[Ads-l] Further Antedating of "Sci-Fi"

Wed Dec 25 14:25:34 UTC 2024

The Internet Archive has a page for Cue magazine which was created on
November 25, 2020. The page states that the collection was obtained
via microfilm. Unfortunately, none of the issues are publicly visible
now. So access apparently has been disabled, and the content may have
been removed (or perhaps the content was never present).

Here is some extracted data from the beginning of the Cue review for
the movie "The Magnetic Monster".

[Begin excerpt based on snippets]
THE MAGNETIC MONSTER -- (United)
At the Globe. Scifiads (science fiction ad-
dicts to the uninitiated) will find them-
selves in the seventh heaven of their
even-expanding universe with their latest
contribution to hair-raising science-fiction
thrillers. It's a first class entertainment
[End excerpt based on snippets]

Garson

On Wed, Dec 25, 2024 at 9:14 AM ADSGarson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Excellent work. Here is some additional information extracted from
> snippets which may be inaccurate.
>
> The match apparently occurs within a review of the movie "The Magnetic
> Monster". Wikipedia states that the release date was February 18,
> 1953. This is consistent with the year 1953. So the month in Cue is
> probably in February or later.
>
> It seems that the reviewer was Jesse Zunser (Executive Editor,
> Screen). The following bold headline appears near the top of the page:
> France Sends Over A Seven-Fold Winner
>
> The first review on the target page seems to be for the film "The
> Seven Deadly Sins".
>
> The top of the target page probably says "Reviews of New Films" but I
> cannot get Google Books to show me this headline in a snippet for page
> 15. So I am not sure.
>
> The line "Reviews of New Films   Jesse Zunser    15" does appear in
> snippets that show the table of contents. But the line seems to occur
> in at least two different issues.
>
> Garson
>
> On Wed, Dec 25, 2024 at 8:53 AM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu> wrote:
> >
> > It appears to me that the Yale library has only very scattered holdings of Cue magazine.
> >
> > I assume that the author of the 1953 citation is, interestingly, named Jesse.
> >
> > Fred Shapiro
> >
> > ________________________________
> > From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Jesse Sheidlower <jester at PANIX.COM>
> > Sent: Wednesday, December 25, 2024 8:27 AM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Subject: Re: Further Antedating of "Sci-Fi"
> >
> > Thanks, Fred. These are terrific discoveries! Hathi Trust also has this text, and while it's not viewable, it supported the 1953 date.
> >
> > Yale seems to have holdings of Cue, I notice.... If not that, I can try to make my way (or find a volunteer to to make their way) to one of the other libraries that has this. It's worth a trip, this is an important one!
> >
> > Jesse Sheidlower
> >
> > On Wed, Dec 25, 2024 at 12:02:52PM +0000, Shapiro, Fred wrote:
> > > sci-fi (OED 1954, Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction 1954)
> > >
> > > 1953 Cue [Volume 22, Issues 1-26, Page 15] (Google Books)
> > >
> > > This is the kind of fantastic problem scifiads love, and its solution provides a fine scifi-drama, a considerable cut above the usual.  I found it an interesting experience in the too rarely developed field of cerebral thrillers.
> > >
> > > NOTE: I discovered this in a Google Books snippet.  The snippet does not indicate the exact date or exact issue number, but this is clearly a 1953 citation.
> > >
> > > Fred Shapiro
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > ------------------------------------------------------------
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