Back to my third story, now-
On July 30, 1938, only eight days after Campbell’s second rejection, I had finished my third story, “Marooned off Vesta.” I did not think it politic to see Campbell oftener than once a month, however, since I suspected that I might easily wear out my welcome if I did. I put “Marooned off Vesta” to one side, therefore, and began to write other stories. By the end of the month I had two more: “This Irrational Planet” and “Ring Around the Sun.”
My first three stories, including “Marooned off Vesta,” had been typed on a very old, but completely serviceable Underwood No. 5 typewriter, which my father had obtained for me in 1936 for ten dollars. After I had submitted my second story to Campbell, however, my father decided that I was in earnest about a writing career, and feeling that my failure to sell was irrelevant and, in any case, temporary, he set about getting me a brand-new typewriter.
On August 10, 1938, a Smith-Corona portable entered the house and it was on the new typewriter that my fourth and fifth stories were written.
Of the three, I felt “This Irrational Planet” to be the weakest, so I did not submit it to Campbell. I submitted it directly to Thrilling Wonder Stories on August 26, and it was not rejected till September 24. Campbell had spoiled me, and the four-week interval between submission and rejection appalled me. I even called during that interval to make an indignant inquiry-not knowing that a mere four-week wait was brief indeed for anyone but Campbell.
But at least the rejection, when it came, was typewritten ‘ and was not a printed form. What’s more, it contained the sentence, “Try us again, won’t you?” That encouraged me. Perhaps I underestimated the story. Buoyantly, I tried Campbell, and he rejected it in six days. Five other magazines rejected it afterward. I never did sell it, and “This Irrational Planet” is also nonexistent now. I don’t even remember the plot, except that I’m pretty certain that the planet of the title was Earth itself. (The only other information I have about it is that it was quite short, only three thousand words long. Actually, most of the stories of those early years that I never sold, and no longer exist, were short. The longest was the first, “Cosmic Corkscrew.”)
The other two stories written in the same month were reserved for a better fate, but it didn’t seem so at first On August 30, 1938, I visited Campbell for the third time and submitted both “Marooned off Vesta” and “Ring Around the Sun”-and both were returned to me on September 8.
The very next day I shipped off “Marooned off Vesta,” which I felt to be the better of the two, to Amazing Stories . It took a month and a half to hear from them, but this time the wait was worth it. On October 21, 1938, there came a letter of acceptance from Raymond A. Palmer, who was then editor of Amazing and who has since achieved his greatest fame as a leading figure in the flying saucers craze and in other forms of occultism. To this day I have never met Mr. Palmer personally.
It was my first acceptance, four months to the day after my first visit to John Campbell. By that time I had written six stories and had collected nine rejections from Various magazines. The check, for $64 (one cent a word), followed on October 31, and that was the first money I ever earned as a professional writer. [In this book, I am going to pay considerable attention to the money I received for my stories. This is not because I write primarily for money or regarded money as particularly important either then or now (my publishers will gladly bear witness to this). The money I received, however, was crucial in determining my career. It paid enough to put me through school and not so much as to lure me out of it. You’ll see as we go along.]
For a number of years I kept that first acceptance letter, from Palmer, framed on my bedroom wall. But in the vicissitudes of life, it, too, has disappeared and, yes, I’m sorry.
The story appeared in the March 1939 issue of Amazing Stories , which reached the newsstands on January 10, 1939, just eight days after my nineteenth birthday. It was the first occasion on which I ever appeared professionally, and I still have an intact copy of that issue of the magazine. I did not save one at the time (my sense of historical importance, as I have already explained, is deficient) but eventually removed my story for binding and discarded the rest. Ordinarily, I don’t mind doing this and have done it ruthlessly through all the years (space is limited even in the best of apartments when one is as prolific as I have been), but the time came when I was sorry I hadn’t saved that first one intact. The well-known science fiction fan Forrest J Ackerman heard me express regret and kindly sent me a copy in excellent condition.
That copy, by the way, contains a little autobiographical squib in the rear, written by my teen-age self. On rereading, years later, it turned out to be exquisitely embarrassing.
“Marooned off Vesta” is not included here, since it appeared in Asimov’s Mysteries . (This doesn’t mean it was a mystery. The reason for its inclusion in that particular collection is explained there. -Well, go ahead, buy the book and satisfy your curiosity.)
As for “Ring Around the Sun,” it was rejected by Thrilling Wonder Stories , but then, on February 5, 1939, it was accepted by Future Fiction , one of the new science fiction magazines that were springing up.
It appeared in the second issue of that magazine, which did not, however, reach the stands until nearly a year after the sale. The payment (theoretically on publication, rather than on acceptance as was Campbell’s more civilized procedure) was even more delayed. What’s more, it was at the rate of only half a cent a word, so the check came to a mere twenty-five dollars. Astonishing Stories also paid only half a cent a word at that time, but “The Callistan Menace” was the longer story-6,500 words-so it netted me $32.50.
I didn’t feel put upon, however. I well knew by that time that in the still earlier history of science fiction magazines, payment of a quarter of a cent a word was common, and that not on publication but (the saying went) on lawsuit. Besides, those were lean times, and twenty-five dollars represented something like five months’ pocket money to me (no kidding).
The editor of Future Fiction was, at that time, Charles D. Hornig. I occasionally visited his office to inquire when a story might appear, or when a check might, but I don’t recall ever having found him in. In fact, to this day I have never, to my knowledge, met him.
Ring Around the Sun
Jimmy Turner was humming merrily, if a bit raucously, when he entered the reception room.
“Is Old Sourpuss in?” he asked, accompanying the question with a wink at which the pretty secretary blushed gratefully.
“He is; and waiting for you.” She motioned him towards the door on which was written in fat, black letters, “Frank McCutcheon, General Manager, United Space Mail.”
Jim entered. “Hello, Skipper, what now?”
“Oh, it’s you, is it?” McCutcheon looked up from his desk, champing a foul-smelling stogie. “Sit down.”
McCutcheon stared at him from under bushy gray eyebrows. “Old Sourpuss,” as he was euphoniously known to all members of United Space Mail, had never been known to laugh within the memory of the oldest inmate, though rumor did have it that when a child he had smiled at the sight of his father falling out of an apple-tree. Right now his expression made the rumor appear exaggerated.
“Now, listen. Turner,” he barked, “United Space Mail is inaugurating a new service and you’re elected to blaze the trail.” Disregarding Jimmy’s grimace, he continued, “From now on the Venerian mail is on an all-year-round basis.”
“What! I’ve always thought that it was ruinous from a financial standpoint to deliver the Venerian. mail except when it was this side of the Sun.”
“Sure,” admitted McCutcheon, “if we follow the ordinary routes. But we might cut straight across the system if we could only get near enough to the sun. That’s where you come in! They’ve put out a new ship equipped to approach within twenty million miles of the sun and which will be able to remain at that distance indefinitely.”
Jimmy interrupted nervously, “Wait a while, S-Mr. McCutcheon, I don’t quite follow. What kind of a ship is this?”
“How do you expect me to know? I’m no fugitive from a laboratory. From what they tell me, it emits some kind of a field that bends the radiations of the sun around the ship. Get it? It’s all deflected. No heat reaches you. You can stay there forever and be cooler than in New York.”
“Oh, is that so?” Jimmy was skeptical. “Has it been tested, or is that a little detail that has been left for me?”
“It’s been tested, of course, but not under actual solar conditions.”
“Then it’s out. I’ve done plenty for United, but this is the limit. I’m not crazy, yet.”
McCutcheon stiffened. “Must I recall the oath you took upon entering the service. Turner? ‘Our flight through space-’ “
“‘-must ne’er be stopped by anything save death,’“ finished Jimmy. “I know that as well as you do and I also notice that it’s very easy to quote that from a comfortable armchair. If you’re that idealistic, you can do it yourself. It’s still out, as far as I’m concerned. And if you want, you can kick me out. I can get other jobs just like that,” he snapped his fingers airily.