DIY History | Transcribe | Hevelin Fanzines | The Thing, whole no. 2, Summer 1946

Transcribe
Translate

The Thing, whole no. 2, Summer 1946

Page 4

It is not so hard to locate sub-fandoms. One of the outstanding recent examples was the so-called Vulcan group, an extremely active coterie of five or six publishers and probably thirty to forty readers who functioned for the most part without benefit of fandom at large. Lionel Innman seemed to be the leading light in this group, which did not become especially assimilated with fandom at all, and which had scarcely any contacts with the main body of fans until it had been functioning for close to a year. A present-day clique -- consisting of Rick Sneary, Roger Rehm, David McGirr, and a few other quite young fans--is somewhat analogous to the Vulcans, though without their prodigious activity in publishing. 
While obviously quality does not always go hand in hand with quantity, it seems reasonably evident that fandom would be bigger, more active, and more stimulating if a larger percentage of the new prospects were developed into active participants, and if the various cliques and sub-fandoms were more thoroughly assimilated.
Since letters are the prime medium through which the activation of neophytes can be accomplished, it obviously is up to the oldsters to conquer their distaste for bright-eyed 13-year-olds, and raise them up to be the kind of fans we want.

Couldn't each of us adopt one neophyte per year? One more correspondent will not break any of us, particularly when there would be the concommitant advantage that we'd be legitimately able to ignore most other new fans. And, in a year's time, at least one of our other correspondents would be certain to falter and drop from sight, so we'd be able to continue our adoptions.
The new fan we adopted would be given the same preferential treatment accorded to our half-dozen or so favorite correspondents. His letters would be answered as promptly as we usually answer our more important letter, and as fully. We shouldn't try to write down to him, either. We should prattle along about whatever we usually prattle along about in the expectation that he'd ask us to explain anything he did not dig the first time. Without being nasty about it, we should be able to steer him away from most of his gaucheries in a year's time,and, partly through precept and partly through suggestion, should also manage to have him pretty well established in fandom by the time his first year is up.
Nor would the benefits be confined to the newcomer: Most of the older fans tend to be pretty much set in their ways,with a certain circle of interests and a certain group of pet dislikes, and quite often with a faint touch of ennui to the whole thing. It is more than possible that the inclinations of our pet protege would cause many of us to dig into things we have so far neglected, and re-investigate matters we have dropped. And definitely the novice's enthusiasm would do something to our ennui; either boredom would quickly change into complete disgust or would evaporate into an indian summer of active interest.
Probably the best way in which to make a start would be for the NFFF to poll its older members and see if enough volunteer monitors could be gotten to assign one to each

Saving...

It is not so hard to locate sub-fandoms. One of the outstanding recent examples was the so-called Vulcan group, an extremely active coterie of five or six publishers and probably thirty to forty readers who functioned for the most part without benefit of fandom at large. Lionel Innman seemed to be the leading light in this group, which did not become especially assimilated with fandom at all, and which had scarcely any contacts with the main body of fans until it had been functioning for close to a year. A present-day clique -- consisting of Rick Sneary, Roger Rehm, David McGirr, and a few other quite young fans--is somewhat analogous to the Vulcans, though without their prodigious activity in publishing. While obviously quality does not always go hand in hand with quantity, it seems reasonably evident that fandom would be bigger, more active, and more stimulating if a larger percentage of the new prospects were developed into active participants, and if the various cliques and sub-fandoms were more thoroughly assimilated. Since letters are the prime medium through which the activation of neophytes can be accomplished, it obviously is up to the oldsters to conquer their distaste for bright-eyed 13-year-olds, and raise them up to be the kind of fans we want. Couldn't each of us adopt one neophyte per year? One more correspondent will not break any of us, particularly when there would be the concommitant advantage that we'd be legitimately able to ignore most other new fans. And, in a year's time, at least one of our other correspondents would be certain to falter and drop from sight, so we'd be able to continue our adoptions. The new fan we adopted would be given the same preferential treatment accorded to our half-dozen or so favorite correspondents. His letters would be answered as promptly as we usually answer our more important letter, and as fully. We shouldn't try to write down to him, either. We should prattle along about whatever we usually prattle along about in the expectation that he'd ask us to explain anything he did not dig the first time. Without being nasty about it, we should be able to steer him away from most of his gaucheries in a year's time,and, partly through precept and partly through suggestion, should also manage to have him pretty well established in fandom by the time his first year is up. Nor would the benefits be confined to the newcomer: Most of the older fans tend to be pretty much set in their ways,with a certain circle of interests and a certain group of pet dislikes, and quite often with a faint touch of ennui to the whole thing. It is more than possible that the inclinations of our pet protege would cause many of us to dig into things we have so far neglected, and re-investigate matters we have dropped. And definitely the novice's enthusiasm would do something to our ennui; either boredom would quickly change into complete disgust or would evaporate into an indian summer of active interest. Probably the best way in which to make a start would be for the NFFF to poll its older members and see if enough volunteer monitors could be gotten to assign one to each