William Timmins – Literary Art and Illustration

A Divine Invasion: Philip K. Dick on Henry Kuttner’s “The Fairy Chessmen”, Astounding Science Fiction, January, 1946 [William Timmins]

Every artist creates works that are memorable. Not necessarily in terms of technical expertise; not in terms of boldness of color; not in terms of clarity and detail. But instead, in terms of qualities that resonate with the human spirit: Ambiguity. Mystery. Symbolism. The unreal, in confrontation with the real.

One such artist was William Timmins, whose cover illustrations were featured on Astounding Science Fiction between December, 1942 and December, 1950. While some of his efforts were – “ho-hum” – adequate if unremarkable, others were striking in their power and boldness, embodying in a single painting a story’s animating concept and message. A particular example is his cover art for the December, 1942 issue of Astounding, for A.E. van Vogt’s “The Weapon Shop”, showing a five-hundred foot high five-tiered information center, from which leads an elevated ramp upon which stand pedestrians. Though a direct representation of a scene central to the story, the image has a dreamlike quality by virtue of the magnitude and distance of the building itself, which is viewed as if from a distance, from a vantage point below the ramp.

An even more memorable painting, for the cover of the January ’46 issue of Astounding, is a representation for Henry Kuttner’s story “The Fairy Chessmen”. (You can access parts one and two via the Pulp Magazine Archive.) In the image, as in the tale, Robert Cameron, civilian director of Psychometrics, is walking across a chessboard-as-hillside-landscape, dominated by human-size pawns, knight, queen, and king. With an autogiro in the distance (they were fashionable in the 40s!), he stands beneath a dark and gloomy sky, with a pattern of square, grayish yellow clouds above.

But, the chessboard is more than a mere chessboard, for the chess pieces are alive, watching, and waiting.

And so, I wondered: “How did Timmins’ painting actually appear, before it was a magazine cover?”

Assuming his painting was lost or destroyed decades ago – like the vast bulk of then unappreciated and now retrospectively invaluable pulp art – I thought I’d do an experiment: Using my scan of the original cover as a basis, I used Photoshop to repair defects, and, create elements of the cover art that were obscured or completely covered by title, logo, and other textual elements. This involved replicating the “fuzziness” and vagueness of some cover features, and at the same time trying to make these modifications consistent with the overall “feel” of Timmins’ painting. While I didn’t do so consciously, on completion, I realized that the square shape of the clouds – with gaps between them – mimicked that of the chessboard.

Perhaps Timmins’ original painting looked something like this.

Hope you like it. Other examples may follow.

The chessmen wonder.

“What is it about SF that draws us?
What is sf anyhow?
It grips fans; it grips editors; it grips writers.
And none make any money.
When I ponder this I see always in my mind
Henry Kuttner’s FAIRY CHESSMEN with its opening paragraph,
the doorknob that winks at the protagonist.
When I ponder this I also see –
outside my mind, right beside my desk –
a complete file of UNKNOWN and UNKNOWN WORLDS,
PLUS Astounding back to October 1933 …
these being guarded by a nine-hundred-pound fireproof file cabinet,
separated from the world,
separated from life.
Hence separated from decay and wear.
Hence separated from time.
I paid $390 for this fireproof file which protects these magazines.
After my wife and daughter these mean more to me than anything else I own –
or hope to own.”

“Notes Made Late at Night by a Weary SF Writer”, by Philip K. Dick
written 1968
in
Eternity Science Fiction, July, 1972

Here’s is Gnome Press’s 1951 edition of Tomorrow and Tomorrow / The Fairy Chessmen, featuring art by Harry Harrison. The dystopian theme of devastation by nuclear war is obviously implied by the presence of a mushroom cloud, a not uncommon visual trope in 50s science fiction art. I had absolutely no idea – until creating this post – that Harrison began his career as an illustrator, his first story appearing in 1951.

Another edition of The Fairy Chessmen, this time published in 1956 as Galaxy (Science Fiction) Novel # 26 under the title Chessboard Planet, with cover illustration by Edmund Emshwiller. The background has somewhat of a Richard Powers-ish feel to it…

(?)
(!)

This Will Read You

Sutin, Lawrence, Divine Invasions – A Life of Philip K. Dick, Harmony Books, New York, N.Y., 1989 (page 35)

11/27/23 – 5

Astounding Science Fiction, December, 1944 – Featuring “Nomad”, by Wesley Long [William Timmins, Robert Tschirsky]

Known primarily for his collection of “Venus Equilateral” stories, Golden Age science-fiction writer George O. Smith’s body of work comprised nine novels, many short stories, and, a number of reviews. I’ve only read a few examples of his work, these comprising a few Venus Equilateral tales. To be honest, I found these stories – which I think fall into the continuum of “hard science fiction” – to be straightforward, middling, and serviceable; neither bad nor exceptional. I’m glad I read them, but have no impetus to revisit them for another reading (or two, or three) as for example the stories of A.E. van Vogt (the early van Vogt!), Philip K. Dick, Cordwainer Smith, or Catherine Moore.

Among Smith’s novels was Nomad, which originally appeared as a three-part series in the December, 1944, and January and February 1945 issues of Astounding Science Fiction. For the December issue, William Timmins’ somewhat bland cover art is cast in muted tones of green, gray, and red.

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Paul Orban’s interior illustrations do the story greater artistic justice. Here’s the opening illustration, on page 7. Note how the spacecraft has the general appearance of a submarine (a one-man submarine?!) – down to entry hatch, typical of many such illustrations from the period.

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This illustration of a disintegrating spaceship appears on page 27. The nautical design theme is evident here, also.

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The Nomad series was published in novel form by Prime Press in 1950, in a run of 2,500 copies. The cover illustration is by L. Robert Tschirsky, whose illustrations were featured on (and in) several works of science fiction, fantasy, and pseudoscience (Atlantis and all that) in the late 1940s.

For your further distraction (? – !)…

George O. Smith, at…

… Wikipedia

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Paul Orban, at…

… PulpFest

… PulpArtists

L. Robert Tschirsky (2/15/15-1/27/03) at…

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

… Arizona Daily Sun (Obituary)

Nomad, at…

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Prime Press, at…

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

… Collectors Showcase (page 1)

… Collectors Showcase (page 2)

Imagining the Integrated Circuit: “Dreadful Sanctuary” by Eric Frank Russell, Astounding Science Fiction, June, 1948

Sometimes, fiction can foresee fact.

Sometimes, entertainment can anticipate reality.

This has long been so in the realm of science fiction, a striking example of which – perhaps arising from equal measures and intuition and imagination – appearing in Astounding Science Fiction in mid-1949. That year, Eric Frank Russell’s three-part serial “Dreadful Sanctuary” was serialized in the June, July, and August issues of the magazine.

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June, 1948: Cover by William F. Timmins.

(Note Timmins’ name on the “puzzle piece” in the lower left corner!)

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July, 1948: Cover by Chesley Bonestell

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August, 1948: Cover by: Alexander Cañedo

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With interior illustrations by Timmins, the story, set in 1972, is centered upon the efforts of one John J. Armstrong – an iconoclastic combination of entrepreneur, inventor, and unintended detective – to accomplish the first successful manned lunar landing as his entirely private venture, in the face the inexplicable mid-flight destruction of each of his organization’s spacecraft. Armstrong doesn’t fit the cultural stereotype of inventor or scientist. As characterized by Russell, “Armstrong was a big, tweedy man, burly, broad-shouldered and a heavy punisher of thick-soled shoes. His thinking had a deliberate, ponderous quality. He got places with the same unracy, deceptive speed as a railroad locomotive, but was less noisy.”

While Russell’s story commences in the June issue as a solid – and solidly intriguing – mystery, effectively conveying a sense of wonder; with characters who portend to be more than two-dimensional; the events, plot, and underlying tone gradually change. With the installments in Astounding’s July and and August issues, what had been a tale with an eerie undertone of Fortean inexplicability, technical conjecture (such as the “ipsophone”, a video-telephone imbued with aspects of artificial intelligence – cool! – we’re talking 1948!), and a well-crafted mood of impending threat … gradually and steadily falls flat.

A pity, because to the extent that the story succeeds – and in parts it does succeed, and creatively at that – it does so far more as a hard-boiled (and very ham-fisted) detective tale than science-fiction.

Regardless of the story’s literary quality (I don’t think it’s ever been anthologized) the physical and psychological presence of the aptly named Armstrong (“arm”?! “strong”?! get it??!) remain consistent throughout. Iconoclastic and independent, he’s extremely intelligent, and if need be, a man capable of brute intimidation, self-defense, and violence. He’s also canny, cunning, and psychologically astute.
It’s these latter qualities that lead to Armstrong’s discovery – after meeting a police captain – of a most intriguing device, at his residence in the suburbs of New York City.

Correctly suspicious of surveillance by adversaries, on reaching his residence, “…Armstrong cautiously locked himself in, gave the place the once-over.

“Knowing the microphone was there, it didn’t take him long to find it though its discovery proved far more difficult than he’d expected.

“Its hiding place was ingenious enough – a one hundred watt bulb had been extracted from his reading lamp, another and more peculiar bulb fitted in its place.

“It was not until he removed the lamp’s parchment shade that the substitution became apparent.

“Twisting the bulb out of its socket, he examined it keenly.

“It had a dual coiled-coil filament which lit up in normal manner, but its glass envelope was only half the usual size and its plastic base twice the accepted length.

“He smashed the bulb in the fireplace, cracked open the plastic base with the heel of his shoe.

“Splitting wide, the base revealed a closely packed mass of components so extremely tiny that their construction and assembling must have been done under magnification – a highly-skilled watchmaker’s job! The main wires feeding the camouflaging filament ran past either side of this midget apparatus, making no direct connection therewith, but a shiny, spider-thread inductance not as long as a pin was coiled around one wire and derived power from it.

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(July, 1948, page 101)

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“Since there was no external wiring connecting this strange junk with a distant earpiece, and since its Lilliputian output could hardly be impressed upon and extracted from the power mains, there was nothing for it than to presume that it was some sort of screwy converter which turned audio-frequencies into radio or other unimaginable frequencies picked up by listening apparatus fairly close to hand.

“Without subjecting it to laboratory tests, its extreme range was sheer guesswork, but Armstrong was willing to concede it two hundred yards.

“So microscopic was the lay-out that he could examine it only with difficulty, but he could discern enough to decide that this was no tiny but simple transmitter recognizable in terms of Earthly practice.

“The little there was of it appeared outlandish, for its thermionic control was a splinter of flame-specked crystal, resembling pin-fire opal, around which the midget components were clustered.” (July, 1948, pp.116-117)

I’ll not explain the origin of this device (it’d spoil the story should you read it!), but suffice to say that in the world of the “Dreadful Sanctuary”, things and people are not as they seem, in terms of their origin, nature, and purpose.

In our world, however, it seems that Eric Frank Russell created a literary illustration – at least in terms of its diminutive size and the delicacy of its fabrication – of what would in only a few years be known as the integrated circuit.

Sometimes, imagination can anticipate the future.

References

Chesley Bonestell – at Wikipedia

Eric Frank Russell – at Wikipedia

William F. Timmins – at Pulp Artists

Astounding – Analog Science Fiction and Fact

Integrated Circuit – at Wikipedia

Retro Car!: Astounding Science Fiction, April, 1943, featuring “Swimming Lesson”, by Raymond F. Jones [William Timmins]

There are two qualities about “bedsheet” format issues of Astounding Science Fiction (published as such from January, 1942, through April, 1943) that, apart from size alone, make them so distinctive.

First, the size and appearance of the very title, which utilizes distinctly different fonts for the words “ASTOUNDING” and “Science Fiction”: the former bold, capitalized, and elongated; the latter italicized and “flowing”. This connotes a melding of adventure, boldness, and modernity, with aspirations towards “highbrow” literature.

Second, a bedsheet format allows cover art larger than that featured by (then) standard-size contemporary pulps. Though only three artists (Hubert Rogers, Modest Stein, and William Timmins) created works featured on the covers of these sixteen issues of Astounding, and these illustrations greatly vary in quality and impact, they have a solid association with stories and authors from the magazine’s “Golden Age”.

However – ! – William Timmins’ cover art for the April, 1943 issue of Astounding might be a little bit less memorable for its association with Raymond F. Jones’ tale “Swimming Lesson”, for Jones’ story only appeared once, in this issue; it’s never been anthologized. (? – !) (Paul Fraser’s review of the story can be found at SFMagazines.) But, this issue is brightly distinctive in being the only bedsheet issue of Astounding featuring a cover background in red, as other covers are in shades of gray, blue, basic black, and a really-ugly-mustardy-looking-off-yellow.

A close-up of Timmins’ art…

Like other early 40s issues of Astounding, the April ’43 issue features its own retro (well, retro from the vantage point of 2021!) interior illustrations.

This cool looking flying car by Paul Orban appears in the story “Escape”, by Joseph Gilbert and Fred W. Fischer. The craft is a hybrid of an airplane (fin, rudder, and horizontal stabilizer) and railroad engine (wrap-around windshield with single headlight in front), all combined in the overall shape of a vastly-improved, streamlined Buck Rogers style space flyer.

It seems like the cops – angrily waving below – and the hero and heroine – above – are both using the same model vehicle…

Reference(s)

Raymond F. Jones, at…

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Swimming Lesson, at…

… SF Magazines

Fred W. Fischer (Fred W. Fischer, Jr.), at…

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Joseph Gilbert, at…

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Paul Orban, at…

… SFE – The Science Fiction Encyclopedia

… Pulp Artists

… Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Astounding Science Fiction, July, 1946 – Featuring “Cold Front”, by Hal Clement [William Timmins]

I have a number of posts currently “in the pipeline”, but not yet finalized.

In the meantime, I thought I’d share this interesting composition by “Swenson”, which accompanies Lewis Padgett’s (Henry Kuttner and Catherine L. Moore) short tale “Rain Check“, from page 54 of the July, 1946 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.

Though perhaps not as well as other illustrators, Swenson – or, “Walter Swenson” / “Walter Swensen” / “H. Swenson”, as suggested by DocSavage.Org and PulpFest – had a very distinctive style, with a woodcut-like boldness and crispness of his work taking precedence over intricate detail.

Anyway, I simply like the image below, for what at first looks benign and paper-weight-ish, on second glance, is actually quite eerie…!

Astounding Science Fiction – July, 1947 (Featuring “With Folded Hands…”, by Jack Williamson) [William Timmins]

William Timmins’ straightforward and somewhat uninspiring covert art, though visually consistent with and appropriate for “With Folded Hands…”, belies the depth, power, and literary quality of Jack Williamson’s 1947 story. In 1954, it was expanded as Galaxy Science Fiction Novel number 21, under the title The Humanoids, with cover art by Edward Emshwiller.

I discovered Williamson’s tale years ago, within “Volume IIA” of The Science Fiction Hall of Fame.

The story was one of fifty science fiction stories adapted by Ernest Kinoy and George Lefferts for the NBC 1950-1951 radio program Dimension X, and broadcast on April 15, 1950. You can listen to the program here, at the American Radio Classics YouTube channel, where, oddly, it’s listed under the category of “comedy”.

“Comedy?!” Nooo… No. It’s not a comedy.

I was reminded of Williamson’s story in the mid-1990s after reading Norbert Wiener’s The Human Use of Human Beings, which I found to be eerily – nay, chillingly! – prescient (albeit now, 69 years too early…), imbued with a sense of compassion, and, composed with an almost poetic sense of language (though obviously not poetry, per se!). Above all, the “tone” of the book is one of deep humility, and, a profound, refreshing absence of the ideologically motivated hubris that passes for intellectuality, so characteristic of the current age. In this, the book’s resemblance to Sir Roger Penrose’s works on the origin and nature of consciousness is striking.

Anyway… I read With Folded Hands once again, and found that Williamson’s story had lost neither its depth nor its impact despite the passage of time. (Other science fiction stories? Not always so much.)

It’s interesting that Williamson’s story and Wiener’s book appeared within three years of one another. This may attest to a commonality of thought about the implications and effect – viewed from the perspective of the mid-twentieth century, the Second World War having ended only a few years earlier – of the intersection of and anticipation of several technological and social trends: Automation, the eventuality of artificial intelligence and machine learning (though I doubt those phrases were conceived of as such, at the time), and computer networks (the humanoids are in constant real-time communication with one another, after all), upon the economic and social “place” of men, both individually and collectively.

Excerpts from Norbert Wiener’s book (1973 Discus edition) follow, a little further down this post..

“At your service,” Mr. Underhill.” Its blind steel eyes stared straight ahead, but it was still aware of him. “What’s the matter, sir? Aren’t you happy?”

(Since creating this post in May of 2019, I’ve acquired a copy of the July, 1947, Astounding, in much better condition than the original – which is displayed at the “bottom” of this post. The “new” copy, minus chipped edges and missing corners, is shown below…)

Underhill felt cold and faint with terror.
His skin turned clammy.
A painful prickling came over him.
His wet hand tensed on the door handle of the car,
but he restrained the impulse to jump and run.
That was folly.
There was no escape.
He made himself sit still.

“You will be happy, sir,” the mechanical promised him cheerfully.
“We have learned how to make all men happy under the Prime Directive.
Our service will be perfect now, at last.

Even Mr. Sledge is very happy now.”

Underhill tried to speak, but his dry throat stuck.
He felt ill.
The world turned dim and gray.
The humanoids were prefect – no question of that.
They had even learned to lie, to secure the contentment of men

He knew they had lied.
That was no tumor they had removed from Sledge’s brain,
but the memory,
the scientific knowledge,
and the bitter disillusion of their own creator.
Yet he had seen that Sledge was happy now.

He tried to stop his own convulsive quivering.

“A wonderful operation!”
His voice came forced and faint.
“You know Aurora has had a lot of funny tenants,
but that old man was the absolute limit.
They very idea that he had made the humanoids,
that he knew how to stop them! I always knew he must be lying!”

Stiff with terror, he made a weak and hollow laugh.

“What is the matter, Mr. Underhill?”

The alert mechanical must have perceived his shuddering illness.

“Are you unwell?”

“No, there’s nothing the matter with me,” he gasped desperately.
“Absolutely nothing!
I’ve just found out that I’m perfectly happy under the Prime Directive.
Everything is absolutely wonderful.”
His voice came dry and hoarse and wild.
“You won’t have to operate on me.”
The car turned off the shining avenue,
taking him back to the quiet splendor of his prison.
His futile hands clenched and relaxed again, folded on his knees.

There was nothing left to do.

( – Jack S. Williamson – )

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Illustration by Hubert Rogers, for Jack Williamson’s story “And Searching Mind” (Astounding Science Fiction, May, 1948 – Part III of III) (p. 118)

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The Human Use of Human Beings
by Norbert Wiener
Avon Books – (1950) 1973

In the myths and fairy tales that we read as children
we learned a few of the simpler and more obvious truths of life,
such as that when a djinnee is found in a bottle,
it had better be left there;
that the fisherman who craves a boon from heaven too many times on behalf of his wife
will end up exactly where he started;
that if you are given three wishes, you must be very careful what you wish for.
These simple and obvious truths represent the childish equivalent of the tragic view of life
which the Greeks and many modern Europeans possess,
and which is somehow missing in this land of plenty.

“Whether we entrust our decisions to machines of metal,
or to those machines of flesh and blood

which are bureaus
and vast laboratories
and armies
and corporations,

we shall never receive the right answers to our questions unless we ask the right questions.”

I have said that the modem man,
and especially the modern American,
however much “know-how” he may have, has very little “know-what.”
He will accept the superior dexterity of the machine-made decisions
without too much inquiry as to the motives and principles behind these.
In doing so, he will put himself sooner or later in the position of the father
in W.W. Jacobs’ The Monkey’s Paw, who has wished for a hundred pounds,
only to find at his door the agent of the company for which his son works,
tendering him one hundred pounds as a consolation for his son’s death at the factory.
Or again, he may do it in the way of the Arab fisherman in the One Thousand and One Nights,
when he broke the Seal of Solomon on the lid of the bottle which contained the angry djinnee.

Let us remember that there are game-playing machines
both of The Monkey’s Paw type and of the type of the Bottled Djinnee.
Any machine constructed for the purpose of making decisions,
if it does not possess the power of learning,
will be completely literal-minded.
Woe to us if we let it decide our conduct,
unless we have previously examined the laws of its action,
and know fully that its conduct will be carried out on principles acceptable to us!
On the other hand,
the machine like the djinnee which can learn and can make decisions on the basis of its learning,
will in no way be obliged to make such decisions as we should have made,
or will be acceptable to us.
For the man who is not aware of this,
to throw the problem of his responsibility on the machine,
whether it can learn or not,
is to cast his responsibility to the winds,
and to find it coming back seated on the whirlwind.

Reference

Bova, Ben (Editor), The Science Fiction Hall of Fame – Volume IIA, Avon Books, New York, N.Y., 1973

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Original cover image, from May of 2019…

Astounding Science Fiction, June, 1945, Featuring “Pandora’s Millions”, by George O. Smith [William Timmins]

“Pandora’s Millions”, in the July, 1945, issue of Astounding Science Fiction, is one of the twelve stories comprising George O. Smith’s Venus Equilateral collection.

The other eleven stories include…

“QRM—Interplanetary” – October, 1942
“Calling the Empress” – June, 1943
“Recoil” – November, 1943
“Off the Beam” – February, 1944
“The Long Way” – April, 1944
“Beam Pirate” – October, 1944
“Firing Line” – December, 1944
“Special Delivery” – March, 1945
“Mad Holiday”
“The External Triangle”
“Epilogue: Identity” – November, 1945

…all of which, with the exception of “Mad Holiday” and “The External Triangle”, originally appeared in Astounding as well.

William Timmins’ cover for the July, 1945 issue of the magazine clearly shows the name “Venus Equilateral” at the station’s entrance, the station itself being an “interplanetary communications hub located at the L₄ Lagrangian point of the Sun-Venus system”.

By profession an electronics engineer whose forte was “hard” science fiction, George O. Smith, born in April of 1911, died on May 27, 1981. His obituary, from the June 5, 1981, issue of The New York Times, appears below.

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References

George O. Smith – bibliography at The Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Venus Equilateral – at Wikipedia

Venus Equilateral (story collection) – at Wikipedia

Astounding Science Fiction, December, 1945 (Featuring “Beggars in Velvet” by Lewis Padgett [Henry Kuttner and Catherine L. Moore]) [William Timmins]

At the core of all literary genres are stories that are emblematic – in terms of theme, plot, characters, and setting. Tales of adventure, drama, fantasy, mystery, romance, tragedy, and more, are represented by particular works, which in the names of their very titles, represent to the reader (or, viewer!) “that” body of literature, without even the briefest need for depiction, description, or explanation.

In the genre of science fiction, one such tale (well, really, a set of tales) continues to remain iconic: Isaac Asimov’s Foundation Trilogy, comprising Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation (the trilogy having been expanded with two sequels and two prequels commencing in 1981), which initially appeared as a series of eleven short stories in Astounding Science Fiction from May of 1942, through January of 1950.

As derived from information at the International Science Fiction Database, the Wikipedia entry for the Foundation Series, plus a brief perusal of my own copies of Astounding, the body of stories that comprise the Trilogy are listed below:

May, 1942 – “Foundation” (also known as “The Encyclopedia”)

June, 1942 – “Bridle and Saddle”

August, 1944 – “The Big and The Little” (also known as “The Merchant Princes”)

October, 1944 – “The Wedge” (also known as “The Traders”)

April, 1945 – “Dead Hand”

November, 1945, December, 1945 – “The Mule”

January, 1948 – “Now You See It”

November, 1949, December 1949, January 1950 – “And Now You Don’t” (also known as “Search for The Foundation”)

Of the eleven issues of Astounding listed above, six were published with cover art symbolizing or representing the actual Foundation story within the particular issue. But, the cover art for issues of May, 1942; October, 1944; December, 1945; December, 1949, and January, 1950 was unrelated to Asimov’s story.

An example appears below. It’s the cover of Astounding for December, 1945, with art by William Timmins for Lewis Padgett’s (Henry Kuttner and Catherine L. Moore’s) “Beggars in Velvet”. While I’ve not yet read the story, the juxtaposition of archers garbed in “Daniel Boonish” attire in the left foreground, with a crowd of seeming civilian hostages to the right – with a futuristic cityscape behind – presents an unusual sight.

Within appears part two of “The Mule”, the text of both parts of which was later incorporated into “Foundation and Empire”.

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The story is illustrated with five drawings by Paul Orban, two of which – the most “science-fictiony” – you can view below.

This image – the leading illustration of the story – shows the spacecraft Bayta, crewed by Toran and Bayta Darell, Ebling Mis, and Magnifico (the Mule himself, unbeknownst to the other three) as they search for the Great Library of Trantor. The year: 12,376, by Galactic Era chronology.

(Illustration on page 60)

“The location of an objective area the great world of Trantor presents a problem unique in the Galaxy. There are no continents of oceans to locate from a thousand miles distance. There are no rivers, lakes, and islands to catch sight of through the cloud rifts.

The metal-covered world was – had been – one colossal city, and only the old Imperial palace could be identified readily from outer space by a stranger. The Bayta circled the world at almost air-car height in repeated painful search.

From polar regions, where the icy coating of the metal spires were somber evidence of the weather-conditioning machinery, they worked southwards. Occasionally they could experiment with the correlations – (or presumable correlations) – between what they saw and what the inadequate map obtained at Neotrantor showed.

But it was unmistakable when it came. The gap in the metal coat of the planet was fifty miles. The unusual greenery spread over hundreds of square miles, inclosing the mighty grace of the ancient Imperial residences.

The Bayta hovered and slowly oriented itself. There were only the huge super-causeways to guide them. Long straight arrows on the map; smooth, gleaming ribbons there below them.

What the map indicated to be the University area was reached by dead reckoning, and upon the flat area of what once must have been a busy landing-field, the ship lowered itself.

It was only as they submerged into the welter of metal that the smooth beauty apparent from the air dissolved into the broken, twisted near-wreckage that had been left in the wake of the Sack. Spires were truncated, smooth walls gouted and twisted, and just for an instant there was the glimpse of a shaven area of earth – perhaps several hundred acres in extent – dark and plowed.” (pp. 93-94)

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This image shows an Empire spacecraft ramming the Foundation spaceship Cluster, during a battle between space fleets of the Foundation and the Empire. The events are watched live (evidently, the time-lag inherent to speed-of-light communication over intragalactic distances is not an issue – oh, well!) by Toran Darell and Ebling Mis.

(Illustration on page 151)

“Toran sat down upon the cot that served as Magnifico’s bed, and waited. The propaganda routine of the Mule’s “special bulletins” were monotonously similar. First the martial music, and then the buttery slickness of the announcer. The minor news items would come, following one another in patient lock step. Then the pause. Then the trumpets and the rising excitement and climax.

Toran endured it. Mis muttered to himself.

The newscaster spilled out, in conventional war-correspondent phraseology, the unctuous words then translated into sound the molten metal and blasted flesh of a battle in space.

“Rapid cruiser squadrons under Lieutenant General Sammin hit back hard at the task force striking out from Iss – ” The carefully expressionless face of the speaker upon the screen faded into the blackness of a space cut through by the quick swaths of ships reeling across the emptiness in deadly battle. The voice continued through the soundless thunder –

“The most striking action of the battle was the subsidiary combat of the heavy cruiser Cluster against three enemy ships of the ‘Nova’ class – ”

The screen’s view veered and closed in. A great ship sparked and one of the frantic attackers glowed angrily, twisted out of focus, swung back and rammed. The Cluster bowed wildly and survived the glancing blow that drove the attacker off in twisting reflection.

The newsman’s smooth unimpassioned delivery continued to the last blow and the last hulk.

Then a pause, and a largely similar voice-and-picture of the fight off Mnemom, to which the novelty was added of a lengthy description of a hit-and-run landing – the picture of a blasted city – huddled and weary prisoners – and off again.” (pp. 77-78)

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When I first saw Orban’s drawing of the viewing screen (on page 151), I was intrigued: A large-diameter viewing scope, with a set of cables attached to its periphery, mounted at an angle to a seated viewer’s line of sight? Hmmm…

Where did I see such image – or its inspiration – before?

Then, I remembered.

The design of Orban’s view-screen – or, at least the front of it – bears a similarity to cathode-ray tube of the World War Two era H2X ground-mapping radar unit, which was primarily utilized in heavy bombers (B-17 Flying Fortresses and B-24 Liberators) of the United States Army Air Force.

Photographs of H2X units in two B-17 Flying Fortress bombers of the 401st Bomb Group of the British-based Eighth Air Force – taken in England on December 5, 1944 – were received in June of 1945, and presumably released to the news media after that date, months before the publication of Orban’s illustrations in the December issue of Astounding.

Given the timing of the photographs’ distribution, and their presumed availability to the general public, could Paul Orban have been inspiration for his illustration in Astounding have been these photographs?

I don’t really know. Just pure speculation.

But, it’s an idea.

You can view the two images of the H2X radar unit below. They’re among the nearly 89,000 images in NARA’s Records Group 342 (Black and White and Color Photographs of U.S. Air Force and Predecessor Agencies Activities, Facilities, and Personnel – World War II ) now available to the public through Fold3.com. Since I scanned both pictures at 400 dpi, a “full-screen” / enlarged view will reveal detailed views of the units’ buttons, switches, control panels and associated equipment.

Army Air Force Photo 65812AC / A12719

Based on this set’s location relative to the bulkhead and fuselage, this unit is probably located in the navigator’s station of the B-17.

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Army Air Force Photo A-65812AC / A12720

Based on the location of the door (to the left) and curvature of the fuselage wall (on the right), this unit is situated within the B-17’s radio compartment. Note the curtain on the left and above the H2X unit, giving the radar operator a view of his scope unimpeded by sunlight.

References

Foundation Series – at Wikipedia

Foundation and Empire – at Wikipedia

Isaac Asimov Short Stories Bibliography – at Wikipedia

International Science Fiction Database – Foundation (Original Stories)

World War Two German Technical Analysis of Captured R-78 / APS-15A Radar (featuring Photo A-68512AC) – at Foundation for German Communication and Related Technologies

R-78A Receiver-Indicator, AN/APS-15 Radar Equipment – Two color images from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum