How To Add Identifications to Jay Kay Klein’s Digitized Photos

Two Eaton archivists studying a Klein shipment.

Since last week, when the California Digital Library and the UC Riverside Library made available online nearly 6,000 photos taken by Jay Kay Klein at eight Worldcons in the Sixties, fans have voiced concerns that the names of the people in most of these pictures are not been included, and that many of the existing identifications are wrong.

J.J. Jacobson, the UC Riverside Library’s Jay Kay and Doris Klein Librarian for Science Fiction, has now announced a way for everyone  to give their input.

Here’s how to tell us what you want us to know about the Jay Kay Klein Photographs now up on Calisphere

  1. Go to the Klein Papers on Calisphere: https://calisphere.org/collections/26943/
  2. Find a photo about which you have information
  3. Create a post here [on the Eaton Collection’s Facebook page] with that photo’s URL — (Example: https://calisphere.org/item/ark:/86086/n23j3b9q/)
  4. Tell us what you know about the image: what, who, where, when
  5. Discuss

[Note: Jacobson is a different person than File 770’s JJ.]

Eaton Collection Puts Jay Kay Klein Photos Online

Nearly 6,000 photos taken by Jay Kay Klein at eight Worldcons in the Sixties were made available for viewing online today by the UC Riverside Library.

The digitization of these photos was covered by Inside UCR on August 10 —

The California Digital Library and the UCR Library recently partnered to digitize nearly 6,000 photographs from the Jay Kay Klein papers – and completed the task in less than two days.

“If we had done the same project in-house, it would have taken us several months to do,” said University Librarian Steven Mandeville-Gamble.

UC Riverside is the first among the entire UC system to employ this specialized workflow with proprietary object holders designed by Pixel Acuity. The company has used the process with previous clients that include the Smithsonian Institution and Stanford University.

Klein contributed his photo collection of 66,000 images of sf fandom and authors to UC Riverside’s Eaton Collection prior to his death in 2012, a collection valued at $1.4 million. His estate also donated $3.5 million and helped create the UCR Library’s Jay Kay and Doris Klein Librarian for Science Fiction.

The eight Worldcons documented in the photos are: Pittcon (1960), Chicon III (1962), Discon I (1964), Tricon (1966), Nycon 3 (1967), Baycon (1968), St. Louiscon (1969), Noreascon (1971).

Unfortunately, the names of the people in most of these pictures have not been included, which impairs their usefulness to fanhistorians.

An overview of everything in the Jay Kay Klein papers is here.

(Doll and Alexis Gilliland, and their son.)

[Via Locus Online.]

SF Scholar Rob Latham Fired by University of California

Rob Latham in 2008.

Rob Latham in 2008.

Rob Latham, a tenured professor of English at University of California, Riverside and a member of its science fiction research cluster who evangelized the Eaton Collection throughout fandom, has been fired by the UC Board of Regents. Charges of sexual harassment and substance abuse are addressed in Latham’s 3,900-word statement, first presented to the Regents and now published by the Academe Blog, however, the exact charges are not quoted.

He denied the complaint of sexual harassment:

….I can’t believe that this case, which began with false charges of sexual harassment brought by a disgruntled graduate student and his girlfriend, has been allowed to reach the Board of Regents. It should have been settled through informal mediation long ago.

However, not only was no such good faith effort ever attempted by the UCR administration, but I was never even invited to respond to the charges or to submit exculpatory evidence. Instead, the administration adopted an adversarial posture from the outset, as if the original allegations—the vast majority of which we now know to be untrue—had already been proven. As Vice Provost Daniel Ozer testified at the disciplinary hearing, the administration never sought to change course even when it became clear that the two complainants had submitted doctored evidence and leveled charges that were proven false by a police investigation.

He argued the issue of substance abuse was being manipulated to support a disproportionate disciplinary action:

I made a serious error of judgment in relation to substance abuse, for which I sought treatment one full year before any charges were filed against me. The Senate, for whatever reason, gave me no credit for that effort at self-correction, and now Chancellor Wilcox is asking you to dismiss me for the recurrence of a psychological illness, rather than for the original charges of flagrant, serial sexual harassment—charges that were considered and dismissed by the Hearing Committee, whose findings the Chancellor has accepted in their entirety.

He levied many criticisms against the hearing process in his address to the Regents, including —

I have outlined, in my ten-page written statement, the political pressures and rank homophobia that deformed the disciplinary process, including acts of official misconduct that are currently being investigated by the Faculty Senate. All I will repeat here is that the intervention of the graduate student union, at an early juncture of this case, and their threats to “go public” if the administration did not acquiesce to their demand for my “removal as Professor of English,” was crucial in setting the administration on the course they pursued. This course included manipulating and corrupting an ostensibly fair and impartial Title IX investigation, coaching student witnesses supportive of their case while attempting to intimidate those supportive of me, and suppressing evidence crucial to my defense before the Faculty Senate.

Latham spent the first 13 years of his teaching career at the University of Iowa as a Professor of English and American Studies, where he ran a Program in Sexuality Studies.

He was hired by UC Riverside in 2008 to join the English Department faculty, with responsibilities that included serving as an informal liaison to the J. Lloyd Eaton Collection of Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Utopian Literature. He received the Clareson Award for Distinguished Service from the SF Research Association in 2012, the field’s premier award.

Latham has made many connections with fanzine fans. He contributed a perceptive and well-received article to Earl Kemp’s eI #37 about using fanzines for academic research. Mike Horvat’s vast fanzine collection landed at the University of Iowa because a former student of Latham’s, Greg Beatty, a UI graduate spotted the listing online, and immediately emailed Latham.

Despite the growing prestige of UCR’s science fiction collection and research, there have been signs of conflict between the administration and faculty members in UCR’s science fiction research cluster. Both Latham and Nalo Hopkinson, a well-known sf writer and another member of that research cluster, publically expressed concern in summer 2014 about the way the Eaton Collection was being administered (see “How Healthy Is The Eaton Collection?”.)

Nothing that was aired in 2014 seems directly related to the issues in Latham’s hearing, other than the foreshadowing of the toxic professional relationships explicitly described in Latham’s statement to the Regents:

My hiring was the result of an international search for a senior scholar, mounted by former Dean Steve Cullenberg and former Chancellor Tim White, two very good men and superb administrators with whom I had an excellent working relationship. However, following the hire of Chancellor Wilcox in 2013—and especially of Provost D’Anieri in 2014—the atmosphere at UCR changed from one of cooperation and consultation with faculty to one of confrontation and hostility. I say this merely to indicate that I gave seven years of exemplary service to the campus but, following the lodging of false charges by a student with a grudge, have been hounded by a vengeful administration intent on railroading me out of my job.

Readers do not have full information to evaluate the case, nor is that likely to become public unless Latham follows up with a lawsuit and the suit goes to trial. However, news of Latham’s firing is all the more surprising for coming at the same time his standing as a scholar has been affirmed by an announcement that the MLA 2017 session “Dangerous Visions: Science Fiction’s Countercultures” will base its call for papers on responses to Latham’s “Countercultures” chapter in his edited volume The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction (2014).

[Thanks to Andrew Porter and Nick Mamatas for the story.]

Melissa Conway Retires from the Eaton Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy

Melissa Conway EI

Melissa Conway

Melissa Conway, the director of the world’s largest collection of science fiction and fantasy, announced her retirement on January 3, 2015. Conway has been at the University of California Riverside for thirteen years, arriving as Head of Special Collections in May 2001. Conway followed her husband to the west coast, having previously worked at the Library of Congress, the Folger Shakespeare Library, Yale’s Beinecke Library, and a private art collection in Washington, DC.

Conway, a specialist in medieval and Renaissance manuscripts with a Ph.D. in Medieval Studies from Yale University, had no scholarly background in science fiction when she came to UCR. “George Slusser was the Eaton Curator when I arrived, so I didn’t have to worry about promoting the Eaton,” explained Conway. But when Slusser retired shortly after she arrived and UCR decided to hire a University Archivist instead of another science fiction specialist, Conway realized she had to learn about science fiction—and quickly! “I didn’t want to be responsible for the decline of the world’s largest science fiction research collection!” she says. Conway took her role seriously, and was particularly pleased when the Eaton was assessed in an independent study as the leading science fiction research collection among Association of Research Libraries in 2006.

Melissa Conway, head of Special Collections & University Archives at UCR, displays a rare first edition of Utopian writer Tommaso Campanella's "Civitas Solis" (City of the Sun), written in Latin in 1623.

Melissa Conway, head of Special Collections & University Archives at UCR, displays a rare first edition of Utopian writer Tommaso Campanella’s “Civitas Solis” (City of the Sun), written in Latin in 1623.

Highlights among Conway’s accomplishments include reviving, in 2008, the Eaton Science Fiction Conference after a nine-year hiatus, making it not only financially self-sustaining but also profitable; establishing the Eaton Lifetime Achievement Award in Science Fiction, honoring SF masters Ray Bradbury (2008), Frederik Pohl (2009), Samuel R. Delany (2010) Harlan Ellison (2011), Ursula K. Le Guin (2012), Ray Harryhausen and Stan Lee (2013); increasing the holdings of Eaton by 40%, largely through donations and grant funding; raising more than $5 million dollars in gifts-in-kind and cash donations, including the 1517 Paris edition of Thomas More’s Utopia, the science fiction fanzine collection of Bruce Pelz, the anime and “furry” collections of Fred Patten; the 1623 edition of Tommaso Campanella’s Civitas Solis; the Jane and Howard Frank Collection of the papers of Edwardian horror writer William Hope Hodgson; the papers of Anne McCaffrey; and the photographic archive—and $3.5 million cash endowment—of Jay Kay Klein, the largest cash gift to the UCR Library in its sixty year history.

Conway even found ways to combine her background in medieval studies with science fiction, including having been chosen in 2009 to participate in a National Endowment for the Humanities Seminar in Florence, Italy on Dante and The Divine Comedy, for her project on Dante’s influence on more than fifty works of SF.

Conway wishes to acknowledge the steadfast support and essential contributions of her colleagues at UCR in the success of the Eaton, in particular Professors Rob Latham, Sherryl Vint, and Nalo Hopkinson; Julia Ree, Eaton Subject Selector; Sarah Allison, former Reading Room Coordinator in Special Collections; Dean Stephen Cullenberg, who established the Science Fiction and Technoculture Studies Program in the College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences; former University Librarian Ruth Jackson, who was a steadfast supporter of the Eaton; and the late George Slusser, who fought the good fight for twenty-five years when the Eaton Collection—and science fiction as an academic discipline—were under attack from various quarters. “Without each of them,” Conway notes, “none of these advances would have been possible.”

Conway’s brilliance and diligence as a curator and conference organizer, as well as her graciousness and good humor as a colleague, have earned her the respect and affection of the UCR faculty who have worked with her. Professor of English Rob Latham, co-director of the Science Fiction and Technoculture Studies Program, who has helped to mount two Eaton Conferences alongside Conway, says that “UCR library—and the entire SF community—simply will not be the same without her. She has been an unparalleled champion of archival research in the field, as well as a wonderful collaborator and a very good friend. Her departure is a terrible loss for all of us who love science fiction.”

“Melissa Conway was an ideal colleague: knowledgeable, dedicated and seemingly tireless in her advocacy of the Eaton collection,” says Professor of English Sherryl Vint, who co-directs the SFTS program with Latham. “She is responsible not only for sustaining this world-class collection but also for creating a vibrant and welcoming intellectual community around it. She will be dearly missed and her absence will be a loss felt across the field.”

In the words of Nalo Hopkinson, award-winning SF author and Professor of Creative Writing at UCR: “Dr. Conway’s work championing and increasing the scope of the Eaton Archive built brilliantly on Dr. Slusser’s legacy. She possessed a visionary approach to collection development and fundraising. The results speak for themselves. Under Dr. Conway’s leadership, she and her staff created an unparalleled dynamic of trust, collegiality, and cooperation with faculty in UCR’s science fiction research cluster and with the science fiction community in general. A golden era has ended.”

[From the press release.]

UCR Seeks Eaton Collection Librarian

Applications to be the Jay Kay and Doris Klein Science Fiction Librarian in University Library at UC Riverside are now being taken.

Primary Responsibilities: The Jay Kay and Doris Klein Librarian for Science Fiction is responsible for all aspects of the development, stewardship and promotion of the Eaton Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy, housed in the University of California, Riverside Library’s Special Collections & Archives.

As a member of the Special Collections & University Archives team, the Klein Librarian interprets and sets priorities for the Eaton Collection within the Library’s collection development policy, and represents the Eaton Collection within the broader community of faculty, students, other scholars, librarians, dealers, collectors, and the public The Klein Librarian participates in library planning, preservation, and access initiatives. S/he provides specialized reference and research support for Eaton Collection users and interprets the collection for diverse audiences through exhibitions, public presentations, and original scholarship. Collection development and management, reference service and access, scholarly collaboration and support, instruction using primary sources, and public outreach are essential activities in this collaborative environment.

And ever so much more!

[Via Bradley Scott and Andrew Porter.]

George Slusser (1939-2014)

George-Slusser_-Eaton-CollectionGeorge Slusser, Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature at UC Riverside, died at home November 4 of cancer.

“He was a fine man, insightful critic, innovative educator, buoyant spirit. Founder of the Eaton Collection and much else,” said Gregory Benford.

Slusser wrote several author studies for the Borgo Press in the 1970s, including one of the earliest studies of Ray Bradbury’s work, The Bradbury Chronicles (1977), also Robert A. Heinlein: Stranger in His Own Land (1976), The Farthest Shores of Ursula K. Le Guin (1976), Harlan Ellison: Unrepentant Harlequin (1977), The Delany Intersection: Samuel R. Delany Considered As a Writer of Semi-Precious Words (1977) and The Space Odysseys of Arthur C. Clarke (1978).

He was a prolific scholar throughout his career. Slusser’s Gregory Benford was published earlier this year by the University of Illinois Press as part of its Modern Masters of Science Fiction series.

Slusser was the first Curator (Emeritus) of the J. Lloyd Eaton Collection of Science Fiction &Fantasy Utopian and Horror Literature and over 25 years he grew the collection from 4,000 to 135,000 hardcover and paperback books in 24 languages. It was always a battle, as he explained to Cristan Tamas who interviewed him for Europa SF:

What I did is called “collection development,” and Eaton became a prime example of this. Of course, I had to adapt to personnel changes, unenlightened head librarians and such. But this is par for the course for any bootstraps operation within an established bureaucracy. Sometimes it felt we were running an underground operation. But I won a couple of large grants that allowed us to catalog huge amounts of material, and we were on our way.

Slusser’s vision for the Eaton Collection, which originated with the donation of J. Lloyd Eaton’s 6,000 hardcover sf books, grew to encompass many topics, including fanhistory, augmented by the fanzine collections donated by the late Terry Carr, Rick Sneary, and Bruce Pelz. It is the most extensive fanzine collection available to researchers.

2013 Eaton Conference poster.

2013 Eaton Conference poster.

Slusser also pioneered the Eaton fanzine collection website. His original design can still be seen online via Wayback Machine. Its ingenious splash page displays the animated rocket of Fanac blazing across a background the color of faded Twiltone — complete with two rusty staples in the margin. Five icons link to the website’s main divisions – which also animate when you click on them.

The narrative portion of Slusser’s original website showed remarkable sensitivity to fanzine fandom’s nuances. And he was not immune to faannish outbursts of his own, such as the impatience he showed with the claims of teenaged faneditor Harlan Ellison: “[His fanzine’s] cover promises ‘Ponce de Leon’s Pants,’ a fantasy by Mack Reynolds, which is nowhere inside the covers. Why bother to copyright this stuff?”

Slusser coordinated 23 Eaton SF Conferences. During his career he also won appointment as a Harvard Traveling Fellow and a Fulbright Lecturer.

[Thanks to Gregory Benford and Steven H Silver for the story.]

Letters From The Editor

GardnerLettersCovMedProzine editors who plan on being around for awhile don’t just pan for nuggets in the slushpile, they spend a lot of time turning the dross into gold, too.

Gardner Dozois’ efforts along that line during his 20 years as editor of Asimov’s Science Fiction are represented in the 35 linear feet of letters and notebooks plus 35,000 e-mails that make up the archive of his correspondence and papers recently acquired by Riverside’s Eaton Collection. (For more details see the September issue of Inside UCR.)

Some of those letters went to author Lou Antonelli while he was trying to break into the sf field a decade ago.

Antonelli submitted 16 stories to Dozois before making his first sale. And Dozois retired after accepting “A Rocket for the Republic” in 2004.

Antonelli reproudces their correspondence in his book Letters From Gardner, recently published by Merry Blacksmith Press. He says, “I was the last person who ever went through this process with Dozois at Asimov’s, which is why I thought it needed to be chronicled.”

The book also explains the revisions Antonelli made to his stories as a result of Dozois’ input, making it a writer’s manual as well.

Strangely enough, all except one of those 16 stories were published in other venues, though it’s easy in hindsight to understand why Dozois invested the effort. So far in Antonelli’s career he has had 85 short stories and three collections published around the globe.

How Healthy Is the Eaton Collection?

The estate of Jay Kay Klein has donated $3.5 million to the Eaton Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy announced UC Riverside officials on August 28. It is the largest gift ever received by the UCR library and ranks among the top 25 donations campuswide.

Klein contributed his photo collection of 66,000 images of sf fandom and authors to the Eaton Collection prior to his death in 2012. The photo collection was valued at $1.4 million.

Two Eaton archivists studying a Klein shipment.

Two Eaton archivists studying photos in a shipment from Jay Kay Klein. Photo by John Hertz.

These gifts are credited to the relationship he established with Melissa Conway, the library’s special collections director.

A cash donation of such magnitude might have appeared one more step in the triumphal march of the Eaton Collection’s development were it not just three weeks ago that Nalo Hopkinson, sf writer and teacher of creative writing at UC Riverside, fired off this SOS:

I’m sad to have to report that new library administration doesn’t seem to appreciate the value of the Eaton Collection or the expertise that goes into it. Since spring of this year, their accomplishments have included driving out staff members and pushing changes to collection policies that would reduce the Eaton’s holdings, its value to researchers and as a repository of our community’s history, and its standing as a world-class archive. Meetings with the staff of the Eaton have been productive, collegial gatherings. Meetings to negotiate with the new library administration, not so much. It’s putting the faculty of the research cluster in the alarming position of having to protect the very collection we’re charged with fostering. We’re dealing with the new library admins’ efforts to split up the collection and change priorities for what to collect (eg, e-text over print) without consulting scholars in the field, and with what we’d characterize as harassment of staff, who’ve demonstrated extreme competence over the years.

But Hopkinson followed that warning with this provisional good news just one week later:

We three profs in the science fiction research cluster at UCR met with Dr. Stephen Cullenberg, the Dean of Humanities. He’s the person who had the vision a few years ago to create a faculty research cluster to promote the Eaton. (I should be clear that the profs in the research cluster are not employees of the Eaton. Drs. Vint and Latham are in the English Department and I — not a Dr — am in Creative Writing.) Dr. Cullenberg told us that he’s had a message from the new UCR library administrators. They’re beginning to work on a few proposals aimed at addressing our concerns about the way they’re managing the collection. There will be negotiations and resolutions mediated through a committee that will provide a trackable log of the decisions and actions upon which we’ve all agreed. Of course, this is all a couple of theoretical birds in the bush. The time for rejoicing is when you have actual birds in hand. For, me, this isn’t so much cautious optimism as it is “wait and see.”

She also reports that Eaton’s Dr. Rob Latham wrote on Facebook:

“At this meeting we were apprised of recent, potentially positive news emanating from the library dean involving plans to establish a “focused Eaton unit” with two full-time staff positions. There has also been movement toward creating an advisory body composed of faculty and administrators from both our college and the library whose charge would be to oversee the Eaton. We are cautiously optimistic about these initiatives and hope that they will lead to an enhancement, rather than a diminishment, of the value of the Collection.

Hopkinson and Latham wrote their comments before Klein’s bequest was announced. One can only speculate whether it helped thaw the attitudes they’ve been contending against.

[Thanks to Michael Walsh for the story.]

Today’s Birthday Boy 7/14

George-Slusser_-Eaton-CollectionBorn July 14, 1939: Professor Dr.George Slusser – Eaton science fiction collection Curator Emeritus.

Slusser has faced serious health challenges lately. Greg Benford reports: “He’s back from 3-plus months of chemotherapy and surgery to attack his mouth cancer, and he’s now recouping at home in the Riverside hills.”

My best wishes for his recovery!

Earlier this year Slusser gave an in-depth interview about his career and the collection to Sci-Fi Portal Europe:

How did you succeed to transform the Eaton SF Collection into the world’s biggest?

By silence, exile and cunning. We gradually acquired several massive collections from private parties–an example is the Douglas Menville collection of SF paperbacks, some 30,000 books in mint condition, which the collector had to sell because the foundations of his house were sinking under the weight of the books. Other collections were outright gifts. We are lucky to be located in the greater Los Angeles area, where collectors abound. Our collections of pulp magazines (nearly complete and in mint condition) was a gift. Gradually, through the conference, I made contacts with collectors and writers. This way I was able to target choice materials–an example is the Terry Carr fanzine collection, a veritable roadmap to the fanzine jungle (there are hundreds of thousands of these publications, how to know which ones are significant? Terry Carr’s collection let us set parameters. I was not trained as a librarian, but certainly learned to be one.

Slusser also pioneered the Eaton fanzine collection website. His original design can still be seen online via Wayback Machine. Its ingenious splash page displays the animated rocket of Fanac blazing across a background the color of faded Twiltone — complete with two rusty staples in the margin. Five icons link to the website’s main divisions – which also animate when you click on them.

The narrative portion of Slusser’s original website also showed remarkable sensitivity to fanzine fandom’s nuances. You can’t get more “inside” than to quote Arnie Katz (from The Trufan’s Advisor) while making a point about print-versus-electronic fanzines. Equally delightful was Slusser’s impatience with the claims of teenaged faneditor Harlan Ellison: “[His fanzine’s] cover promises ‘Ponce de Leon’s Pants,’ a fantasy by Mack Reynolds, which is nowhere inside the covers. Why bother to copyright this stuff?”

Slusser’s vision for the Eaton Collection, made possible when J. Lloyd Eaton gave his 6,000 hardcover sf books to UC Riverside, has grown to encompass many topics, including fanhistory, augmented by the fanzine collections donated by Terry Carr, Rick Sneary, and Bruce Pelz. It is the most extensive fanzine collection available to researchers.

Eaton Presents Benford, Hartwell and Wolfe 5/12

UC Riverside’s Eaton Collection will host a discussion and debate between Gregory Benford, Gary K. Wolfe and David Hartwell titled “Perspectives on Science Fiction” on Monday, May 12. It begins at 3:15 p.m. in the Special Collections & University Archives on the 4th Floor of Rivera Library.

Gregory Benford has published over thirty books, mostly novels. Nearly all remain in print, some after a quarter of a century. His fiction has won many awards, including the Nebula Award for his novel Timescape. A winner of the United Nations Medal for Literature, he is a professor of physics, emeritus, at the University of California, Irvine.

David Hartwell is an American editor of science fiction and fantasy. He has worked for Signet (1971–73), Berkley Putnam (1973–78), Pocket (where he founded the Timescape imprint, 1980–85, and created the Pocket Books Star Trek publishing line), and Tor Books Since 1995, his title at Tor/Forge Books has been “Senior Editor.” He chairs the board of directors of the World Fantasy Convention and, with Gordon Van Gelder, is the administrator of the Philip K. Dick Award. He holds a Ph.D. in comparative medieval literature.

Gary K. Wolfe is a science fiction editor, critic and biographer. He is Professor of Humanities at Roosevelt University’s Evelyn T. Stone College of Professional Studies. Wolfe has written extensively about science fiction and fantasy literature; he is widely recognized as one of the experts in the field. He has had a monthly review column in Locus and has written for Salon and other sites.

[Thanks to Gregory Benford for the story.]