GILLINGS, Walter (Herbert)

(1912-1979)

   UK journalist and editor, active in FANDOM from the early 1930s; he published (1937-8) 7 issues of an historic FANZINE, Scientifiction. This activity led to his editing the first true UK sf magazine, TALES OF WONDER (1937-42). Immediately after WWII he joined the author Benson HERBERT to create the Utopian Publications imprint, which issued sf, fantasy and some soft-core pornography in cheap paperback format; this included the AMERICAN FICTION and STRANGE TALES series. WG then edited the 3 issues of FANTASY (1946-7). After its demise he produced the professional-looking fanzine FANTASY REVIEW (1947-50); when, in 1950, he was given the editorship of the new professional magazine SCIENCE FANTASY, the fanzine was incorporated as a section of the first 2 issues.John CARNELL took over editorship of Science Fantasy with \#3 (Winter 1951/2), and WG dropped out of sf activities for some years. He then produced another fanzine, Cosmos, for 3 issues in 1969, and also appeared regularly in VISION OF TOMORROW (1969-70) with a series about the HISTORY OF SF in the UK, and again as a columnist in SCIENCE FICTION MONTHLY(1974-6), where he also had a column as Thomas Sheridan - the pseudonym under which he had years earlier published the first of his 3 sf stories, "The Midget from Mars" for Tales of Wonder in 1938. Another story, "LostPlanet" (Fantasy 1946), was published as by Geoffrey Giles.

   PN

   See also: BRITISH SCIENCE FICTION ASSOCIATION; SF MAGAZINES.