Frances Evans

(???? – 1998)

Frances Evans (later Frances Varley) was a British fan active from the early 1950s, first in Manchester and later in London. She first proposed the idea of a fanzine for British female fans. The result was Femizine although it didn't entirely match the conception.

Space Times #10 said that she 'walked in on an early meeting of the club [the Nor'west Science Fantasy Club] to find the members discussing when they could expect a female fan to appear on the NSFC horizon'. This must have been 1951 or early 1952. She was the only female member of the NSFC for much of its existence and a contemporary photo of that group shows her as the only woman among twenty-five men. Her husband Cyril Evans was also a fan although the implication of the Space Times piece is that she introduced him to fandom.

Science Fantasy News #11 (March 1952) reported that when the NSFC helped publicise The Day the Earth Stood Still in Manchester:

Frances Evans, "pin-up girl" of the NSFC had her photo taken holding Gort-the-Robot's hand and appeared in the Manchester Evening News, 14th J. 

She put on a “Future Fashion” show at Mancon in 1952.

When Sandy Sanderson conceived the idea of the hoax fan Joan W. Carr he'd enlisted Evans as an ally. Evans had struck up a correspondence with Ethel Lindsay during which she'd proposed the idea of a female-only fanzine. Lindsay mentioned the idea to Carr who respondent with a proposal for just such a thing, only to be edited by Carr with Lindsay as assistant. When the hoax was revealed in 1956 Lindsay said she felt:

a bit miffed about this on Frances' behalf, as her idea had more or less been lifted from her. Especially as she admitted to some disappointment. 

However, writing in Femizine #10 in 1958 Lindsay said that Evans 'gleefully aided and abetted "Joan"'.

Evans and Lindsay first met at the 1954 Supermancon and got on well, becoming lifelong friends. After the convention, Evans and Sanderson agreed that Lindsay would need to be brought in on the Carr hoax. Femizine, the all-female fanzine, launched later that year with a man at the helm. (See more at the Carr entry.)

Both Evans and Lindsay were becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the Carr hoax. Evans attended Cytricon I in 1955 and moved from Manchester to London in early 1956. Cyril Evans remained in Manchester and at some point they divorced. In her 1958 Femizine piece Lindsay said of her friend:

She has a good brain, an effervescent personality and is so inactive these days as to be practically moribund. It takes months of nagging from me to get an article out of her.

Evans later married Brian Varley (references to 'Frances Varley' start appearing in fanzines around 1961). They did occasionally still attend conventions but in Skyrack #57 (January 1961) Ron Bennett described them as 'former wheels of British fandom' implying a diminished role. In 1963 the couple were listed as in charge of the [art show]] for the Worldcon bid that became Loncon II but in PAS-tell #18 Ethel Lindsay reported that a change of circumstances meant they would be unable to fulfil the role and the Varleys are not even listed as members of the convention in the programme book. Later in 1965 thye relocated to Leeds and attended some social events with Leeds fans.

The Varleys remained in contact with Ethel Lindsay until her death in 1996. Frances died two years later.

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Person

????—1998

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