STORIES FROM THE GOLDEN AGE
PULP CORNER

Step back in time and revisit an era when the Stories from the Golden Age were originally published—in the heyday of the pulp fiction magazines of the 1930s and 1940s.

Each segment of the Pulp Corner will take you on a fascinating journey into the past, offering items such as historical notes, letters to the editor, reviews, anecdotes and personal remembrances from L. Ron Hubbard himself.

HISTORICAL NOTE

“The Dangerous Dimension” was L. Ron Hubbard’s first science fiction story, published in the July 1938 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.  It was the first of thirty-one novels and stories—under Hubbard’s name and such pen names as Rene Lafayette and Kurt von Rachen—that would appear in that magazine over the next twelve years and prove instrumental in making Astounding the undisputed epitome of popular science fiction.

HITTING NATIONAL AIRWAVES IN 1950

Adventures in Time and Space
On
NBC Radio’s
DIMENSION X
And
X MINUS ONE

THE PROFESSOR WAS A THIEF  11/5/50 by
L. Ron Hubbard.
Grant’s Tomb disappears then reappears.
Arthur Mailtand as Pop, John Larkin
as Sweeney & John Gibson as the
Professor.  Tonight is the premier of
NBC’s gigantic Sunday night broad-
cast, THE BIG SHOW, with host
Tallullah Bankhead.  Preview of
“Shanghaied.”

*  Announcer Fred Collins *

SPOTLIGHT ON “THE PROFESSOR WAS A THIEF”

Why I Selected—“The Professor Was a Thief”
As My Best Science Fiction Story
by L. Ron Hubbard

THE PROFESSOR WAS A THIEF may not be great literature.  In fact, I am not sure just what great literature really is.  A savant I once knew defined it to me as any writing which changed a trend or originated a form.  On his authority, then, not mine, this story must be great literature.  For it changed a trend.  In the days when it was first published all the professors of science fiction fiction were blowing up worlds, creating new universes--making bigger and better cataclysms.  My professor had another idea.  I thought it rather unique if only because it did not follow an established motif.  That is why I especially like this story.  I hope you like it, too.

ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION (1938-1940)
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Dear Mr. Campbell:

     "Dangerous Dimension"… Some more from L. Ron Hubbard, please.

                                               Isaac Asimov
                                               Brooklyn, NY

Dear Mr. Campbell:

     The best story in the present issue is "The Professor Was a Thief." L.  Ron Hubbard is one of my favorite authors.  Please get some more "Arabian Nights" yarns from him for Unknown.  "The Ultimate Adventure" and "Slaves of Sleep" were two of the most fascinating novels I have ever read!  Please some more!

     Here is a list of your best authors: L. Ron Hubbard, Lester del Rey, D.L. James, Robert Heinlein, L. Sprague de Camp, (of course E.E. Smith), Norvel Page, Don A. Stuart, and a host of other lesser.  Stick to these boys.

                                                 W. Lawrence Hamling
                                                 Editor Stardust