Paul F. Olson

A Journal of Miscellany and Disorder

Someone who saw my last post asked if I had ever actually met Manly Wade Wellman, to which I was proud to answer, “You bet.” As a matter of fact, I was the young writer referred to in the old Hellnotes essay, the one who received some words of encouragement during a brief break in an otherwise hectic World Fantasy Convention — New Haven, 1982, I think.

I was lucky enough to attend quite a few of the earlier WFCs, starting with the fifth, which was the first one to return to Providence, Rhode Island, the convention’s birthplace. One of the best things about those gatherings, besides the giddy enthusiasm they always instilled, the contact high that didn’t wear off for weeks afterwards, was the opportunity to rub shoulders, even just briefly, with some of the old pulp masters.

I remember chatting with Manly, getting autographs from the likes of Frank Belknap Long and J. Vernon Shea, and having a pleasant conversation with Robert Bloch while he patiently signed my inordinately large stack of books. I also had things signed by Hugh B. Cave, who years later subscribed to my magazine and years after that became a Hellnotes reader — how cool was that?

One day our group found itself in the buffet line with H. Warner Munn, who ended up sharing our table and regaling us with tales of writing “The Werewolf of Ponkert,” his memories of Lovecraft and his vast knowledge of the Roman Empire, the subject of his then-new historical novel, The Lost Legion.

One of the best memories of all was riding in an uncomfortable yellow school bus with 60 or 70 fans and one very special guest to the site of Poe’s grave, where the guest — the great Fritz Leiber — laid a wreath and provided a stunning, chill-inducing midnight reading of “The Conqueror Worm.” That trip was the subject of another early Hellnotes essay, which I would reprint here … except I can’t find it at the moment.

Those were good times, rare opportunities to meet a generation that even then was slipping away from us. For a few short moments, we actually got to mingle with the same giants whose shoulders we were trying so hard to stand upon.

They’re gone now, of course, but their ghosts linger and their books and stories remain a constant source of joy.

You never know what you’re going to find when you’re clicking here and there, cruising around the Internet.

The other day, I stumbled across this old essay of mine — one of the first pieces I did for Hellnotes, back in the earliest days, when Dave and I were still trying to figure out exactly what the newsletter was going to be. I hadn’t yet started writing weekly editorials. Instead, I was putting together semi-regular pieces like “The Roots of Horror,” trying to say a lot in a very few words, which has never been especially easy for me.

I remember writing the piece on Wellman and giving permission for it to be reused. I even remember seeing it not long after it had been posted. But I was a little bit startled to discover that it’s still out there, all these years later.

Re-reading the piece now makes me wish I’d said a few more things, or at least said these particular things a little better. But Manly Wade Wellman was a nice guy and a great writer, and I suppose nothing you say about people like that is ever really enough.

As for the Wellman tribute site itself, it seems to be in a “lingering” phase, without any recent updates. I hope it sticks around. Manly deserves all the ink — virtual and real — that he can get.