Portland Science-Fantasy Society
(Did you mean PSFS, the Philadelphia Science Fiction Society?)
PSFS was a club located in Portland, OR, which was formed in 1947 and seems to have dissolved not long after running the 1950 Worldcon, roughly 1952.
It was was a stand-alone club, in no way connected to the previous Portland club, the Progressive Fantasy Fan Federation of the early 1940s nor did it have a connection to the later Portland Science Fiction Society (PorSFS).
It organized a small (23-person) regional named Norwescon in 1949 and then bid for and won the right to run the 1950 Worldcon, also named NorWesCon. The regional seems to have gone smoothly enough, but running the Worldcon was fraught (but when hasn't that been true?).
Just before the 1949 Worldcon, the Cinvention, Donald B. Day, the Treasurer, suspended half the club for non-payment of dues. John de Courcy resigned, then became the temporary chairman of an open meeting to produce a new constitution. The club's officers started handing in their resignations at each meeting, and abolishing both the club and its constitution on special occasions. At one point, Dale Donaldson wound up holding all offices in a club which had just been put out of existence again. It the mess that followed, de Courcy nearly tried legal action.
Its clubzines included The Fanscient, edited by a number of people, but rescued by Donald B. Day after the club descended into chaos, and under him it became influential. It also published the Portland Science-Fantasy Society News Bulletin.
A list of active members in September 1947: Lambert Ashton, H. R. Bowman, Fred A. Couch, Forrest C. Davis, Donald B. Day, Bob Hagan, Thomas Harryman, Al L. Montpelier, Ruth Newbury, Ralph Rayburn Phillips, Cherol Preisz, Helen Sandoz, C. W. Pullen, Frank Rossi, Joe Salta, Donna Shaffer, Paul Shaffer, Betty Shreeve, David Shreeve, Gene P. Slyvester, and Gerald Waible.
| Club | 1947—1952 |
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