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Fantasy Aspects, issue 1, May 1947
Page 6
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WEIRD TALES: Cradle of Fantasy by E. Hoffman Price When I met Farnsworth Wright in the fall of 1926, shortly after the editorial department of Weird Tales had moved Indianapolis to Chicago, we began to discuss the glowing masterpieces and reeking stinkers of what was then a young magazine; and Wright said, "Thank God, we've just about used up the last of the stuff Edwin Baird bought while he was editor." Or words to the effect. I had for two and a half years been selling to Wright; it was in March, 1924, that he accepted my first Weird Tales yarn, Raja's Gift. My recollection is that Edwin Baird was the founder, so to speak, of Weird Tales, and also its first editor; that soon after the organization of Rural Publishing company, Farnsworth Wright became associate editor, and presently, editor in fact, although for some time Baird retained the title. Baird was an idea-man when it to magazines. Once WT was launched, he lost interest (or perhaps realized it would never be a money maker) and started, among other things, Real Detective, which, like WT was a pioneer in its field. It is not and was never clear to me whether the Cornelius Printing Company of Indianapolis was in on the ground floor, or whether they bought Baird's interest. In defence of possible inaccuracies I plead failing memory; eighteen years twist details. Suffice to say that Farnsworth Wright was almost from the start the man who put Weird Tales across; barring Baird's selections, WT was for better or worse, what Wright made it. Late in 1924 Rural Publishing Co. went through financial acrobatics all to common in the publishing field, and after some months of absence from the newstands, WT reappeared, with Wright still editor, and under the management of Popular Fiction Pub. Co., not to be confused with today's Popular Publications, Inc. Then came something astonishing: the new publishing company paid off, out of its skimpy profits, all the indebtedness of Rural Publishing Co. to the authors for their published work. There was not any legal obligation to do so. Whether this was due solely to the personal influence and integrity of Wright and his business manager, Bill Springer, or rather Cornelious Printing Co. did so of their own honest will, I never asked. Not knowing that twenty years later I would be called on to act as historian, I took my dough, and to hell with secret history. Paying for dead horses was slow work. It would have been slower had not Wright cut the rates on all current acceptances from 1c a word to a 1/2c, so that in effect, newcomers cut back fifty percent of the rake-off to keep their predecessors happy, and to give the magazine a name for square dealing. By 1926, things had improved so much that the rates for current material were upped and by 1927 I was getting 1c on publication. Weird Tales
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WEIRD TALES: Cradle of Fantasy by E. Hoffman Price When I met Farnsworth Wright in the fall of 1926, shortly after the editorial department of Weird Tales had moved Indianapolis to Chicago, we began to discuss the glowing masterpieces and reeking stinkers of what was then a young magazine; and Wright said, "Thank God, we've just about used up the last of the stuff Edwin Baird bought while he was editor." Or words to the effect. I had for two and a half years been selling to Wright; it was in March, 1924, that he accepted my first Weird Tales yarn, Raja's Gift. My recollection is that Edwin Baird was the founder, so to speak, of Weird Tales, and also its first editor; that soon after the organization of Rural Publishing company, Farnsworth Wright became associate editor, and presently, editor in fact, although for some time Baird retained the title. Baird was an idea-man when it to magazines. Once WT was launched, he lost interest (or perhaps realized it would never be a money maker) and started, among other things, Real Detective, which, like WT was a pioneer in its field. It is not and was never clear to me whether the Cornelius Printing Company of Indianapolis was in on the ground floor, or whether they bought Baird's interest. In defence of possible inaccuracies I plead failing memory; eighteen years twist details. Suffice to say that Farnsworth Wright was almost from the start the man who put Weird Tales across; barring Baird's selections, WT was for better or worse, what Wright made it. Late in 1924 Rural Publishing Co. went through financial acrobatics all to common in the publishing field, and after some months of absence from the newstands, WT reappeared, with Wright still editor, and under the management of Popular Fiction Pub. Co., not to be confused with today's Popular Publications, Inc. Then came something astonishing: the new publishing company paid off, out of its skimpy profits, all the indebtedness of Rural Publishing Co. to the authors for their published work. There was not any legal obligation to do so. Whether this was due solely to the personal influence and integrity of Wright and his business manager, Bill Springer, or rather Cornelious Printing Co. did so of their own honest will, I never asked. Not knowing that twenty years later I would be called on to act as historian, I took my dough, and to hell with secret history. Paying for dead horses was slow work. It would have been slower had not Wright cut the rates on all current acceptances from 1c a word to a 1/2c, so that in effect, newcomers cut back fifty percent of the rake-off to keep their predecessors happy, and to give the magazine a name for square dealing. By 1926, things had improved so much that the rates for current material were upped and by 1927 I was getting 1c on publication. Weird Tales
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