GIBSON, Walter B(rown)

(1897-1985)

   US newspaper journalist, editor and writer who founded and ran Tales of Magic and Mystery (1927-8) - where he published his first piece of genre interest, "The Miracle Man of Benares", in 1927 - as well as True Strange Stories (1929) for Bernarr MACFADDEN, and FANTASTIC SCIENCE FICTION (1952); this latter lasted only 2 issues, and is not to beconfused with FANTASTIC, also founded 1952. Variously prolific, he remains best known under the house name Maxwell Grant - though "pseudonym" would perhaps be a more accurate term, as WBG wrote almost 300 novels as Grant, most for the celebrated pulp magazine The Shadow(325 issues 1931-49), whose hero - originating in a 1930 radio series - is a mysterious vigilante who often walks by night. WBG wrote most (not all) of these, but only 25 or so contain sf themes, those later republished as books being Charge, Monster (1934; 1977), The Silent Death (1978) and The Death Giver(1978). Other Shadow episodes republished in book form include The Living Shadow (1933), The Shadow and the Voice of Murder (1940), Return of the Shadow (1963) as WBG, The Weird Adventures of the Shadow (coll 1966) as WBG, and (all first published in The Shadow) The Weird Adventures of the Shadow: Grove of Doom (1933; 1969), The Eyes of the Shadow (1931; 1969), The Shadow Laughs! (1931; 1969), The Death Tower (1932; 1969), The Ghost Makers (1932; 1970), Hidden Death (1932; 1970), Gangdom's Doom (1931; 1970), The Black Master (1932; 1974), The Mobsmen on the Spot (1932; 1974), Red Menace (1931; 1975), Silent Seven (1932; 1975), Hands in the Dark (1932; 1975), Double "Z" (1932; 1975), The Crime Cult (1932; 1975), The Romanoff Jewels (1932; 1975), The Crime Oracle (1936; 1975), Teeth of the Dragon (1937; 1975), Kings of Crime (1932; 1976), Shadowed Millions (1933; 1976), Green Eyes (1932; 1977), The Creeping Death (1933; 1977),The Shadow's Shadow (1933; 1977), Fingers of Death (1933; 1977), Murder Trail (1933; 1977), Grey Fist (1934; 1977), Charg, Monster (1934; 1977) and Zemba (1935; 1977). The Shadow titles published as by WBG include The Mask of Mephisto and Murder by Magic (coll 1975), A Quarter of Eight andThe Freak Show Murders (coll 1978), Crime Over Casco and The Mother Goose Murders (coll 1979), The Shadow Scrapbook (coll 1979), Jade Dragon and House of Ghosts (coll 1981) and The Shadow and the Golden Master (coll of linked stories 1984). WBG also wrote Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone * (coll 1963; cut vt Chilling Stories from Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone1965) and Twilight Zone Revisited * (coll 1964).

   JC