Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction

by Leigh Grossman

  Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, other anthology series occasionally turned to science fiction. Suspense, a popular and long-running series, dramatized several Ray Bradbury stories and, in 1944, did a two-part adaptation of Curt Siodmak’s novel Donovan’s Brain, in which a disembodied brain takes telepathic control of the protagonist’s body.

  Escape, one of radio’s highest quality offerings, also did a few science fiction episodes. Perhaps the finest was a two-part adaptation of George Stewart’s novel Earth Abides, in which a plague wipes out most of mankind and the survivors must rebuild some sort of civilization. The horror shows Lights Out and Quiet Please turned to the genre as well, perhaps the most famous example being Lights Out’s “Chicken Heart,” broadcast in 1942. The memory of this weird and scary tale, about a reanimated chicken heart that grows to envelop the entire world, was later the inspiration of a well-known comedy monologue by Bill Cosby.

  NBC Presents: Short Stories gave its listeners a faithful and appropriately creepy episode based on Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” as well as an excellent and touching adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s “The Rocket.” Favorite Story did a truncated but still effective version of Frankenstein, while Family Theater managed to squeeze a surprisingly good adaptation of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea into its half-hour time slot.

  Shows specializing in science fiction remained rare during the Golden Age of Radio. One of radio’s most popular shows, though, had a premise that touched on the genre. The Shadow, which ran from 1938 to 1954, presented its listeners with a man who could hypnotically “cloud men’s minds so they cannot see him.” Early in the series, the Shadow could also employ telepathy and on at least one occasion generated a mental hallucination in someone else’s mind. His opponents were usually straightforward killers and gangsters, though an occasional mad scientist would bring in additional science fiction elements. One villain had invented a magnetic ray that ripped airplanes out of the sky. Another performed vocal cord transplants, causing a pack of killer dogs to meow like cute little kittens.

  Interestingly, The Lone Ranger—normally a straightforward Western—did a six-part story arc in 1943 that also wandered towards science fiction. The story involved a bad guy who used electrical devices to booby-trap his headquarters and drugged his minions to turn them into zombie-like slaves. By employing science just a bit too advanced for the post Civil War setting of the series, the villain allowed the Lone Ranger and Tonto to briefly pay homage to another genre.

  In the 1950s, radio brought us several notable series specializing in science fiction. One of them was again aimed at children: Tom Corbett, Space Cadet was one of the few radio shows that began on television and came to radio later. (It was usually the other way around.) Using the same cast as its TV counterpoint, it tossed several young cadets of the Solar Guards into danger on a weekly basis. But by this time, television was rapidly usurping radio’s hold on popular culture. Where the TV version of Tom Corbett ran for five years, the radio show was only around for about six months.

  All the same, dramatic radio managed to squeeze in a few superb adult-oriented SF shows before it faded away. Dimension X was an anthology show, specializing in adapting stories that appeared in Astounding Science Fiction magazine. Running for 50 episodes in 1950 and 1951, Dimension X presented intelligent and faithful adaptations of stories by Ray Bradbury, Robert Heinlein, Clifford Simak, Isaac Asimov and other top writers. From 1955 to 1958, the same creative staff returned to the airwaves for another 125 episodes with a show titled X Minus One, this time sponsored by Galaxy magazine.

  Drawing their material from the finest prose writers in the genre, both series operated on tiny budgets but still produced consistently excellent stories. With an effectively unlimited special effects budget—which was as vast as the imaginations of the audience—both series regularly took listeners to other times and planets. “A Gun for Dinosaur,” based on L. Sprague de Camp’s witty short story, travelled back to prehistoric Earth to stalk a tyrannosaur. “Cold Equations,” based on Tom Godwin’s heartbreaking tale, journeyed to deep space, where a lack of fuel might force a space ship pilot to shove an innocent girl out an airlock. Jack Vance’s “The Potters of Firsk” demonstrates the difficulties of dealing with an alien culture without properly understanding their mind set.

  Ray Bradbury’s brilliant prose, which often manages to somehow sound poetic and conversational at the same time, translated beautifully to radio; a number of his stories were adapted for both Dimension X and X Minus One. Arguably, the best of these was “And the Moon Be Still and Bright,” taken from The Martian Chronicles. Broadcast on both shows, this tale about a man who sympathizes more with a dead Martian culture than with his fellow humans cannot help but touch even the hardest heart.

  A few other science fiction shows had very brief runs during the 1950s. Most notable of these was Exploring Tomorrow, which ran for about six months during 1957 and 1958. Hosted by John W. Campbell, the innovative editor of Astounding Science Fiction magazine, this show managed to add a few more gems to dramatic radio’s history. “Liar,” based on one of Isaac Asimov’s Robot tales, is perhaps the finest episode. This compact but emotional story involves the accidental creation of a telepathic robot. Like all robots in Asimov’s stories, this one has a prime directive to prevent humans from being injured in any way. For a telepathic robot, this means telling lie after lie in a desperate but doomed attempt to preserve romantic fantasies or salve bruised egos. This, in turn, leads to a lot of emotional messiness as the lies inevitably unravel.

  Even though dramatic radio has largely died away, derivations of it continue on. In 1984, National Public Radio broadcasted a series of dramatized Ray Bradbury stories. Douglas Adams’ hilarious Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy began life as a BBC radio series in 1978. Beginning in 2002, episodes from the original Twilight Zone TV series have been adapted as audio dramas and made available via CDs and downloads. A British production company has been producing original Doctor Who audio adventures staring actors from series’ original run.

  Podcasting has been a popular outlet for classic radio shows, but is also a venue for original science fiction. The tongue-in-cheek Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd is one example of this, as is the space pirate show The Endless Night. The endless storytelling potential of the genre guarantees that no storytelling outlet will ever be completely left behind.

  Science fiction and radio were natural partners. The writers and directors were tasked with the necessity of effectively conveying often complex plot points to their listeners; but once they pulled that off, the unlimited special effects budget that resided in each of their listeners took over and did much of the important work. The opening narration of X Minus One promised the audience “adventures in which you’ll live a million could-be years on a thousand may-be worlds.” The best science fiction from radio’s Golden Age—whether aimed at children or adults—whether based on sound science or on fantasy—fulfilled this promise magnificently.

  * * * *

  Tim DeForest lives in Sarasota, Florida, and is the circulation manager of the library at the Ringling College of Art and Design. He has written the books Storytelling in the Pulps, Comics, and Radio and Radio by the Book, as well as a number of articles on military history and the Wild West. He maintains blogs on pre-digital pop culture and old-time radio at comicsradio.blogspot.com and radioserials.blogspot.com.

  NAT SCHACHNER

  (1895–1955)

  A chemist, lawyer, and part-time writer, Nathaniel Schachner was best known for his biographies of American historical figures, but he also wrote prolifically for the pulps for about ten years, starting in 1930. He began publishing science fiction with “The Tower of Evil” (co-written with Arthur Leo Zagat) for Wonder Stories Quarterly in 1930. He wrote ten more stories with Zagat over the next year before writing on his own, both under his own name and as Chan Corbett and Walter Glamis. (Especially prolific authors often used several names as a way to have more than one story i
n the same issue of a magazine.) Although he wrote a number of longer pieces, only one of Schachner’s SF works appeared in book form, the novel Space Lawyer. That lack of reprinting outside of the pulps, combined with his short career and the genre’s movement away from the kind of adventure fiction he wrote, left him little-remembered for many years.

  Schachner stopped writing science fiction around 1940 to focus on writing historical biographies. His best known nonfiction works at the time were the two-volume Thomas Jefferson, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton, Nation Builder. Ironically, with the advent of ebooks and print-on-demand publishing, Schachner’s science fiction is again widely available, but his historical writing is all-but-forgotten.

  PIRATES OF THE GORM, by Nat Schachner

  First published in Astounding Stories, May 1932

  Grant Pemberton sat up suddenly in his berth, every sense straining and alert. What was it that had awakened him in the deathly stillness of the space-flier? His right hand slid under the pillow and clutched the handle of his gun. Its firm coolness was a comforting reality.

  There it was again. A tiny scratching on the door as though someone was fumbling for the slide-switch. Very quietly he sat, waiting, his finger poised against the trigger. Suddenly the scratching ceased, and the panel moved slowly open. A thin oblong patch glimmered in the light of the corridor beyond. Grant tensed grimly.

  A hand moved slowly around the slit—a hand that held a pencil-ray. Even in the dim illumination, Grant noted the queer spatulate fingers. A Ganymedan! In the entire solar system only they had those strange appendages.

  Pemberton catapulted out of his berth like a flash. Not a moment too soon, either. A pale blue beam slithered across the blackness, impinged upon the pillow where his head had lain only a moment before. The air-cushion disintegrated into smoldering dust. Grant’s weapon spat viciously. A hail of tiny bullets rattled against the panel, and exploded, each in a puffball of flame.

  But it was too late. Already the unknown enemy was running swiftly down the corridor, the sucking patter of his feet giving more evidence of his Ganymedan origin. Pemberton sprang to the door, thrust it open just in time to see a dark shape disappearing around a bend in the corridor. There was no use of pursuit; the passageway ended in a spray of smaller corridors, from which ambush would be absurdly easy.

  * * * *

  He glanced swiftly around. The corridor was empty, silent in the dim, diffused light. The motley passengers were all sound asleep; no one had been disturbed by the fracas. Earthmen, green-faced Martians, fish-scaled Venusians, spatulate Ganymedans and homeward-bound Callistans, all reposing through the sleep-period in anticipation of an early landing in Callisto.

  All were asleep, that is, but one. That brought Pemberton back to the problem of his mysterious assailant. Why had this Ganymedan tried to whiff him out of existence? Grant frowned. No one on board knew of his mission, not even the captain. On the passenger list he was merely Dirk Halliday, an inconspicuous commercial traveler for Interspace Products. Yet someone had manifestly penetrated his disguise and was eager to remove him from the path of whatever deviltry was up. Who?

  Grant gave a little start, then swore softly. Of course! Why hadn’t he thought of it before! The scene came back to him, complete in every detail, as though he were once more back on Earth, in the small, simply furnished office of the Interplanetary Secret Service.

  The Chief of the Service was glancing up at him keenly. Beside him was a tall, powerfully shouldered Ganymedan, Miro, Inspector for Ganymede. Grant looked at him with a faint distaste as he sat there, drumming on the arm of his chair with his spatulate fingers, his soft-suction padded hoofs curled queerly under the seat. There was something furtive, too, about the red lidless eyes that shifted with quick unwinking movements.

  * * * *

  But then, Pemberton had small use for the entire tribe of Ganymedans. Damned pirates, that’s all they were. It was not many years back since they had been the scourge of the solar system, harrying spatial commerce with their swift piratical fliers, burning and slaying for the mere lust of it.

  That is, until an armada of Earth space-fliers had broken their power in one great battle. The stricken corsairs were compelled to disgorge their accumulations of plunder, give up all their fliers and armament, and above all, the import of metals was forbidden them. For, strangely enough, none of the metallic elements was to be found on Ganymede. All their weapons, all their ships, were forged of metals from the other planets.

  It was now five years since Ganymede had been admitted once again to the Planetary League, after suitable declarations of repentance. But the prohibitions still held. And Grant placed small faith in the sincerity of the repentance.

  The Chief was speaking.

  “We’ve called you in—Miro and I,” he said, in his usual swift, staccato manner, “because we’ve agreed that you are the best man in the Service to handle the mission we have in mind.”

  Grant said nothing.

  “It’s a particularly dangerous affair,” the Chief continued. “Five great space-fliers, traveling along regular traffic routes, have all vanished within the space of a month—passengers, crews and all. Not a trace of them can be found.”

  “No radio reports, sir?”

  “That’s the most curious part of the whole business. Everyone of the fliers was equipped with apparatus that could have raised the entire solar system with a call for help, and yet not the tiniest whisper was heard.”

  * * * *

  The Chief got up and paced the floor agitatedly. It was plain that this business was worrying him. Miro continued to sit calmly, seemingly indifferent. “It’s uncanny, I tell you. Gone as though empty space had swallowed them up.”

  “You’ve applied routine methods, of course,” Grant ventured.

  “Of course,” the Chief waved it aside impatiently. “But we can’t discover a thing. Battle fliers have patrolled the area without success. The last ship was literally snatched away right under the nose of a convoy. One minute it was in radio communication, and the next—whiff—it was gone.”

  “Where is this area you mention?” Already Pemberton’s razor-edged brain was at work on the problem.

  “Within a radius of five million miles from Jupiter. We’ve naturally considered placing an embargo upon that territory, but that would mean cutting off all of the satellites from the rest of the system.”

  Miro stirred. His smooth slurred voice rolled out.

  “And my planet would suffer, my friend. Alas, it has already suffered too much.” He evoked a sigh from somewhere in the depths of his barrel chest, and tried to cast up his small red eyes.

  Grant suffered too, a faint disgust. Damn his eyes, what business had an erstwhile pirate, not too recently reformed, being self-righteous?

  “Miro thinks,” the Chief continued unheeding, “that the Callistans know more about this than they admit. He has a theory that Callisto is somehow gathering up these ships to use in a surprise attack against his own planet, Ganymede. He says Callisto has always hated them.”

  “Damn good reason,” Grant said laconically.

  * * * *

  Miro’s lidless eyes flamed into sudden life. “And what do you mean by that, my friend?”

  Pemberton replied calmly. “Simply that your people have harried and ravaged them for untold centuries. They were your nearest prey, you know.”

  Miro sprang to his feet, his soft suction pads gripping the floor as though preparatory to a spring. Gone was the sanctimonious unction of his former behavior; the ruthless savage glared out of the red eyes, the flattened fingers were twisting and curling.

  “You beastly Earthling,” he cried in a voice choked with rage, “I’ll—”

  The Chief intervened swiftly. “Here, none of that,” he said sharply to Miro. “Don’t say anything you’ll regret later.” Then he turned to Grant, who was steadily holding his ground: “There was no reason, Pemberton, to insult an inspector of the Service. Consider yourself r
eprimanded.” But the edge of the rebuke was taken off by the slight twinkle in the Chief’s eye.

  Somehow a truce was patched up. Grant was to ship as an ordinary passenger on the Althea, the great passenger liner that plied between Callisto and the Earth. It was not his duty to prevent the disappearance of the vessel, the Chief insisted, but to endeavor to discover the cause. It was up to Grant then to escape, if he could, and to report to Miro on Ganymede immediately with his findings. Miro was leaving by his private Service flier at once for Ganymede, to await him. Grant thought he saw a faint sardonic gleam in the Inspector’s eyes at that, but paid no particular heed to it at the time.

  * * * *

  Now, as Grant stood in the corridor of the great space-flier, listening intently for further sounds from his hidden foe, it flashed on him. Miro knew he was on board. It was a Ganymedan who had treacherously attacked him. The puzzle was slowly fitting its pieces together. But the major piece still eluded him. What would happen to the ship?

  As he turned to go back to his room, a ripping, tearing, grinding sound came to his startled ears. It was followed by a sudden swishing noise. Grant knew what that meant. A meteor had ripped into the vitals of the space-flier, and the precious air was rushing through the fissure into outer space. He whirled without an instant’s hesitation and sprang down the long corridor toward the captain’s quarters. If caught in time, the hole could be plugged.

  Even as he ran, there was another grinding smash, then another, and another. Good Lord, they must have headed right into a meteor shower. Panels were sliding open, and people, scantily attired, thrust startled heads out into the corridor. Someone called after him, but he did not heed or stop his headlong race. He must get to the control room at once.