Marvel Science Fiction
Stadium Publishing Corporation
August 1951

     Here is a wonderful Hannes Bok cover, gracing the cover of one of the oddities of the pulp magazine world.
     Marvel Science Fiction began as Marvel Science Stories in 1938. It was one of the magazines published by Martin Goodman, who would soon jump into the comics field with intoduction of the Sub-Mariner and the Human Torch in Marvel Comics #1 (the rest, as they say, is history) and although it was in comics that Goodman made his fortune, magazines were always a part of his publishing empire.
     In 1939, the title was changed to Marvel Tales and then in 1940 to Marvel Stories (during this period it is also interesting to note that some of the artists that worked on Goodman's comics did spot illustrations for his magazines:  Simon and Kirby among others). Marvel Stories folded in 1941 and the title disappeared until 1950, when Marvel Science Stories appeared. In 1951, the title was changed again to Marvel Science Fiction, before being cancelled for good in 1952. What I find most fascinating about all this, is that among six title changes and five years of publishing, the entire title only produced fifteen issues!
     This particular issue has nothing much memorable in terms of its fiction, but there are a couple of little tidbits of interest that might otherwise go overlooked:

• Under the heading "Other Departments and Features" there a section entitled "The Dianetics Question" that features serveral pages of letters in response to some question posed by the editors in a previous issue (Dianetics was first discussed in a series of articles written by Hubbard and published by Campbell in Astounding just around this time).
  
• There are two stories in the mazazine which are illustrated by H. Harrison. This is author Harry Harrison, who worked in comics, most memorably in collaboration with Wally Wood, before he went into writing full time.
  
• Lastly, the title page lists Daniel Keyes as an associate editor. This is author Daniel Keyes, who was to later write the classic "Flowers for Algernon."