Ray Bradbury

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(August 22, 1920 – May 6, 2012)

Ray Bradbury, 1988.

Considered one of the Big Three, and one of the most celebrated writers of the 20th century, author Ray Bradbury was goh at the 1986 Worldcon, Confederation.

He first became interested in SF when he read an A. Hyatt Verrill Ant story in Amazing at age 9. He continued to read and got hooked on Astounding in 1937. Born in Waukegan, Illinois, Bradbury spent his childhood alternating between there and Tucson, Arizona, finally moving with his family to Los Angeles at age 14.


Fan[edit]

In the fall of 1937, he met a member of LASFS in a bookstore, and when T. Bruce Yerke heard there was another reader around, he invited him to the club. Bradbury went to a meeting where he met Henry Kuttner and Forry Ackerman. (This was also the week when the first issue of Voice of the Imagi-Nation was published.) He joined the following week and was soon club librarian and writing for various fanzines. He became a close friend of Ray Harryhausen’s.

He was a member of Apa-F, WAFFF and the Sacred Order of FooFoo. He was a founding member of The National Fantasy Fan Federation.

In Memoirs of a Superfluous Fan, Bruce Yerke describes the teenaged Bradbury: "This fantastic creature became endeared to all of us henceforth, and though often the victim of assaults with trays and hammers by infuriated victims of his endless pranks and disturbances, remained a primary figure in the club all through 1938, 1939, 1940, and 1941."

In 1939, he attended the first Worldcon in New York, with funds from his friends Forry Ackerman and Morojo. Also funded by Ackerman, Bradbury started a fanzine, Futuria Fantasia, in 1939, and wrote most of its four issues.

Pro[edit]

Bradbury began to publish science fiction stories in fanzines in 1938. His first published story was "Hollerbochen's Dilemma", which appeared in the fanzine Imagination! in January, 1938.

He later became a filthy pro. His first paid work, "Pendulum", written with fellow LASFan Henry Hasse, was published in the pulp magazine Super Science Stories in November 1941; he earned $15.

His best known works include the novel Fahrenheit 451 (1953) and his short-story collections The Martian Chronicles (1950) and The Illustrated Man (1951).

The Ray Bradbury Theater, an anthology TV series by Bradbury, with 65 episodes based on his fiction, ran 1985–92.

He was a member of the West Coast Writers Group.

Legacy[edit]

In 1971, Apollo 15 astronauts named an impact crater on the Moon "Dandelion" in honor of Bradbury's 1957 novel, Dandelion Wine. An asteroid discovered in 1992 was named "9766 Bradbury" in his honor. A digitized copy of The Martian Chronicles was sent to the Red Planet in 2008, aboard NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander. In 2012, the NASA Curiosity rover landing site (4.5895°S 137.4417°E) on Mars was named "Bradbury Landing."

Ray Bradbury Park was dedicated in Waukegan, IL, in 1990. On December 6, 2012, the Los Angeles street corner at 5th and Flower Streets was named "Ray Bradbury Square."

Critic Christopher Isherwood compared Bradbury’s work to that of Edgar Allan Poe's. The Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation was named in his honor.

In 2010, comedian Rachel Bloom wrote a salacious song about him, “Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury”; her music video was a finalist for the 2011 Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form Hugo, and Bloom performed the song at the 2011 Worldcon, Renovation.

Other filksongs he inspired include “The Bradbury Hate Song” by Ray Beam, Jack Natkin, Lewis Forbes, Jerry Hunter and others (1952).

Personal Life[edit]

Bradbury was married to Marguerite “Maggie” McClure (January 16, 1922–November 24, 2003) from 1947 until her death; she was the only woman he ever dated. He lived at home until he was 27 and married. they had four daughters: Susan, Ramona, Bettina and Alexandra.

See:[edit]

Fanzines and Apazines:

Awards, Honors and GoHships:

Retro Hugos:

From Fancyclopedia 2, ca. 1959
One of the more distinguished fans-turned-pro, had made a reasonably good name for himself in fanzine work before America's entry into World War II, tho his neoish characteristics were not loveable. But, crashing the pros, he began to turn out fantasy and science-fantasy which, tho in a quasi-mystical style not representative of the best modern SF, gained much praise and popularity in the late 40s and early 50s either in spite of or because of its close resemblance to modern "arty" writing. (During this period of Fifth Fandom we were undergoing all sorts of soulsearching about stf not being Literature, and welcomed a Real Artistic Writer.) From this output derived Bradburyism as a descriptive of the gentleman's attitude toward the world; it's merely another department of that Anti-Materialist cult which keens over the grave of home handicrafts and proclaims the Evil of dirty old mechanistic science's trampling on Higher Spiritual Values.


During the first Worldcon, fans took the opportunity to visit Coney Island, where this foto-op took place. Front, from left: Mark Reinsberg, Jack Agnew, Ross Rocklynne. Rear: Vincent Kidwell, Robert A. Madle, Erle Korshak, Ray Bradbury, July 4, 1939. Courtesy of Robert Madle.


Person 1920—2012
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