On Thursday, March 27, the cry of “Play Ball” will resound across the United States. All thirty Major League Baseball teams will be playing, including PulpFest’s hometown Pittsburgh Pirates (who will be playing in Miami). The ultimate goal for every team playing on Thursday is to win the 2025 World Series. Let’s go Bucs!
Pittsburgh happens to be a city of champions. One of the last professional sports teams to capture a national championship for two years running happens to be the city’s National Hockey League affiliate, the Pittsburgh Penguins. The team brought home hockey’s Stanley Cup to Pennsylvania’s Steel City in both 2016 and 2017.
Back in the 1970s, the Pittsburgh Steelers were back-to-back Super Bowl champions not once, but twice. Major League Baseball’s Pittsburgh Pirates have never managed the feat, although they have won the World Series five times since joining the National League in 1887.
With all the winning going on in Pittsburgh, why not sign on with another of the city’s winners — PulpFest? You can join the winning team by becoming a PulpFest sponsor.
Your link and logo will appear on our homepage for an annual website sponsorship of $120. Six-month sponsorships are also available.
Or perhaps you’d like to sponsor the convention’s welcome banner, proudly displayed at the main entrance of each year’s convention. Your name will be displayed at the top of our 2025 banner, welcoming visitors to PulpFest. Another alternative is to sponsor our membership badges. Your name or logo will appear on every badge, acknowledging your contribution.
We also welcome support for the annual PulpFest Pizza Party. Contributors of $20 or more will have their names posted near the serving area in the Ember & Vine lounge at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Pittsburgh – Cranberry.
Other opportunities to contribute financially to PulpFest include advertising in our annual program book, The Pulpster, or donating free giveaways or door prizes.
All of our sponsors, both large and small, will be thanked via several posts that will run on our homepage and social media sites.
Join the winning PulpFest team! If you or your organization want to discuss a PulpFest sponsorship or advertising opportunities, don’t hesitate to get in touch with marketing and programming director Mike Chomko at mike@pulpfest.com or write to 2217 W Fairview Street, Allentown, PA 18104-6542.
Our featured image is excerpted from Clarence Doore’s cover art for the August 1941 issue of Popular Publications’ Sports Novels Magazine. A freelance pulp artist who painted for various genres, Doore also painted covers for the Ziff-Davis comic book line, including twenty-four issues of G. I. Joe. In later years, he worked for men’s adventure and digest magazines, as well as paperback and hardcover book publishers.
Our lead image is Sam Cherry’s cover for the April 1943 issue of Dime Sports Magazine, also published by Popular Publications. Its first sports pulp, Dime Sports debuted in 1935 and ran for 81 issues. Along with Sports Novels Magazine — which ran for 85 issues — it was one of the two longest-running general sports pulps behind Street & Smith’s Sport Story Magazine.
Other Popular sports pulps included Fifteen Sports Stories — published by Popular’s “bargain basement” subsidiary, Fictioneers, Inc. — Knockout Magazine — a boxing pulp — and New Sports Magazine. Our final image is the June 1948 issue of New Sports, with cover art by an unknown artist. The latter has been called a higher-priced revival of Dime Sports (which lasted into 1944). New Sports debuted at the end of 1946.
In total, Popular Publications released 239 issues of its five sports pulps, including 9 issues of its boxing pulp, Knockout Magazine.
Derek Starr is a writer and popular culture enthusiast who began contributing to our website in 2022. He particularly enjoys the Fiction House pulps. One of his favorites is Planet Stories, the publisher’s legendary science fiction pulp. He’s also a fan of their air pulps and Action Stories. Being a longtime baseball fan, Derek has a soft spot for sports pulps.
