Oliver Saari

(March 22, 1918 – January 25, 2000)

Oliver Saari with his fiancée, Ginny Haas, during Midwestcon 1, May 1950.

Oliver E. “Ollie” Saari was a Finland-born, Midwestern fan and SF writer of the 1930s–1940s. He published in most of the early prozines, including Astounding.

He was one of the founders (and first Director) of the Minneapolis SFL in 1936 and was later one of the leaders of the Minneapolis Fantasy Society. His automobile was named the Sfnash.

While living in Flint, Michigan (he worked for General Motors), he was part of the group who hung out at the Slan Shack. He attended many SF conventions in the 1940s and ’50s (including the 1943 and ’44 Michiconferences, Centracon, First Post-Radar-Contact-with-the-Moon Con and Midwestcon, and Worldcons). He was a member of FAPA and of the would-be shadowy Order of Dagon.

In June 1950, he attended the first Midwestcon with his fiancée, Ginny Haas. They married in November of that year and settled in Chicago, according to Bob Tucker in Science Fiction News Letter 18, p. 3 (December 1950). They both were on the concom of Chicon II, the 1952 Worldcon. They had divorced by 1977, when she married someone else.

In mundane life, Saari was a mechanical engineer who designed some important gears.

Links:

• Bibliography at ISFDB.
• “A Quick Nod to Oliver Saari, Godfather of Spiroid.”
• Photo, center, at St. Louiscon, 1969, with Bob Madle, left, and Jim Young.
• Brief autobiography in So Saari 1.

Fanzines and Apazines:

• STF Comment [1944] (for FAPA)
• So Saari [1944] (for FAPA)

Awards, Honors and GoHships:

• 2011 -- First Fandom Hall of Fame (Posthumous)

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Person

1918—2000

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