avenger: The Justice Inc. Files. He’ll also be available for questions, critiques, autographs, etc.
Join Win Scott Eckert on Friday, July 29, beginning at 3 PM. In the meantime, you can find him online at WinScottEckert.com.
Published in 2009 by Subterranean Press, The Evil in Pemberley House was co-written by Philip José Farmer & Win Scott Eckert and features a dust jacket by Glen Orbik.
Hardluck Hannigan and Bill Craig
July 13, 2011 – One of today’s more prolific writers of new pulp fiction is Bill Craig, whose earliest published work was Valley of Death, the first of five modern adventure thrillers featuring Chicago police detective Jack Riley and his reporter girlfriend, Moria Clark.
Bill’s most popular character is Mike “Hardluck” Hannigan. A throwback to the hero pulps of the thirties and forties, featuring slam-bang action and rollicking adventure, Hannigan is a soldier of fortune with the worst luck imaginable.
Craig also writes the Sam Decker, P.I. series. He’s also the author of the noir thriller The Butterfly Tattoo, and credits Lester Dent and Walter B. Gibson, the creators of Doc Savage and The Shadow, as the two greatest influences on his writing style.
On Saturday, July 30, at 2:30 PM, Bill Craig will read from The Golden Scorpion, the seventh volume in The Fantastic Adventures of Hardluck Hannigan as part of PulpFest‘s continuing salute to “The New Fictioneers.” He’ll also be available for questions, critiques, autographs, and more.
Granddaughters of the Pulps
July 14, 2011 – Their names are legendary — Frederick C. Davis, creator of Operator #5, The Moon Man, and a slew of detective-pulp heroes; Norvell W. Page, who wrote over 100,000 words per month for the pulps, including more than ninety novels featuring The Spider, the Master of Men; Paul S. Powers, creator of the Sonny Tabor and Kid Wolf stories for Street & Smith’s Wild West Weekly and author of more than four hundred pulp yarns; and Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson who, after writing well over one hundred adventure tales for a wide variety of magazines, went on to create the modern comic book.
These men all labored mightily in the pulp field, churning out fiction for a penny or two a word in order to support themselves and their families. But as the pulps died, they moved into other fields, leaving behind their rough-paper days. For some, the pulps were forgotten or became a faint memory of bygone days. Their children, grandchildren, nieces, and nephews may have known these men had been writers, but little of those pulp-era days was remembered or mentioned.
But those memories were not completely forgotten, thanks to pulp collectors and researchers working to unearth the history of the pulp era. Through these efforts, descendants of pulp greats like Davis, Page, Powers, and Wheeler-Nicholson learned of their forebears’ abundant labors in the pulp vineyard.
PulpFest 2011 is pleased to present “Granddaughters of the Pulps,” a panel featuring four descendants of the aforementioned authors. Elizabeth Bissette, Karen Davis Cunningham, Laurie Powers, and Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson Brown will speak about these four pulp greats and their families. They will also discuss their personal searches to collect what have become important family heirlooms — the pulps that featured their ancestors’ work. Moderated by Blood ‘n’ Thunder editor Ed Hulse, “Granddaughters of the Pulps” will take place at 8:50 PM on Friday, July 29, in the PulpFest programming area.
Elizabeth Bissette is the great-niece of Norvell W. Page, one of the most prolific pulpsters, best known for his Spider novels. A critically acclaimed actress, director, playwright, and producer of multimedia programs, Elizabeth is also a singer/songwriter, rhythm guitarist, fine artist, and art and music writer for Fine Art Magazine and several music websites. She is currently working on adaptations of Beowulf and the pulp character The Purple Scar for Airship 27 and created the Norvell Page Page. Elizabeth lives in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
Karen Davis Cunningham is the granddaughter of author Frederick C. Davis. While she grew up reading many of her grandfather’s mystery novels, she knew little about his pulp career until many years after he’d passed away. When she read an article that suggested he’d written over one thousand pulp stories, she began a quest to find out what they were. In 200, her search brought her to her first Pulpcon in Dayton, Ohio, where she was sucked into the vortex and has not been able to escape since.
In a parallel life in the real world, Karen teaches conflict management at Kent State University and lives with her husband Tom, four cats, Zeke the wonderdog, and two grown children who are in the process of leaving the nest, but somehow keep finding their way back.
Laurie Powers is the granddaughter of Paul S. Powers, a prolific pulp fiction writer who wrote over 400 stories for rough-paper magazines such as Wild West Weekly, Weird Tales, Thrilling Western, and Texas Rangers. Later, Paul wrote a successful and acclaimed western novel, Doc Dillahay. Laurie didn’t know of her grandfather’s career as a pulp fiction writer until 1999, when she discovered his contributions to Wild West Weekly through an Internet search. Later that same year, she reunited with Paul’s daughter Pat, who gave Laurie her grandfather’s personal papers. Among them was a manuscript, Pulp Writer: Twenty Years in the American Grub Street, Paul’s memoir of being a pulp fiction writer. It was eventually published in 2007.
Laurie recently edited a new collection of Paul Powers’ western stories, Riding the Pulp Trail, which will be available for sale at PulpFest 2011. She is a writer and editor, creator of the Laurie’s Wild West blog, and lives in Los Angeles.
Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson Brown is the granddaughter of Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, the prolific pulp fiction writer, founder of DC Comics, military intelligence officer, and inventor. Nicky has researched her grandfather’s life and work since 1997. She is a writer, editor, and publisher, co-owning Berkshire Media Artists, with experience in audio, film, animation, and book publishing.
Nicky holds a Master’s Degree in Classical Greek Mythology. Her published work includes articles on the environment, Native American elders, comic book history, and scripts for theatre and animated film. Nicky’s most recent published work includes editing and contributing to Oil and Water and Other Things That Don’t Mix, an anthology benefiting environmental groups on the Gulf Coast, and an article about “The Major” for The Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide. She fell madly in love with the “true” pulp genre when she bought her first pulps featuring The Major’s byline. “The Czarina’s Pearls” was serialized in the July 19 and 26, 1930 issues of Argosy. As determined as Nancy Drew, she has been pursuing the elusive trail of collecting all her grandfather’s works ever since.
H. Winfield Scott contributed the cover art for the January 27, 1934 issue of Street & Smith’s Wild West Weekly. Paul S. Powers wrote “Kid Wolf in the Snow Country” under the pseudonym Ward M. Stevens.
Walter B. Gibson and The Shadow
July 17, 2011 – Following the Thursday-night screening of three rare 1931-32 “Shadow Detective” featurettes and Martin Grams’ Friday-night presentation on the character’s radio incarnation, PulpFest continues its 80th-anniversary celebration of The Shadow Magazine with an all-star panel that will discuss the series and its primary author, Walter B. Gibson.
Joining us for what promises to be a lively and informative discussion will be J. Randolph Cox, long-time editor of Dime Novel Round-Up and author of Man of Magic and Mystery: A Guide to the Work of Walter B. Gibson; Will Murray, novelist, historian, and author of The Duende History of The Shadow Magazine; and Anthony Tollin, contributing editor to Gibson’s The Shadow Scrapbook and publisher of the Sanctum Books Shadow reprints. All three knew Walter Gibson well and can offer the audience rare insights into the man’s personality, along with details and critiques of his work.
Between 1931 and 1949, Walter B. Gibson wrote a staggering 283 Shadow yarns — most running between 50,000 and 60,000 words — for a total of roughly fifteen million words. His achievement in fleshing out a character that, previously, was just a voice on the radio is nothing short of monumental in the history of American popular culture. Gibson rode the whirlwind whipped up by his own success, supplying The Shadow Magazine with novel-length stories at the rate of two per month for ten solid years before World War II paper shortages forced the bi-weekly magazine back to monthly frequency. But the indefatigable Gibson, not about to let the grass grow under his feet, filled his spare time with the writing of scripts for The Shadow’s comic-book adventures.
Our panelists will touch on Gibson’s influences, accomplishments and working methods. Blood ‘n’ Thunder editor Ed Hulse, who has himself written at some length about The Shadow, will moderate the panel, which is scheduled to get underway at 8:20 p.m. on Saturday.
Edmond Hamilton: From Ohio to the Stars
July 20, 2011 – Best known to many fans as the creator of Captain Future, Edmond Hamilton was one of the first full-time science fiction writers for the pulps. He pioneered and popularized many themes that later became staples of modern science fiction.
On Thursday evening, July 28, at Ohio State University, editor and publisher Stephen Haffner will discuss this popular author’s work for avidly collected pulps such as Weird Tales, Amazing Stories, and Wonder Stories. Haffner’s presentation will include several vintage, rarely exhibited photographs of Hamilton and his contemporaries. A collection of Hamilton first editions will also be on display.
“Edmond Hamilton: From Ohio to the Stars” will take place at 6:30 PM in Room 150A/B in the Thompson Library at the Ohio State campus. The address is 1858 Neil Avenue, Columbus, OH 43210.
The four-part serialization of Edmond Hamilton’s “The Vampire Master” began in the October 1933 issue of Weird Tales, which featured one of the most iconic pulp cover paintings, contributed by Margaret Brundage. Hamilton wrote “The Vampire Master” under the pseudonym of Hugh Davidson.
The Shadow at 80!
July 24, 2011 – Just one final reminder that PulpFest 2011 is celebrating not only the 80th anniversary of the launch of The Shadow’s pulp magazine, but also the 80th anniversary of The Shadow’s celluloid debut. The character was featured in six short subjects released to theaters between the summer of 1931 and the spring of 1932.
PulpFest, in conjunction with Anthony Tollin’s Sanctum Books, has obtained copies of three Shadow featurettes — including the first — and will kick off its anniversary celebration of The Shadow, a Detective Monthly, by screening them on Thursday evening, July 28, beginning at 9 PM.
Early arrivals to PulpFest will have a chance to see the first Shadow featurette, A Burglar to the Rescue, which has been seen only one other time since its 1931 debut. Two Shadow shorts from 1932, The Circus Show-Up and House of Mystery, will also be shown. PulpFest 2011 attendees will be the first to see both 1932 films since their original theatrical releases.
PulpFest’s Shadow programming will continue Friday evening with a presentation on “The Shadow on Radio,” offered by popular culture historian Martin Grams. Later, Rick Lai will discuss the character’s ties to the Wold Newton Family and other “secrets” that science-fiction Grand Master Philip José Farmer knew about the first great pulp hero.
On Saturday evening, July 30th, Blood ‘n’ Thunder editor Ed Hulse will moderate a panel presentation entitled “Walter B. Gibson and The Shadow.” Joining Ed will be Randy Cox, author of Man of Magic and Mystery: A Guide to the Work of Walter B. Gibson, Will Murray, author of The Duende History of The Shadow Magazine, and Anthony Tollin, co-author with Walter B. Gibson of The Shadow Scrapbook. All three panelists not only wrote books about The Shadow, but personally knew the character’s creator.
And, of course, we still hope that Mr. Kent Allard, long rumored to be the Dark Avenger whose exploits were recorded in The Shadow Magazine by Walter B. Gibson and others, can still attend PulpFest 2011. Mr. Allard is turning 115 this year, and his plans are still up in the air. Whether or not he can attend, Mr. Allard feels the dynamic programming planned for PulpFest 2011 will be an exceptional salute to the character with whom he has long been associated. He wishes us all a very successful convention.
The Shadow, a Detective Monthly, dated April 1931, featured a cover by Modest Stein. The artist’s painting had been previously used as the cover for the October 1, 1919, issue of The Thrill Book, illustrating H. Bedford-Jones’ “Mr. Shen of Shensi.”
PulpFest’s 2011 Guest of Honor
August 1, 2011 – A man whose real name rings far fewer bells than his more famous aliases was scheduled to be PulpFest‘s 2011 guest of honor. Born in 1896, Kent Allard entered military service during World War I. It is believed that he served in the United States Army Air Service until he was shot down behind enemy lines. Afterward, he turned this wartime misfortune into a sterling career as an espionage agent, distinguishing himself in ways that remain top secret. It is rumored he single-handedly liberated one Allied POW camp.
Mr. Allard’s post-war activities remain shrouded in mystery. His 1925 disappearance into the wilds of Guatemala during a mysterious airplane flight baffled searchers for more than a decade. Equally astounding was his celebrated return to civilization in 1937, after twelve years as a “white god” of the legendary Xinca Indians. Mr. Allard faded into obscurity after 1940. Little is known of his shadowy activities after that.
He has been so identified with the late Lamont Cranston that to this day, many people mistakenly believe that Kent Allard was only one of the millionaire sportsman’s alter egos.
Unfortunately, because of his advanced age — Mr. Allard turned 115 in 2011 — our guest of honor could not attend the 80th anniversary celebration of The Shadow, a Detective Monthly. Although he couldn’t attend PulpFest 2011, Mr. Allard believed the convention’s dynamic programming was an exceptional tribute to the cloaked character who dominated radio, pulp magazines, and movies for many years.
After the convention, Mr. Allard sent the PulpFest committee a personal message to share with its membership, but almost as soon as the envelope was opened, the blue-ink handwriting faded before anyone could copy it down. But those who read the elusive words recall that the man who was long rumored to be The Shadow thanked the convention for a job well done.
Although Kent Allard couldn’t attend PulpFest 2011, several rumored sightings of a mysterious shadowy figure circulated at the convention. None could actually be confirmed.
Unfortunately, another guest, Elizabeth Bissette, the great-niece of Norvell W. Page, also couldn’t attend.
Chris Kalb adapted this flyer from George Rozen’s cover art for the March 1932 issue of The Shadow Detective Monthly, illustrating Walter B. Gibson’s “The Black Master.” It’s also our featured image.
