1971
From Fan History Wiki
The new year comes and things still have not progressed to a stage where most modern fan fiction fen would understand what was going on. Fan fiction, outside of Trek, seems to be locked into various literary communities related to Sherlock Holmes and Edgar Rice Burroughs and clubs affiliated with universities.
Various science fiction clubs were beginning to appear at universities around the globe. One such club was Wayne Third Foundation, a science fiction club that was affiliated with Wayne State University in Detroit, and the Long Island University SF Club. These clubs, like the one at Wayne State would frequently produce their own fanzines. They were just beginning to include in their publications pieces of fan fiction. The samples included works from communities such as Star Trek and Doctor Who. Often times, the zines created by these clubs would be sold at a university’s book store. This helped to further introduce a larger audience to fan fiction on a university level.
There existed other fan fiction communities, similar to the Sherlock Holmes one. Examples of these communities include the Jane Austen, Edgar Rice Burroughs and Lord of the Rings communities. They were literature based, attracting professional and amateur authors alike. One fan fiction community that followed that model was the one based on the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Their community was largely founded in 1960 with the creation of the Burroughs Bibliophiles and the group’s fanzine Burroughs's Bulletin. This group was still around and active in 1974. The Burroughs Bulletin #21 was published in this year with a story by William Gilmour titled “Back to Earth’s Core.”
The Star Trek fan fiction community chugged on as Joan Marie Verba documented. Means of publishing fanzines consisted of using spirit duplicators and mimeographs. Star Trek was now being rerun on television. Fanzines contained comments that they felt fans were beginning to drift away from the Star Trek community. Ruth Berman wrote one of the early and influential Sarek/Amanda stories. It was called “It seemed the logical thing” and was published in T-Negative 9. Star Trek fanzines began the practice of surveying readers. There was an effort on the part of Star Trek fans to get Spockanalia nominated for a Hugo. One of the first review of fanzines so readers know what to get came out. This happened in an issue of Deck 6, which reviewed four fanzines.
See also:
- Canon released in 1971
- Fan fiction archives founded in 1971
- Mailing lists founded in 1971
- Fanzines published in 1971
- Technology innovations in 1971
