Korshak, 1941, high school graduation photo. An important science fiction fan, but barely a Fortean.
Erle Melvin Korshak was born 20 October 1923 in Chicago. His family were relatively recent immigrants from Russia. (Documents differ as to whether his father was born there or in Illinois, the earlier ones reporting Russia, the latter the U.S.) Sam Korshak, a veteran of the first World War, managed a dress shop in 1930; he was married to Meady Korshak, and they rented a place in Chicago, where they lived with Erle and German maid, who had immigrated only 4 years before. The 1940 census does not indicate much had changed: the family was still in Chicago, still renting. Sam was a salesman now and their made was no longer with them.
Erle graduated from Hyde Park High School in 1941 and matriculated at the University of Illinois the next year. He wasn’t there long before war intervened, though, and on 20 November 1942—one month exactly after he turned 19—Korshak enlisted as a private in the army; he was involved with field artillery. Interestingly, he enlisted in San Francisco—I’m not sure why he was in California. Korshak was 5’11” and a slight 159 pounds. I am not sure how long he was in the military, but he did end up finishing his schooling and becoming a lawyer.
Erle Melvin Korshak was born 20 October 1923 in Chicago. His family were relatively recent immigrants from Russia. (Documents differ as to whether his father was born there or in Illinois, the earlier ones reporting Russia, the latter the U.S.) Sam Korshak, a veteran of the first World War, managed a dress shop in 1930; he was married to Meady Korshak, and they rented a place in Chicago, where they lived with Erle and German maid, who had immigrated only 4 years before. The 1940 census does not indicate much had changed: the family was still in Chicago, still renting. Sam was a salesman now and their made was no longer with them.
Erle graduated from Hyde Park High School in 1941 and matriculated at the University of Illinois the next year. He wasn’t there long before war intervened, though, and on 20 November 1942—one month exactly after he turned 19—Korshak enlisted as a private in the army; he was involved with field artillery. Interestingly, he enlisted in San Francisco—I’m not sure why he was in California. Korshak was 5’11” and a slight 159 pounds. I am not sure how long he was in the military, but he did end up finishing his schooling and becoming a lawyer.
Korshak was a fan of science fiction at least since his teens. In 1939, he had a letter published in “Weird Tales.” In 1940, while he was still a high school student, he helped to organize the second World Science Fiction Convention (Chicon I), which was held at the Hotel Chicagoan in September. (In 1941, he was involved in a fan controversy over why Denver was the site for the third convention; he also published an essay, “The Science Fiction Fan Moment.”) Along with some friends, including Fortean Frederick B. Shroyer, Korshak started to compile a comprehensive list of science fiction and fantasy stories—they were spread out among such an array of publications, it was quite an undertaking. The initial work, though, was lost—literally, lost—during World War II. After the war, in 1946, Korshal and Ted Ditky began selling used books, meanwhile shifting the work of the bibliography to Everett F. Bleiler (another Fortean). As Ditky explaine,d such a list would be useful to used booksellers, since otherwise science fiction and fantasy fans would scour their collections and get underpriced classics.
The book business evolved, by 1948, into Shasta Publishers. Its first book was Bleiler’s “The Checklist of Fantastic Literature.” After that, Shasta—supposedly named after the place in California where Korshak and another friend had summer jobs, possibly accounting for Korshak being inducted to the army in San Francisco—put out works by a number of important science fiction writers, including the founder of Dianetics, L. Ron Hubbard (but not a book on Dianetics), and Forteans or Fortean-allies John W. Campbell, Robert Heinlein, A. E. Van Vogt, and Fredric Brown. The business, though, struggled—there was along, drawn-out rift with Heinlein over payments—and collapsed in 1957. Indeed, by 1953, Shasta was unable to pay off a prize it had promised or publish the manuscript (by Philip José Farmer) which had won. He had some minor contact with British science fiction fans in the late 1940s through Walter Gillings’s fanzine.
After that, Korshak left fandom behind, whether or not he continued to follow science fiction, concentrating on his family and his legal job in San Francisco. He returned to the fold in the late 1980s, and in the late two-thousand aughts he and his son revived Shasta publishers.
********
I do not know what led Korshak to Fort—or, in fact, if he had more than a minimal investment in Forteanism. It is easy enough to speculate, given his science fiction interests. Astounding serialized “Lo!” in 1934, when he was ten, turning eleven; there were frequent references to Fort in the science fiction literature. And he had friends and business acquaintances connected to the Fortean Society. The links are dense and frequent.
But for all that, Korshak barely made a dent in the Fortean universe. And as far as I know, never referenced Fort or Forteanism in his own writings. The entirety of his Fortean career, as I reconstruct it, occurred in 1948, and was entirely passive on his part. In June, Thayer recommended science fiction and fantasy literature to the readers of Dout as the natural reading material of Forteans and mentioned Bleiler’s checklist, noting with pride that Bleiler was a member, as was the dedicatee, Shroyer, and the publisher, Korshak. (The Society was also selling the book.) Two months later, on 14 August (Fortean Style), he wrote to Don Bloch, who was making a trip to Chicago, and recommended that while in the Windy City he look up James Staver and Korshak, book dealers and Forteans, for conversation. Bloch did not.
And that was that.
The book business evolved, by 1948, into Shasta Publishers. Its first book was Bleiler’s “The Checklist of Fantastic Literature.” After that, Shasta—supposedly named after the place in California where Korshak and another friend had summer jobs, possibly accounting for Korshak being inducted to the army in San Francisco—put out works by a number of important science fiction writers, including the founder of Dianetics, L. Ron Hubbard (but not a book on Dianetics), and Forteans or Fortean-allies John W. Campbell, Robert Heinlein, A. E. Van Vogt, and Fredric Brown. The business, though, struggled—there was along, drawn-out rift with Heinlein over payments—and collapsed in 1957. Indeed, by 1953, Shasta was unable to pay off a prize it had promised or publish the manuscript (by Philip José Farmer) which had won. He had some minor contact with British science fiction fans in the late 1940s through Walter Gillings’s fanzine.
After that, Korshak left fandom behind, whether or not he continued to follow science fiction, concentrating on his family and his legal job in San Francisco. He returned to the fold in the late 1980s, and in the late two-thousand aughts he and his son revived Shasta publishers.
********
I do not know what led Korshak to Fort—or, in fact, if he had more than a minimal investment in Forteanism. It is easy enough to speculate, given his science fiction interests. Astounding serialized “Lo!” in 1934, when he was ten, turning eleven; there were frequent references to Fort in the science fiction literature. And he had friends and business acquaintances connected to the Fortean Society. The links are dense and frequent.
But for all that, Korshak barely made a dent in the Fortean universe. And as far as I know, never referenced Fort or Forteanism in his own writings. The entirety of his Fortean career, as I reconstruct it, occurred in 1948, and was entirely passive on his part. In June, Thayer recommended science fiction and fantasy literature to the readers of Dout as the natural reading material of Forteans and mentioned Bleiler’s checklist, noting with pride that Bleiler was a member, as was the dedicatee, Shroyer, and the publisher, Korshak. (The Society was also selling the book.) Two months later, on 14 August (Fortean Style), he wrote to Don Bloch, who was making a trip to Chicago, and recommended that while in the Windy City he look up James Staver and Korshak, book dealers and Forteans, for conversation. Bloch did not.
And that was that.
