Doc Savage Organized » article

Doc Savage on the Funny Pages

Chuck Welch — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 00:48:24 +0000

Doc Savage Comic Strips by Dave Cockrum

We rarely feature Doc Savage material that doesn’t reside in the Hidalgo Trading Company. (Links get moved, sites close, and other problems just remind us it’s better to keep everything in-house.) That said, rush over to Rip Jagger’s Dojo to read The Return of Dave Cockrum’s Doc Savage — two weeks of Doc for the funny pages.

Doc Savage on the Funny Pages is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

The Doc Savage Waiting Game

Chuck Welch — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 14:13:49 +0000

May 1933

For the sake of argument pretend you were born around 1920.

Now jump forward to when you turned 13. (Let’s say May 17, 1933.)

You’ve been buying each issue of the new Doc Savage Magazine as soon as it hits the newsstand. (Where are you getting the money? You sell Grit.)

You become successful. From Grit you graduate to the New York Times. Pretty soon you’re in college, but you never stop buying Doc Savage Magazine. They’re taking up room in the attic, but Mom loves to have something of yours at home.

You’re kinda sad when you buy the last issue just before your 29th birthday. You hoped to have a son and introduce him to the Fabulous Five.

Flash forward to 1964. You’re 44 and you do have a son. He’s 13 and he finds the Bantam copy of The Man of Bronze at Parrino’s Drugstore. He’s hooked!

After a few months you’re disappointed to find they’re not in the order you remember. You’d get out the old issues for the boy, but you threw them away when your wife convinced you to build her a sewing room in the attic.

You had the pool room downstairs. What could you say?

The years go by. Bantam re-releases Docs in something that looks like random order. Sometimes one a month…sometimes months between reissues. It’s OK. Your son doesn’t care what order as long as Bantam publishes them all. he’s a collector.

It’s October 1990. You’re 70. You’re on the porch with your grandson. He’s 13. (Amazing how that works.) He brings you a book he found at Hawley-Cooke. He remembered you and his Dad talking about the Man of Bronze. He’s found a copy of Doc Savage Omnibus #13.

You look over Up From Earth’s Center and get that feeling again. You tell your grandson it’s been over 40 years since you saw that story and you still remember it.

“Fourty-one years and three months, grandpa.” You’re happy the kid inherited his mother’s smarts. You think aloud, “I wonder what the longest it was between when a novel came out and when Bantam reprinted it?”

The next day your grandson gives you a printout. It’s a list of all the novels and the length of time between pulp publication and Bantam reprint publication.

“I figured it out for you Grandpa. You had to wait an average of 37 years and 8 months between the time a novel was first published and the time Bantam reprinted it.”

You give your grandson a funny look. Gas, but he misinterprets it.

He shows you the list. “See here Grandpa? The Green Eagle came out in July 1941 and Bantam reprinted it in May 1968. That’s 26 years and 10 months.”

“That would have been the shortest wait. The longest was Bequest of Evil. It was first printed in February 1941, but Bantam didn’t reprint it until June 1990.”

You look up, “That’s, uh, almost 50 years.”

“49 years and 5 months, grandpa. I put them all on that printout I gave you.”

You smile at the boy and think, “He’ll give up all this foolishness as soon as he discovers girls.”

Bantam #	Magazine #	Wait #	Bantam Title	Years	Months
24	101	1	The Green Eagle	26	10
25	95	2	The Devil’s Playground	27	5
29	83	3	The Other World	28	9
30	76	4	The Flaming Falcons	29	5
23	68	5	Fortress of Solitude	29	6
37	81	6	Hex	29	7
40	82	7	The Dagger in the Sky	29	9
2	17	8	The Thousand-Headed Man	30	3
41	77	9	Merchants of Disaster	30	3
39	74	10	World’s Fair Goblin	30	4
42	75	11	The Gold Ogre	30	6
3	13	12	Meteor Menace	30	7
9	23	13	The Mystic Mullah	30	10
14	34	14	The Fantastic lsland	30	11
28	56	15	The Deadly Dwarf	30	11
12	29	16	Quest of Qui	31	0
7	14	17	The Monsters	31	2
15	33	18	Murder Melody	31	2
5	11	19	Brand of the Werewolf	31	3
21	43	20	Cold Death	31	4
57	79	21	Poison Island	31	5
13	25	22	Land of Always-Night	31	6
1	1	23	The Man of Bronze	31	7
6	7	24	The Lost Oasis	31	7
11	19	25	Fear Cay	31	8
4	4	26	The Polar Treasure	31	10
33	50	27	The Terror in the Navy	31	10
34	51	28	Mad Eyes	31	10
16	26	29	The Spook Legion	31	11
59	72	30	The Yellow Cloud	32	2
10	10	31	The Phantom City	32	3
8	2	32	The Land of Terror	32	4
50	61	33	Devil on the Moon	32	4
20	27	34	The Secret in the Sky	32	6
27	36	35	Mystery Under the Sea	32	6
36	45	36	Resurrection Day	32	6
56	65	37	The Giggling Ghosts	32	6
49	57	38	The Sea Angel	32	7
58	66	39	The Munitions Master	32	7
48	55	40	The Feathered Octopus	32	8
55	58	41	The Golden Peril	33	0
65	69	42	The Green Death	33	0
66	71	43	Mad Mesa	33	0
67	73	44	The Freckled Shark	33	0
63	64	45	The Submarine Mystery	33	2
32	32	46	Dust of Death	33	3
47	47	47	Land of Long Juju	33	3
62	62	48	The Pirate’s Ghost	33	3
54	53	49	He Could Stop the World	33	4
64	63	50	The Motion Menace	33	4
61	59	51	The Living Fire Menace	33	5
46	42	52	The Midas Man	33	7
53	49	53	The Mental Wizard	33	7
17	6	54	The Red Skull	33	9
18	8	55	The Sargasso Ogre	33	9
26	20	56	Death in Silver	33	9
52	46	57	The Vanisher	33	9
45	38	58	The Men Who Smiled No More	33	10
31	22	59	The Annihilist	34	0
19	5	60	Pirate of the Pacific	34	2
51	40	61	Haunted Ocean	34	2
22	9	62	The Czar of Fear	34	4
38	24	63	Red Snow	34	5
94	143	64	The Hate Genius	34	5
35	18	65	The Squeaking Goblin	34	8
44	21	66	The Sea Magician	35	2
78	78	67	The Crimson Serpent	35	2
98	146	68	Cargo Unknown	35	3
106	154	69	The Screaming Man	35	7
60	31	70	The Majii	35	8
97	141	71	Satan Black	35	8
43	12	72	The Man Who Shook the Earth	35	10
100	142	73	The Lost Giant	35	10
79	70	74	The Devil Genghis	35	11
82	86	75	The Evil Gnome	36	1
96	125	76	Mystery on Happy Bones	36	3
74	48	77	The Derrick Devil	36	5
75	52	78	The Land of Fear	36	5
81	80	79	The Stone Man	36	5
85	87	80	The Boss of Terror	36	6
101	136	81	The Pharaoh’s Ghost	36	7
104	137	82	The Man Who Was Scared	36	9
71	35	83	Murder Mirage	36	10
72	37	84	The Metal Master	36	10
73	39	85	The Seven Agate Devils	36	10
86	84	86	The Angry Ghost	36	11
87	85	87	The Spotted Men	37	0
103	134	88	The Whisker of Hercules	37	0
107	140	89	Jin San	37	0
70	30	90	Spook Hole	37	1
99	127	91	Hell Below	37	1
90	89	92	The Flying Goblin	37	2
77	44	93	The South Pole Terror	37	4
109	138	94	The Shape of Terror	37	5
76	41	95	The Black Spot	37	9
114	145	96	The Ten-Ton Snakes	37	9
83	67	97	The Red Terrors	37	10
91	91	98	The Purple Dragon	37	10
110	132	99	Death Had Yellow Eyes	37	11
130	178	100	The Swooning Lady	37	11
102	119	101	The Time Terror	38	0
129	177	102	The Angry Canary	38	1
69	15	103	The Mystery on the Snow	38	2
92	88	104	The Awful Egg	38	4
111	131	105	One-Eyed Mystic	38	5
93	90	106	Tunnel Terror	38	6
84	60	107	The Mountain Monster	38	7
108	121	108	The Black, Black Witch	38	7
105	117	109	They Died Twice	38	8
68	3	110	Quest of the Spider	39	0
113	123	111	The Talking Devil	39	7
142	175	112	The Pure Evil	39	7
89	54	113	The Magic Island	39	10
112	113	114	The Man Who Fell Up	39	11
147	174	115	I Died Yesterday	40	1
146	173	116	Once Over Lightly	40	3
145	172	117	Let’s Kill Ames	40	5
144	171	118	The Monkey Suit	40	7
80	16	119	The King Maker	40	8
143	170	120	No Light to Die By	40	9
116	112	121	The Speaking Stone	41	0
115	111	122	Pirate Isle	41	1
120	122	123	The King of Terror	41	2
134	152	124	The Thing That Pursued	41	3
182	181	125	Up From Earth’s Center	41	3
126	129	126	The Secret of the Su	41	4
125	128	127	The Goblins	41	5
136	155	128	Measures for a Coffin	41	5
133	149	129	King Joe Cay	41	6
181	180	130	Return From Cormoral	41	6
119	116	131	The Laugh of Death	41	8
151	166	132	The Disappearing Lady	41	8
155	169	133	Danger Lies East	41	8
180	179	134	The Green Master	41	9
88	28	135	The Roar Devil	41	11
122	115	136	The Fiery Menace	42	1
150	161	137	Fire and Ice	42	1
118	106	138	Peril in the North	42	2
121	114	139	The Three Wild Men	42	2
138	144	140	Strange Fish	42	4
141	147	141	Rock Sinister	42	5
179	176	142	Terror Wears No Shoes	42	5
154	158	143	Five Fathoms Dead	42	7
117	98	144	The Golden Man	42	10
137	135	145	The Three Devils	43	1
128	124	146	The Running Skeletons	43	2
172	165	147	The Devil Is Jones	43	3
159	153	148	Trouble on Parade	43	4
176	168	149	The Death Lady	43	4
153	148	150	The Terrible Stork	43	5
175	167	151	Target for Death	43	5
124	100	152	The Headless Men	43	6
135	130	153	The Spook of Grandpa Eben	43	6
170	162	154	Three Times a Corpse	43	6
167	157	155	Terror and the Lonely Widow	43	8
169	160	156	Colors for Murder	43	8
174	164	157	Death in Little Houses	43	8
171	159	158	Death is a Round Black Spot	43	9
177	163	159	The Exploding Lake	43	9
163	151	160	Terror Takes 7	43	10
162	150	161	The Wee Ones	43	11
168	156	162	Se-Pah-Poo	44	0
123	92	163	Devils of the Deep	44	2
158	139	164	Weird Valley	44	6
132	107	165	The Rustling Death	45	0
131	103	166	The Mindless Monsters	45	4
127	97	167	The All-White Elf	45	5
156	126	168	The Mental Monster	45	7
140	108	169	Men of Fear	45	8
139	102	170	Mystery Island	46	2
149	110	171	The Magic Forest	46	4
178	133	172	The Derelict of Skull Shoal	46	7
165	120	173	Waves of Death	46	9
164	118	174	The Devil’s Black Rock	46	11
160	105	175	The Invisible-Box Murders	47	8
166	109	176	The Too-Wise Owl	47	8
148	93	177	The Awful Dynasty	47	9
161	104	178	Birds of Death	47	9
157	99	179	The Pink Lady	47	10
152	94	180	The Men Vanished	47	11
173	96	181	Bequest of Evil	49	4

Originally published on DocSavage.Info and one of the many early incarnations of the Hidalgo Trading Company

The Doc Savage Waiting Game is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

The Timeline of the Bleeding Sun

Chuck Welch — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 14:04:08 +0000

Cover of Bantam 127

Quite a few years ago there was a shenanigan perpetuated by Doc Savage fans. Well, not all of the fans. Just a few. At dinner during a Pulpcon, a few of us marveled over the lists of Jay Ryan. In a homemade collection of sheets Jay has assembled all sorts of information about the various editions of Doc Savage. We wondered, “What if Jay has missed one?” Many eyes lit up and we agreed…there had to be a novel that Bantam had planned to publish. One that had been announced. Cover art commissioned. Maybe even a few copies were printed for book reviewers.

And Jay had missed it.

What follows is the timeline of that shenanigan. Written almost 14 years ago, the timeline has been resurrected for DocSavage.Org. As for Bleeding Sun itself, ask around at Pulpfest. Maybe someone has a copy you can borrow.

•

First, we had the idea for the shenanigan. Next we had a cover. Then we had the back cover blurb.

8-4-1998 Doc and his courageous crew race to the Far East to combat the Axis plague! Can they solve the mystery of an insidious new weapon certain to turn the tide of the war? What causes the sun to turn red and ships to disappear? Can mere light really turn a man to smoke and ashes? Will Doc and Monk save Ham in time or will he too die under a bleeding sun?

Then, Bill had a story idea.

Email 8-6-98 This is my idea on the story line. Doc and Long Tom are in Norfolk working on a new radar system for the Navy in preparation for the invasion of Japan. The head of Naval intelligence, Admiral J. Ryan, disappears after a strange red cloud appears in the Navy base in Norfolk and causes ships to melt and turns men to ashes. Doc analyzes the remains and discovers a rare element that is only found in the coastal islands of Japan. Doc and Long Tom immediately take off for Japan in hopes of finding Admiral Ryan before he reveals the secret plans for the invasion.

We didn’t have a real novel though. Bleeding Sun might have ended then and there. Then another email from Duane.

Email excerpt 8-13-98 Meanwhile, I have a weird idea: If you think it’s worth trying, I’d like to take the ideas everyone’s thrown out about #127 and actually take a stab at writing the “unpublished novel.” (Okay, okay, I’ve always had a grandiose dream of wanting to be one of the Kenneth Robesons.) You could serialize it on your site as the Chapter of the Week or something like that.

A great idea! Which led to a lot of hard work. Two years of hard work. Using the barest bones of the blurb he began writing Bleeding Sun. I promised to publish each chapter as he finished it. At a chapter per month I figured we’d have the novel finished by Pulpcon 2000. Of course, neither one of us counted on family and careers delaying the project.

I doubt Duane let Bill’s idea and my cover blurb dictate his novel. We didn’t discuss how he planned to plot the novel and my editorial interference was limited to a couple of suggestions.

Email 10-29-1998 After reading the two adventures that supposedly precede and follow “Bleeding Sun” — “Trouble on Parade” and “The Screaming Man” — it’s clear that the Doc who appears in 1945 is quite different from the Doc of the early 1930s. Even the language and tone that Dent uses is quite different. So I’ve tried to combine a little of both the early 1930s and 1945. I hope it works. — Duane

I know he had planned the tone and timing of the novel pretty early on. There are a few familiar names used as character names and I want to state emphatically that all characters in this novel are fictions and any resemblance to persons living or dead is unintended.

It was wonderful reading each new chapter as Duane mailed them to me. Even more I enjoyed being able to read the complete novel in one weekend last week. I hope you’ve enjoyed this welcome addition to the Doc Savage cannon as much as I have.

Now if I can just convince Duane to start writing Terror of the Death Devil

The Timeline of the Bleeding Sun is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

How the Doc Savage Novel ‘Bleeding Sun’ Came to Be

Chuck Welch — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 14:00:48 +0000

Reprinted from DocSavage.Info March 2001

shenanigan: “a playful or mischievous act; a prank.”

At first Bleeding Sun was a shenanigan. In 1998, a few attendees of Pulpcon pretended there was a Doc Savage novel named Bleeding Sun. There wasn’t. That was the fun.

Now it really is a novel. A fine work of fiction written by a true Brother of Bronze. No longer can anyone say, “The Bleeding Sun doesn’t exist. It’s a hoax.” No one can claim to own all the Doc Savage novels if they don’t have Bleeding Sun. (2012 Note: Finding the novel is possible. You just have to ask the right person at the Pulpfest dealer room.)

Then again maybe it wasn’t really a shenanigan. Maybe we just pretended to “discover” what already existed. For those who weren’t there…and only a few of us were… here is the true story of the Bleeding Sun….

In the summer of 1998 I attended my second Pulpcon. The year before I had a great time and I was looking for more of the same. This year was to be even better. Fate wanted me to meet my (then) future wife, Catherine. Thank you, Fate.

We did all the usual Doc Savage fan activities. We spent hours in the dealer room looking for coverless magazines and pristine Bantam’s. We sat and thumbed though a near mint copy of The Man of Bronze. We oohed and ahhed over Jay Ryan’s detailed account of the publishing history of Doc Savage. We argued over the relative merits of the various authors. We learned the difference between “e”, “e”, and “e.”

We were Doc fans at “the” convention. All those years of being the only Doc fan in town were forgotten as we had a great time. You won’t find a more dedicated group of crazy and inventive people than at Pulpcon.

The event that would reverberate for months in Doc fandom started with a simple comment over Jay’s book, “What if Jay had missed something?”

The cartoons are right: light bulbs literally appear over our heads.

Email excerpt 8-23-1998 I know it was in the dealer room where the subject was first mentioned. I know that we had been discussing the rather high price that was put on Doc doubles by some of the dealers. — Bill

The story developed over the next two days. The principal members of the shenanigan operated the more popular Doc Savage websites. People looked to us for information on Doc Savage.

What if we quietly inserted information about a Doc Savage novel that had been published by Bantam? A novel that never existed, but that would seem to be as real as any of the others.

Primarily over a single dinner we developed our “back story.” Our Doc Savage was novel scheduled to run late 1945 but was pulled at the last second. The editors at Street and Smith thought the novel was too wrapped up in the war to be published after VJ Day. So the manuscript was filed away until Bantam discovered it 30 years later. Of course they would publish it! Bantam editors would remember the cash they had reaped over The Red Spider.

We decided to insert the novel as Bantam Number 127. That’s when the novels went to Bantam Omnis. Our #127 would be the last numbered Bantam Doc Savage. We all knew that a Bantam 127/128 double had been announced but was pulled in favor of the first omni edition. It would only confuse the issue more.

Next, we had to have a novel synopsis. We attacked the story logically. Since it was to be set at the end of the war it needed to feature the war in the Pacific. The Japanese empire was called the rising sun. We bandied about plays on such words as “sun” “red” “blood” and “setting sun.” We thought about the red sun of the Japanese flag, which took us to “Bloody Sun” and finally to Bleeding Sun.

That would be our title: Mystery of the Bleeding Sun. Of course, Bantam would have shortened that to Bleeding Sun.

You may have noticed I haven’t identified all of the names of the perps of the shenanigan. I’ll leave it up to the dedicated Savageoligist to uncover the posts and interview the participants. Suffice it to say that we numbered at least seven and each had his or her role.

The story and title developed over an otherwise forgettable dinner. During the next day we would identify certain needs to carry out the shenanigan. We needed a blurb. I volunteered to write one. I had just completed an interview with the original Bantam blurb writer, Nick D’Annuzio, and thought I was up to the task.

Chris Kalb not only operated the prime Doc Savage website but was also an award-winning artist. (Later someone claimed the art had been put together by some “idiot with photoshop.”) He agreed to make up a Doc Savage cover….using Photoshop. We didn’t want to make it too hard to figure out.

Email excerpt 8-4-1998 The cover might be a little too nice considering the cheap crap Bantam put on the fronts of the first omni. BTW, looking at the list there’s plenty of time between the doubles (mar 85) and omnis (aug 86). –Chris

We would place that cover and blurb on all of our sites. There would be no special announcement. We wanted it to seem like it had been there all along. Crazy, huh?

I was taking quite a few pictures of the festivities. The previous year I had posted them on the Hidalgo Trading Company along with a record of the event. To sell the shenanigan, I took a picture of Catherine holding up a novel she had purchased. Chris finished the cover and digitally placed it on Catherine’s novel.

Now we had a picture of someone holding Bleeding Sun. It had to exist! We went home and started fixing our sites. Someone noticed the picture of Catherine and asked about Bleeding Sun. I feigned surprise they didn’t own a copy.

The story started to unravel when a copy was placed on eBay. I know it sounds like we were pushing our luck, but it seemed to make sense at the time. Only one person bid on the novel and he laughed when he learned of the joke.

One participant tried to enlist someone outside the group to help. In retrospect, that was the beginning of the end. The first rule of any shenanigan is “Don’t try to involve anyone who doesn’t have a sense of humor.”

Accusations, recriminations and many angry Usenet posts later the word was out. We had pulled a fast one. No one was really hurt and the alt.fan.doc-savage newsgroup was more alive than it had been for months.

Only one person seemed angry. Most laughed when they discovered the joke. We had a few emails thanking us for injecting some fun into fandom. I think the following two comments were representative of the majority response to the shenanigan:

Usenet excerpt Aug 13, 1998 As I happen to have been one of the people who actually bid on “Bleeding Sun” and therefore was “taken” by the “hoax”, I want to say to one and all, “Relax”. I appreciate the laugh and I really appreciate the fact that the only thing I lost was some time placing a bid on Ebay. It was a masterful hoax, and I applaud its originators. If, however, in any real or imagined guilt they may or may not feel, they desire to commit acts of restitution, I will gladly accept, though I do not compel this action, help in getting the last 3 Doc PB’s that I need for my collection.
Sincerely, Marcel Allen Lamb

Email 1-16-99 Just wanted you to know I fell for the Bleeding Sun book scam, and loved it! You have to understand I was in a vulnerable state when I saw it, I had just been at J__ G_____ site and found out the hardcover versions of the Bantam pb’s exist so I thought anything was possible. Thanks, Mike S_______

I tried to write Marcel recently. I wonder if he finally completed his collection? Maybe he bought those three to reach his Nirvana. I hope someone sends him a copy of Bleeding Sun so he will truly discover “completion peace.”

Chuck Welch
March 2001

How the Doc Savage Novel ‘Bleeding Sun’ Came to Be is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

Pulpfest 2012 is Mere Months Away

Chuck Welch — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 16:30:42 +0000

The annual pilgrimage for pulp fans is making a pair of changes this year. First off, the con is moving to downtown Columbus. From August 9th to the 12th, the Hyatt Regency Hotel will host Pulpfest. Room rates will be $109 a night, which includes parking for one. It’ll probably be best to split your room with someone without a car. You can find more information here about the hotel and surrounding amenities.

Since 2009 the Munsey Award has been awarded to “a deserving person who has given of himself or herself for the betterment of the pulp community, be it through disseminating knowledge about the pulps or through publishing or other efforts to preserve and to foster interest in the pulp magazines we all love and enjoy.” Starting in 2012, the Munsey has been renamed The Rusty Hevelin Service Award in honor of the man who guided Pulpcon and influenced the Pulp fan world for many years.

This year’s guest of honor is author Mike Resnick. Some highlights of Pulpfest 2012 programming include “How French Literature May Have Influenced American Pulp Heroes” with Rick Lai, Christopher Paul Carey will read from his novel co-authored with Philip José Farmer, the FarmerCon VII panelists will “discuss a sampling of the Burroughsian works of Philip José Farmer,” panels on the depiction of Mars in pulp fiction and J. Allen St. John, the artist most associated with Edgar Rice Burroughs, a panel on Conan of Cimmeria and much more.

The early bird Pulpfest registration this year is $30. Children 15 & younger are free. Dealer tables are $70 or $80, which does not include Pulpfest membership.

You can get more information about Pulpfest at the website, email, RSS feed, Facebook page or Twitter account.

Pulpfest 2012 is Mere Months Away is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

A 2000 Interview with Will Murray

Chuck Welch — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 11:23:29 +0000

From the interview... All of the books you wrote were based on his outlines? Every one of them. Does he have any left? Yeah, I've got enough for about seven or eight books. I started about four of them when Bantam Books pulled the plug on the series in '93. That's too bad. It was too bad, especially since I was caught in the middle of several books. I dearly wish to finish them, and I expect I will at some point, for some publisher. I would love to come in and do some new ones because that also is where a lot of the interest lies.

A 2000 Interview with Will Murray is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

Will Murray Working to Publish New "Wild Adventures"

Chuck Welch — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 15:25:10 +0000

At the 2010 Pulpfest author Will Murray spoke to a crowed room of Doc fans eager to hear news from the latest “Kenneth Robeson.” Murray, who wrote seven Doc adventures using materials from the Lester Dent archives, announced he had secured the rights to publish new Doc Savage novels.

Will Murray at Pulpfest 2010
Photo CC by Chuck Welch

Murray explained Conde Nast (copyright holders for the Doc Savage character) had given him the right to publish seven new novels and reprint his seven published novels. Murray is in negotiation with a publishing house to produce the novels in paperback form — either in traditional or trade paperback size. Citing ongoing negotiations, Murray refrained from naming the publisher other than to state it wasn’t Anthony Tollin’s Sanctum Books. Tollin’s publishing house currently reprints the original Doc Savage novels from the 1930s and 40s.

The real reason I do this is to salvage the Lester Dent experience. — Will Murray

Murray unveiled a proposed cover for the first of the new novels, The Desert Demons. The cover used original art by Joe DeVito, cover artist for Murray’s seven novels published by Bantam. Murray explained the cover used a painting of Doc commissioned by Jack Juka and applicable to Murray’s story.

Murray explained the new novel was based on material unearthed during his research into Lester Dent’s papers. In 2005, Murray found a discarded Dent chapter that “introduced Doc in a whole different way.” Murray explained the chapter fit into a Doc novel he was considering, but would take it into a new direction.

Murray explained he wanted his new novels to be “over the top.” “We’re trying to take Doc somewhat out of the envelope,” Murray added. He said the stories would be similar to adventures such as those found in The Spook Legion or Repel.

Murray concluded the presentation by answering audience questions about his working methods, writing philosophy and information about the proposed seven novels. Later this week, the Hidalgo Trading Company will publish additional information about the new novels.

Will Murray Working to Publish New "Wild Adventures" is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

Lester Dent Short Video Biography

Chuck Welch — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 14:17:42 +0000

A 2-minute film about Missouri pulp author Lester Dent, creator of Doc Savage. Third place winner in the Columbia Missouri 2007 Gimme Truth contest.

Interesting super-short documentary from a couple of years ago. See which Doc Savage fans you recognize from the final few seconds…

Lester Dent Short Video Biography is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

Man of Blurb

Chuck Welch — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 03:44:53 +0000

He is an unassuming man. You’d pass him on the street without a second look. Under that façade is the most respected man of his profession. Though you’ve never heard his name before you’ve read some of his best work.

He knows most people have no idea of the years he spent perfecting his craft. The long hours. The deadlines. A marriage sacrificed. No fame or fortune. He doesn’t care. Fortune is not why he did it.

He is probably the first man you connected with Doc Savage. No, not Jim Bama. Think back to when you saw Fear Cay for the first time. You turned over that pristine copy to read:

It was all a great mystery. Who was this man called Dan Thunden who claimed he was one hundred and thirty years old? Did he really have the secret of the fountain of youth? What was this island called Fear Cay that spelled horror and death? What was the strange thing that turned men to bone? These were the mysteries that Doc Savage and his fearless crew had to solve at peril of their very lives.

Nick D’Annuzio laughs when he recalls writing that pithy description, “Asked a lot of questions — never gave many answers.” From The Man of Bronze to Up From Earth’s Center D’Annuzio was “The Man of Blurb.”

The blurb — that bit of marketing designed to lure you into buying a product. Blurb writers are not a high-priced commodity in the publishing field. Usually they’re omnivorous readers who majored in Liberal Arts. D’Annuzio did and went back to get a Masters in Marketing. He still studies today, “It’s a little more casual now. I check out the mags. ‘Next Month’ columns and the like. Oh, and the news. Amazing how much a politician can talk and how little he’ll give away in 30 seconds. Always gives the impression he’s Thomas Jefferson though.”

How did Nick and Doc get together? “When I was nine I picked up an issue of National Geographic. I skipped past the tribal pictures – too young then – and was fascinated by the writing. Not the articles. They were long and boring. I was astounded by the Next Month column. I wanted to read those articles!”

Imagine how disappointed I was when I saw that next issue. More long and boring articles. But my spirits soared with ‘Next Month.’ I knew then and there I wanted to be a blurb writer. Didn’t know the word yet, but I knew I wanted to write them. As a matter of fact, I ended up ghost writing a few of those National Geographic columns when (Richard) “Professor” Laflamme had that strange accident in 78.”

For a man who gets to the point when he writes, D’Annuzio often wanders to the point when he speaks.

“Yeah, you asked me about Doc Savage.” He pulls out a folder. He has kept all his notes. “Back in ’62 I packed up my Bug and traded notebooks at Northwestern for legal pads at Bantam. My first project was a one-shot — Doc Savage. If it took off we’d have 180 more to go. I took home the galleys for “The Man of Bronze” and worked all night.

High above the skyscrapers of New York, Doc Savage engages in deadly combat with the red-fingered survivors of an ancient, lost civilization. Then, with his amazing crew, he journeys to the mysterious “lost valley” to search for a fabulous treasure and to destroy the mysterious Red Death.

“Sure, I had to get their attention without giving anything away. That isn’t easy. I wasn’t quite into the swing of things then. Too many declarative sentences and no questions. I cringe when I read it today. That’s what they wanted though. You always make the company happy.”

D’Annuzio dug out his first draft for the blurb, “Who dares to challenge the Man of Bronze? Does Death always win? Will Doc and his team defeat Death in the Valley of the Vanished? Will the mysterious Red Death claim them? Will it snuff their lives — as it did the only man who truly knew the origin of Doc Savage — his father, Clark Savage, Senior?”

He is still proud of that work. The editors at Bantam wanted less philosophy and more action. “Get murder, danger and the bad guy in every one. That’s what they wanted. I gave it to them. I grabbed you with 50 words or less.”

D’Annuzio remembers the glory days of Doc Savage in the 60s. Sometimes they seemed to write themselves, “I’d work every night from midnight to 2 am. That’s the absolute best time to write a blurb. You’re right on the edge of sleep. Your mind can’t hold a complex thought. Words are ethereal.

Like Lester Dent, D’Annuzio had a touch of wanderlust. He once traveled the Caribbean in a seaplane and farmed a few blurbs out. He won’t reveal who, but assures us we’d recognize the name.

Cadwiller Olden was only three feet tall, but he was the most dangerous man on Earth. With his legion of brutal giants, and control of REPEL — a massive, devastating energy force — the murderous midget began an all-out assault against the defenseless bastions of the free nations. As the entire world huddles in fear, Doc Savage battles against the bizarre doll criminal, and the unleashed fury of his deadly tool of destruction, REPEL!

“He just didn’t work out. Too wordy. Writes a great horror story though.”

Ask D’Annuzio what blurb he is most proud of and you’d be surprised, “None. It wasn’t the blurbs I sweated over. They just flowed — it was the titles I put my heart into.”

D’Annuzio not only wrote blurbs for 181 adventures – he was the first blurb writer who titled his work. Each blurb featured the title in bold on the back cover. “I was able to give alternate titles to 82 of the Doc Savage novels. I started with Soul of the Mystic Mullah. They were sporadic at first. Bantam didn’t place much emphasis on them. They’d just not use the title line sometimes. After Bantam started receiving letters from my fans – yep, those days we had blurb groupies – usually Bryn Mawr girls – they didn’t miss a one from Doc Savage Out West to Trapped in a Steel Tomb.

A new editor was assigned to the Blurb Department at about the same time the Doc Doubles started. “At first I had about the same amount of lines, but gradually I had to fit into less space. The omnibuses almost killed me. No titles and usually just room for a sentence or two to grab you. I was really looking forward to the time we start publishing the new adventures. One story per book and room for a paragraph or two blurb.

It wasn’t meant to be. D’Annuzio was shocked to find that Bantam didn’t call him out of retirement for the new editions of Doc Savage. “Said they wanted new blood. Said my last one was the capstone of my career.”

A shipwrecked lunatic, a mysterious cavern, and a plump little man with a fear of fire lead Doc on his strangest and most legendary adventure ever — straight to the gates of hell itself!

His career is far from over. Brill’s Content called him for the blurbs they used in their early promotional work. Utne Reader depends on D’Annuzio as their Senior Blurb Editor. And the New Yorker has featured three all D’Annuzio blurb issues in the past two years. Still, D’Annuzio hopes someday to again pen the words “fearless crew” for Doc Savage.

* Editor’s note: We received this article with no return address. A call to Bantam revealed that the publisher had employed a Nick D’Annuzio, but not as writer. D’Annuzio was the publisher’s night janitor from 1960 until his “sudden” retirement in 1993. A source speculated D’Annuzio had moved to Florida. Others speculate the blurbs were written by Doc Savage himself. Who knows?

Man of Blurb is a post from: Doc Savage Organized

Doc Savage Batman First Wave Begins

Chuck Welch — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:11:09 +0000

The one shot comic combining the worlds of Doc Savage and Batman has arrived. Titled First Wave Begins, the comic has the pair meet and come to, let’s say, an understanding.

Set just after Doc’s father dies, and early in the career of the Bat-Man, the comic lets the reader see what Brian Azzarello plans to do with the characters. Based on his notes (presented after the comic), Azzarello shows a good understanding of Doc* and his crew. Not to mention a few other pulp characters you might know.

This is it. Doc Savage makes his return to DC Comics, and crashes right into Gotham’s protector, The Batman. Noir mastermind Brian Azzarello teams with artist Phil Noto to present a gritty and shadowy version of the DCU, where thugs are at every corner, corruption runs deep and even the heroes reside in a gray area of morality.

Doc Savage has heard only bad things about The Batman, Gotham’s violent new vigilante, but what can he do to stop him? Check out some more pages from this issue, a vital prologue to the upcoming FIRST WAVE mini-series from Azzarello and artist Rags Morales. – Alex Segura, The Source

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* – Even to his understanding that Doc must be “mixed race.” What? You didn’t know?

Doc Savage Batman First Wave Begins is a post from: Doc Savage Organized