"The Eyrie," July/August 1923

Letter writers in the July/August 1923 issue of Weird Tales magazine:

• Ernest Hollenbeck (1846-1935) of Davison, Michigan, who told about writing a story called "A Cruel Mystery" on his seventy-seventh birthday, finishing it in the anniversary of the hour of his birth. He submitted it to the editor of Weird Tales, Edwin Baird, but it was never published and is now presumably lost forever.

• Eleanor Gause (1911-1980), then age eleven, having been born on October 15, 1911. "Imagine an eleven-year-old girl reading stories like yours!" she wrote.

• Richard Jenkins (1908-1982), age fourteen, of North Catasauqua, Pennsylvania.

• Jack Bohn, presumably John A. Bohn (1911-1986), age eleven, a student at Alexander Hamilton High School, Oakland, California. John A. Bohn was later an accomplished attorney.

• A.L. Mattison of Dallas, Texas, who wrote a very long letter, possibly the longest to date printed in "The Eyrie," ironically about the excessive length and verbosity of stories in popular fiction.

• Abe Yochelson, possibly Abraham, later Albert, Yochelson (1907-1966), who gave his age as seventeen, of Chicago, Illinois, and who also read Hugo Gernsback's magazine Science and Invention "for its stories of the end of the world."

• Mrs. Walter Jackowiec, presumably Valdivia (Szymczyk) Jackowiec (1902-1969), also of Chicago, who got so scared by reading Weird Tales that in the night she cuddled up to her husband in their bed. Good husband.

• Henry W. Whitehill (1879-1960) of Oakland, California, who later had a story called "The Case of the Russian Stevedore" in Weird Tales, December 1924.

• Weird Tales Fan, Jr., of Houghton, Michigan.

• Charles Pracht (1867?-1934?) of Springfield, Missouri.

• W. C. Young of Wilmington, Delaware.

• John Richards of Niagara Falls, New York.

• H. M. of New York, New York, who remarked upon the similarity of "The Devil Plant" by Lyle Wilson Holden (H.M. called it "The Devil Tree") in the issue of May 1923 to "The Cask of Amontillado" by Edgar Allan Poe. (An excellent observation.) H.M. also pointed out that "that tree appeared long ago in a Strand Magazine story." I wish we knew which one.

• One of the Bunch, who wrote from a place unknown.

• Agnes E. Burchard of Los Angeles, California, who asked that Weird Tales reprint "The Upper Berth" by F. Marion Crawford. (She couldn't remember his name.) I assume this was Agnes Elizabeth Burchard (1892-?), a teacher born in Great Neck, Long Island, and educated at Bryn Mawr College.

• Mrs. Frances Miller of Cleveland, Ohio.

• Miss Zahrah E. Preble of New York, New York. Zahrah Ethel Preble Hodge (1880-1934) was a singer and dancer specializing in the cultures of American Indians, including the Zuni tribe of the American Southwest. She was the wife of archaeologist, ethnologist, and author Frederick Webb Hodge (1864-1956). Zahrah E. Preble also had a letter in "The Eyrie" in September 1923. I will have more on her in the next entry.

As you can see, Weird Tales appealed to women and children. Maybe the stereotype of the young male fan came later, especially in regards to science fiction and comic books.

An illustration by Roy Crane for "Child Culture's Oldest Cradle" by Zahrah E. Preble  in The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 24, 1923, whole page number 95. Roy Crane (1901-1977) was then a young cartoonist, Texas-born but living in New York City. Less than a year after this illustration was published, his comic strip Wash Tubbs began in syndication. Crane added Captain Easy to the cast of his strip in 1929. Easy is the character we remember from one of the great adventure strips and from one of our greatest cartoonists. Crane later created the newspaper comic strip Buz Sawyer.

Original text copyright 2023 Terence E. Hanley