The Magic Carpet Magazine Covers

Weird Tales had its many problems with circulation over the years. It's no wonder that an offshoot like Oriental Stories suffered from poor sales as well. It didn't help matters at all that the magazine arrived on the newsstand a year into the Great Depression. In any case, with the new year, 1933, Oriental Stories became The Magic Carpet Magazine.

Oriental Stories had started out as a bimonthly magazine, then switched to a quarterly schedule after just three issues. The Magic Carpet Magazine stuck with that schedule for its five issues and came to an end in January 1934.

The Magic Carpet Magazine (Vol. 3, No. 1), January 1933. The cover is by Margaret Brundage, but the scene echoes Donald von Gelb's cover for Oriental Stories for Summer 1931, while the pose is similar to that of Botticelli's Aphrodite.

The Magic Carpet Magazine (Vol. 3, No. 2), April 1933. Once again, the cover is by Margaret Brundage.

The Magic Carpet Magazine (Vol. 3, No. 3), July 1933. J. Allen St. John was the cover artist. Note the change in the logo.

The Magic Carpet Magazine (Vol. 3, No. 4), October 1933. Margaret Brundage is back as cover artist.

The Magic Carpet Magazine (Vol. 4, No. 1), January 1934. Margaret Brundage did the cover art. Except for the logo, the magazine could be mistaken for an aviation pulp. This would be the last issue of The Magic Carpet Magazine. A noble experiment had come to an end.

The complete covers of The Magic Carpet Magazine.

Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

Oriental Stories Covers

In 1930, Popular Fiction Publishing put out a companion magazine to its main publication, Weird Tales. Initially entitled Oriental Stories, the magazine would last nine issues, from October-November 1930 to Summer 1932, whereupon the name was changed to The Magic Carpet Magazine. Although Farnsworth Wright believed in the concept and recruited many of his authors and artists from Weird Tales as contributors, The Magic Carpet Magazine lasted just five more issues, from January 1933 to January 1934.

The West had of course been fascinated by the Orient since the Napoleonic Age. The rise of Japan as a world power and Chinese efforts to throw off European control and influence helped keep East Asia in the public eye during the early twentieth century. It's only natural that the Orient would show up in popular culture, in everything from Sax Rohmer's Fu Manchu stories to Terry and the Pirates by Milton Caniff to the Road Pictures with Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour to Oriental Stories and The Magic Carpet Magazine from Popular Fiction.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 1, No. 1), October-November 1930, with a cover by Donald von Gelb (aka Donald Gelb).

Oriental Stories (Vol. 1, No. 2), December 1930-January 1931. Again, Donald von Gelb was the artist.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 1, No. 3), February-March 1931. Donald von Gelb drew the cover illustration, while Joseph Doolin did the interior illustrations.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 1, No. 4), April-May-June 1931, the Spring Issue, with a cover by Donald von Gelb. Note that the logo has changed, just as Gelb's style has changed, from the colorful and decorative to a more naturalistic approach. Changes are often a sign of trouble behind the scenes of a magazine or other serial.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 1, No. 5), Summer 1931, with the last of Donald von Gelb's five covers for the magazine.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 1, No. 6), Autumn 1931. The cover artist is Lucille Holling, wife of children's book author and illustrator Holling Clancy Holling. It's a shame she didn't do more work for Popular Fiction. Note that once again, the logo has changed. 

Oriental Stories (Vol. 2, No. 1), Winter 1932. The cover artist is pulp workhorse J. Allen St. John.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 2, No. 2), Spring 1932. Margaret Brundage contributed this cover  to the magazine. Compare the sensuality of her drawing to Lucille Holling's more innocent piece.

Oriental Stories (Vol. 2, No. 3), Summer 1932, the last issue before Oriental Stories became The Magic Carpet Magazine. The cover artist is once again Margaret Brundage.

Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

Terva Gaston Hubbard (1902-1977)

Aka Trevor Bardette

Author, Actor

Born November 19, 1902, Nashville, Arkansas

Died November 28, 1977, Los Angeles, California

Actor Trevor Bardette spent more than three decades in front of the camera playing more than 200 roles in movies and television, yet information on his life is scarce and in some places just plain wrong. The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) claims his name at birth was Abraham Lincoln. Ancestry.com shows him as a graduate of Oregon State University (based on a yearbook page that may be labeled incorrectly). Internet sources claim his death date as either November 2 or 28, 1977, and no one has found his obituary despite years of looking. Even his family knew little of him, and then only after he died. And to top it all off, sources on Weird Tales include him with the magazine's female authors.

Bardette was actually born Terva Gaston Hubbard, son of Marshall and Olive Perilea Hubbard, in Nashville, Arkansas, on November 19, 1902. The Hubbard family split early in their son's life. Marshall Hubbard remarried, while his ex-wife set out for parts west (presumably with her son in tow) and lived in California for decades. Terva Gaston Hubbard attended Oregon State University but graduated from the University of Oregon in June 1925. While at the University of Oregon, Hubbard appeared on stage in student productions. (1) A source on the Internet says that Hubbard also studied at Northwestern University and planned on a career in mechanical engineering. (2) However Hubbard might have spent his youth, by the early 1930s, he was going by the stage name Trevor Bardette and had begun acting on the East Coast. By 1936 or 1937, he had made the move to Hollywood.

The IMDb lists Hubbard's first credit as the Hopalong Cassidy feature Borderland (1937). Over the next thirty years and more, Bardette became a familiar face in the movies and on television, especially in westerns such as Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Wagon Train, and Cheyenne. He also appeared on film in the genres of detective, fantasy, and science fiction, including in The Adventures of Superman, in which he played "The Human Bomb." Bardette lived in Green Valley, Arizona, late in life and died on November 28, 1977, in Los Angeles.

When Trevor Bardette was still going by the name Terva Gaston Hubbard, he authored a single story for Weird Tales. Its title is "The Phantom Photoplay" and it appeared in the August 1927 issue. The title of Hubbard's story suggests that he was involved in show business as early as the late 1920s. Hubbard's first name, Terva, evidently sounding feminine, has landed him in lists of Weird Tales' women writers. That's just one of many pieces of misinformation on his life. I hope this blog entry can be a start to correcting them.

Terva Gaston Hubbard's Story in Weird Tales

"The Phantom Photoplay" (Aug. 1927)

Further Reading

The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) has a long list of Trevor Bardette's credits and a brief biography. Movies and television shows in which he appeared are readily available on video.

Notes
(1) A fellow student actor was Oregon native Norvell Thompson. At the time of the 1930 census, Thompson was lodging with Bardette and his wife in Manhattan, on Macdougal Street in Greenwich Village. Bardette was an actor. Thompson was a theatrical artist. There were other artists in the area, too, while next door was newspaper reporter Nathan Einhorn, a noted Communist and later believed to have been a spy. At the time of the 1940 census, Trevor and Dorothy Bardette were living in Los Angeles. Bardette gave his income as more than $5,000 per year and indicated that in 1935, he had lived in Mexico City.
(2) In 1931, he was married and living in Evanston, Illinois, as a student.

Actor and author Trevor Bardette (1902-1977).

Bardette appeared in the 1941 serial Jungle Girl with Frances Gifford as the title character, Nyoka. Nyoka the Jungle Girl was based on a story by Edgar Rice Burroughs and later appeared in comic books.

Bardette was also in Universal Pictures' Monolith Monsters (1957), one of the most unusual and memorable science fiction films of the 1950s.

Updated and revised August 24, 2016.
Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

William Hope Hodgson (1877-1918)

Soldier, Sailor, Author, Bodybuilder, Photographer

Born November 15, 1877, Blackmore End, Essex, England

Died April 19, 1918, On the Battlefield at Ypres, Flanders, Belgium

In observance of Memorial Day, here is a posting on one of the great early writers of science-fantasy, William Hope Hodgson, who was killed on the battlefield during World War I. Much has been written on his life and work. H.P. Lovecraft himself knew of Hodgson and commented on his works in Lovecraft's own "Supernatural Horror in Literature." You can read an excerpt on an interesting website devoted to Hodgson called "The Night Land," here.

Hodgson died before Weird Tales came into existence, but the magazine printed one of his stories, "The Hog," in its January 1947 issue. "The Hog" is the longest in a series of stories featuring Hodgson's supernatural detective, Carnacki the Ghost Finder. Perhaps because of its length, it was not printed as the others were in the British magazines The Idler and The New Magazine between 1910 and 1912. Hodgson's powers and limitations as a writer are on full display in the Carnacki stories. He had a great imagination--an imagination ahead of its time really--and was capable of describing dreadful wonders. On the other hand, his stories and novels are often overlong, repetitive, mawkish, and formulaic. Hodgson's needless framing devices alone are enough to drive you crazy. In any other writer these flaws might prove fatal. Hodgson, though, is always worth reading because when he is good, he is unmatched.

William Hope Hodgson's Stories in Weird Tales

"The Hog" (Jan. 1947)

"A Tropical Horror" (Summer 1973)

"Eloi Eloi Lama Sabachthani" (Fall 1973)

"The Terror of the Water Tank" (Winter 1973)

"The Finding of the Graiken" (Summer 1974)

Further Reading

William Hope Hodgson's work has been reprinted repeatedly during the last century. If you can find Ballantine's paperback reprints from the early 1970s, that might be a good place to start. In any case, his works include the following (with selected paperback reprints that might be easier on your wallet should you decide to add them to your library):

• The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" (1907; Ballantine, 1971)
• The House on the Borderland (1908; Ace, 1962)
• The Ghost Pirates (1909; Hyperion, 1976)
• The Night Land (1912; Ballantine, 1972)
• Carnacki the Ghost-Finder (1913; Panther, 1973)

And many, many short stories. In addition, Sam Moskowitz was a particular fan of Hodgson and published one of his stories in each of Moskowitz's four issues of the revived Weird Tales in the early 1970s. Moskowitz also wrote and published a three-part critical, biographical, and bibliographical study of Hodgson in the Summer 1973 issue through the Winter 1973 issue, the first of its kind.

Some websites:
The Amalgamated Brotherhood of Spooks
http://www.amalgamatedspooks.com/index.html

Alan Gullette
http://alangullette.com/lit/hodgson/

William Hope Hodgson (1877-1918), one of the casualties in the unspeakable slaughter and waste that was the First World War. 

It's hard to beat Ace for great science fiction and fantasy covers. Here is the cover of Hodgson's novel The House on the Borderland, done by the indispensable Ed Emshwiller.

Finally, the cover of Carnacki the Ghost-Finder in a British edition from Panther (1973). The illustration is for "The Hog," the longest story in the book and the only one to be reprinted in Weird Tales. The cover artist is Bob Haberfield.

Hodgson's long short story "The Hog" was the cover story of the January 1947 issue of Weird Tales magazine. "The Hog" is not my favorite Carnacki story--I think it's overlong and a little repetitive--but I can't complain as long as his work gets out there into the world. The cover artist was Albert Roanoke Tilburne (1887-1965) who also served during World War I. In Tilburne's case, it was with the U.S. Naval Reserve Force, the same branch in which Jacob Clark Henneberger served in the last year of the war.

Revised slightly on October 20, 2019.
Recognition should go to Randal A. Everts for his yeoman's work in discovering the proper death date of William Hope Hodgson.
Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

Harry Anable Kniffin (1876-1939)

Author, Illustrator

Born February 12, 1876, Brooklyn, New York

Died February 18, 1939, Westfield, New Jersey

Harry Anable Kniffin was born on February 12, 1876, in Brooklyn, New York, but lived in Bayonne and Westfield, New Jersey, for most of his life. As a young man, he worked in the insurance business, then as an illustrator, a stenographer, and finally a writer for magazines. His triumph was "The Tribute," a story from Brief Stories selected for an O. Henry Award and published in Prize Stories of 1921. His only work for Weird Tales, "The Hand of Fatma," was published in the January 1924 issue. Kniffin also wrote for The Delineator, a Butterick magazine with a focus on women's fashions. His family, some of whom worked as pattern makers, may also have worked for the Butterick Publishing Company, which was based in Manhattan. Kniffin's stories for The Delineator appeared in the issues for April and July 1924. His short story, "Westfield 140 Years Ago," was printed in his local paper, The Westfield Leader, on December 9, 1925.

Kniffin was probably the same H.A. Kniffin who authored a one-act play called "Mrs. Flynn's Lodgers" (1910). He was also involved in civic affairs in his home town of Westfield, co-authoring a church history printed in 1929 and serving as president of the Westfield Art Association. Kniffin died a week after his birthday, on February 18, 1939, in Westfield. His wife, Louise H. Kniffin, remained active as head of the Children's Country Home in Westfield for many years afterward.

Harry Anable Kniffin's Story in Weird Tales
"The Hand of Fatma" (Jan. 1924)

Further Reading
"The Tribute" has fallen into the public domain and is readily available on the Internet.

Harry Anable Kniffin wrote fiction and perhaps also provided illustrations for the Butterick company's magazine, The Delineator.

Harry Anable Kniffin (1876-1939)

Thanks to Randal A. Everts for the photograph of Harry Anable Kniffin.
Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

Preston Langley Hickey (1900-1962)

Editor, Author, Magician, Poet, Publicist

Born July 30, 1900, Charlestown, Massachusetts

Died September 28, 1962, Indianapolis, Indiana

Preston Langley "Duke" Hickey was born on July 30, 1900, in Charlestown, Massachusetts, and lived in Chicago (where his father ran a restaurant called the JeJong) and Minneapolis as a young man. He served overseas in the U.S. Army's famed "Rainbow Division" during World War I. (Poet Joyce Kilmer was also a member of the division, commanded by General Douglas MacArthur.) In civilian life, Hickey attended the New York Institute of Fine Arts and the McPhail School of Music in Minneapolis.

At nineteen Hickey was an editor for the Associated Press in Minneapolis. He also wrote booklets after the war, Practical Drawing Room, Club and Stage Patter (1919) and Parlor Problems, or Mental Mathematical Magic (1920). During the 1920s, he wrote for pulp magazines, some fiction, some verse, and some "true" stories. "True" stories--true romances, true confessions, true mystery stories, true terror tales--were a popular kind of pulp story. Hickey contributed to that sub-genre in the magazine True Detective Mysteries. During the first year of Weird Tales' run, he conducted a regular "true" feature, "The Cauldron: True Adventures of Terror." "The Unique Magazine" also published two of his poems, "Hops" and "The Crystal Globe," in 1924. His short story, "The Ship Terror," appeared in the October 1924 issue of Triple-X. If Hickey is known for any of his works today, it's for a book called The Conspiracy of Silence: An Indictment (1938), written with silent movie actress Juanita Hansen (1895-1961). The book came out of her experiences abusing drugs. In it, she argued that drug users should be treated medically rather than sent to prison. Unlike other celebrity drug users, she reformed and lived a long life.

Hickey spent most of his career in motion picture publicity and eventually became known to "every newspaper movie critic east of the Mississippi" according to his obituary. He spent the last fourteen years of his career in Cleveland with Universal International Films. From his obituary:

Combining the swashbuckling style of movie publicists of another era with the qualities of modern public relations men, he obtained essentially the space he required in newspapers and other publications when he was publicizing a movie.

In addition to writing fiction, semi-fiction, and non-fiction, Hickey enjoyed compiling historical information on the state of Montana. He was in fact a member of the Montana Cowboys Association, the Vigilantes Club of Virginia City, Montana, and other organizations, despite living in Lakewood, Ohio, late in life. Preston Langley Hickey died on September 28, 1962, in Indianapolis, Indiana, while on a publicity trip.

Preston Langley Hickey's Features and Poems in Weird Tales

"The Cauldron: True Adventures of Terror" (June 1923; July/Aug. 1923; Sept. 1923; Oct. 1923)

"Hops" (poem, Jan. 1924)

"The Crystal Globe" (poem, Mar. 1924)

Further Reading

I don't know of any sources for Hickey's work except for the original works themselves.

Although Preston Langley Hickey's "The Cauldron" did not appear in the May 1923 issue of Weird Tales, a cauldron appeared on the cover that month, presaging the arrival of Hickey's feature in June. The cover art is by an illustrator whose identity will be revealed in a future posting.

Silent movie actress Juanita Hansen suffered through drug abuse during much of her career in Hollywood. By the 1930s, that career had ended, but that didn't stop her from becoming an anti-drug crusader. Her book with Preston Langley Hickey, The Conspiracy of Silence: An Indictment (1938), was part of that crusade. Early on, Juanita Hansen took a turn as a jungle girl in The Lost City of the African Jungle (1920). Tarzan had made his debut just eight years before.

For the last fourteen years of his life, P.L. "Duke" Hickey did publicity work for Universal International pictures, producer and purveyor of movies made in the old pulp genres of western, adventure, horror, and science fiction.

Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

Lamont Buchanan's Books

Lamont Buchanan (b. 1919) was the associate editor and art director of Weird Tales during its years in his hometown of New York City. Although I have not yet found when he started in that position, I have found a source announcing his resignation in the winter of 1949-1950. (My source is Science Fantasy Review, Vol. 4, No. 17. You can look at that source here, on the website Efanzines.com.) By the time of his resignation, Buchanan had already seen three or four of his books in print. His future as a writer, editor, and compiler of pictorial books must have seemed bright.

In a review of one of his books, the reviewer wrote: "The author is identified as 'one of the earliest contributors to the big pictorial magazines' and 'a pioneer in the text and picture method of telling a story.' " That would suggest that Buchanan's work appeared in Life, Look, or similar magazines. In any case, Lamont Buchanan specialized in pictorial books, a field that seems to have opened up after World War II. One review stated that he had authored thirteen books, but I could find the titles of just twelve, the first from 1947 and the last from 1956.

• The Story of Football in Text and Pictures (New York: Stephen-Paul, 1947)
• The Story of Basketball in Text and Pictures (New York: Stephen-Paul, 1948)
• People and Politics: The Pictorial History of the American Two-Party System (New York: Stephen-Paul, 1948)
• The Story of Tennis in Text and Pictures (New York: Vanguard Press, 1951)
• A Pictorial History of the Confederacy (New York: Crown Publishers, 1951)
• The World Series and Highlights of Baseball (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1951)
• The Kentucky Derby Story (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1953)
• The Flying Years: A Pictorial History of Man's Conquest of the Air (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1953)
• The Pictorial Baseball Instructor (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1954)
• Steel Trails and Iron Horses: A Pageant of American Railroading (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1955)
• Ballot for Americans: A Pictorial History of American Elections, 1789-1956 (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1956)
• Ships of Steam (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1956)

And then, like Allison V. Harding, he seems to have vanished.

Copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley