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[February 2, 1970] Deceptive Appearances (March 1970 IF)

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by David Levinson

The Super Fight

Back in 1967, a radio producer by the name of Murray Woroner came up with the idea of using a computer to work out who the best heavyweight fighter of all time is. He polled 250 boxing writers and came up with a list of 16. He then worked closely with a programmer to input everything that could be determined about each boxer into a computer.

Match-ups were set up as a single-elimination tournament to be broadcast as a series of radio plays. Each fight was run through an NCR 315 computer the night before broadcast to create a blow-by-blow account of the fight. Woroner and boxing announcer Guy LeBow would then “call” the fight as if it were really happening. In the end, Rocky Marciano beat Jack Dempsey and was awarded a championship belt worth $10,000.

The arbiter, an NCR 315.The arbiter, an NCR 315.

Ali was not happy. The computer had him losing in the quarter finals to Jim Jeffries, a boxer he has little respect for. He sued for defamation of character, asking for $1 million. They settled when Ali agreed to take part in a filmed version of a computerized fight between him and Marciano in return for $10,000 and a cut of the box office.

Last year, Ali and Marciano got together and sparred for over 70 rounds, filming a few different versions of events that the computer might predict. Marciano dropped 50 pounds and wore a toupee so he’d look more like he did in his prime. Ali probably had to get back in shape too, since he’s been banned from boxing for refusing induction into the army. Instinct seems to have taken over for both men. Ali bloodied Marciano’s nose and opened cuts over his eyes (Rocky always bled easily); at one point, Ali was so exhausted he refused to go back into the ring (until he got another $2,000) and could barely raise his arms enough to eat breakfast the next day. Filming ended just three weeks before Marciano was killed in a plane crash last Labor Day.

Armed with hours of footage and the top secret computer result, Woroner and his team put together a film they dubbed The Super Fight. On January 20th, it aired in 1,500 theaters in the US, Canada, and Europe via closed-circuit television, with viewers paying a whopping $5.00 a head.

How did it turn out? Ali is not happy. The computer had him knocked out in the 13th round. He’s talking about another defamation suit. Maybe he’ll change his mind when he finds out that was only in the US and Canada. European viewers saw Ali win by TKO. The producers are also talking about destroying all the prints.

Boxing Poster captioned AT THIS THEATRE JANUARY 20, 1970 - 10 PM-E.S.T. THE SUPER FIGHT ONE SHOWING ONLY THE ONLY 2 UNDEFEATED HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONS IN HISTORY ROCKY MARCIANO VS MUHAMMAD ALI (CASSIUS CLAY) ON FILM LIVE! IN COLOR TICKETS ON SALE NOW!Movie poster for the event. That “LIVE!” is a little deceptive, which is something else Ali is complaining about.

It’s a rather science-fictional concept we’ve seen in other guises. Maybe Murray Woroner got his original idea from the Star Trek episode “A Taste of Armageddon.” Of course, any statistician will tell you that a single simulation doesn’t really say anything. Rolling a die once doesn’t tell you if it’s fair; it takes hundreds or thousands of repetitions to determine that. But when the computer needs 45 minutes to determine the events of one match, this is the best that can be expected. For now.

Not what it looks like

Authors like to counter readers’ expectations. It’s a good way to evoke a response, particularly in a genre that has a fair number of cliches and formulas. Sometimes, the surprise comes from the author doing something that’s not what you expect that particular writer to do or say. This month’s IF offers some of both.

Cover of the March 1970 issue of IF science fiction, depicting an astronaut carrying an antenna on the surface of the moon, looking out onto the Earth and its magnetic field depicted in white, orange, red and blue.Art actually for “SOS,” rather than just suggested by. Maybe because it’s by Mike Gilbert, not the overworked Jack Gaughan.

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[August 2, 1969] Specters of the past (September 1969 IF)

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by David Levinson

La guerra del fútbol

Land reform has been a major issue in Central America since not long after the War. Honduras passed a land reform law in 1962 to take land illegally occupied by immigrants and squatters and give it to Hondurans. Most of the immigrants who have been displaced are Salvadorans, many of whom held their land legally. Thousands have been uprooted and sent back to El Salvador. Tensions between the two nations are high.

The two countries have also been vying for a spot in next year’s soccer World Cup. They faced each other twice in June, with the home team winning each time. Both events were marred by riots and other unpleasant incidents. On the eve of the playoff match in Mexico City on June 26th, El Salvador severed diplomatic ties with Honduras, claiming 12,000 Salvadorans had been forced to flee Honduras while the government did nothing.

Early July saw various border skirmishes, largely involving violation of air space. Honduras asked the Organization of American States to step in, but the OAS largely just dithered. On the 12th, Honduras claimed to have killed four Salvadoran soldiers on Honduran territory, and the next day six Honduran civilians were injured during an exchange of mortar fire.

War began on the evening of the 14th, when the Salvadoran air force launched a bombing raid on Honduran airfields. That was followed up by a two-pronged ground invasion. The Honduran air force struck back the next day, destroying 20% of El Salvador’s fuel reserves, but quickly fell back to a defensive posture. After early successes by El Salvador, both sides stalled due to a shortage of ammunition.

Salvadoran President and General Fidel Sanchez Hernandez inspecting the troops.

The OAS stepped in quickly after the war began and formed a committee to oversee the negotiation of a ceasefire. They were successful and a ceasefire was announced the evening of the 18th, going into effect at midnight. The Salvadoran army was given 96 hours to withdraw, but as the deadline approached they announced they were staying. They would respect the ceasefire, but demanded the Honduran government guarantee the safety of Salvadorans living in Honduras (300,000 people by some accounts, over 10% of the population of Honduras), the payment of reparations, and the punishment of the anti-Salvadoran rioters. At the time of writing, they are still in place. (As we go to press, El Salvador has withdrawn in the face of threatened sanctions by the OAS.)

It’s been a strange little conflict. The extensive air war was fought without a single jet, mostly P-51 Mustangs and F4U Corsairs. We’re not likely to see that again. Some are calling it the 100 Hour War, the length of time from the first bombing raid to the announcement of the ceasefire. Others are calling it the Football War (that’s soccer to Americans, Canadians, and Australians), reflecting some of the language used to report on the June matches and their role in escalating tensions. Whatever history knows it as, let’s hope it’s over.

The bad old days

For unstated reasons, IF failed to appear last month. It’s pretty clear that this September issue was intended to be dated August. If you look at the cover, you can see that the old month was overprinted with a black bar, and the new month was added below.

A robot carrying off a fainting human woman. It’s not as old-fashioned as you might think. Art by Chaffee

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[March 2, 1966] Words and Pictures (April 1966 IF)

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by David Levinson

For a lot of people, February tops the list as their least favorite month. In the northern hemisphere, it’s cold and dark, and spring seems a long way off. The only things to break up the monotony are Valentine’s Day, which isn’t for everybody, and (most of the time) Carneval or Mardi Gras, which in the United States only matters if you’re near New Orleans and for lots of practicing Christians is immediately followed by giving up something nice for Lent.

As I look over my notes of newsworthy events for the last month, I see the usual things – coups, politics and power plays – but nothing that really catches my interest. Oh, there’s a couple of things that might develop into something, but they need time to come to fruition. Fortunately for my purposes, Fred Pohl has accidentally given us a little artistic puzzle to talk about, but let’s save that for the end.

The Words

In this month’s IF, the big Heinlein serial draws to a close and a brand-new serial begins. As does a new non-fiction series on fandom. Plus a new Saberhagen story. It’s a lot to whet a reader’s appetite, even if the cover is a bit mediocre. But that’s where our art mystery begins.


Roan’s first day on the job isn’t turning out well. Art attributed to Morrow

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[August 2, 1965] Expansion and Contraction (September 1965 IF)

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by David Levinson

It seems like the world gets a little smaller every day. Jet planes are gradually replacing larger propeller-driven planes in the passenger market, reducing the time it takes to get from one place to another. As they become more ubiquitous even the middle class may be able to travel like the jet set. Communications satellites are making it possible for news to spread faster, and we can even see some events on television as they happen on the other side of the world.

On the other hand, the world seems to be getting bigger, too. We hear constantly about remote places where this conflict or that independence is taking place. The wealth of human knowledge is growing so fast, it’s almost impossible to keep up. Growing, shrinking, let’s look at some things that have done one or the other lately.

A long shortcut

France and Italy are now closer. Not diplomatically, and it’s not conclusive proof of continental drift, but the time to travel between them has shrunk thanks to the opening of a tunnel underneath Mont Blanc. The two countries agreed on building the tunnel in 1949, but excavation didn’t begin until a full decade later, with a company from each country drilling from their own side. The excavations met on August 4th, 1962, with an axis variation of a mere 5 inches. The tunnel was inaugurated at a ceremony on July 16th, attended by French President Charles de Gaulle and Italian President Giuseppe Saragat, and opened to traffic three days later.

At 8,140 feet below the surface, the two-lane highway tunnel is the deepest operational tunnel in the world, and at 7.2 miles, it is also the longest highway tunnel, some three times longer than the previous record holder, the Honshu-Kyushu tunnel in Japan. The travel distance from France to Turin is now 30 miles shorter, and the distance to Milan is 60 miles shorter.


Presidents de Gaulle and Saragat in front of the Mont Blanc tunnel connecting Chamonix to Courmayeur during the official inauguration

Flash!

Kodak made a big splash when they introduced the Instamatic camera two years ago. Like the venerable Brownie, the Instamatic makes it easy for amateurs to take snapshots. There’s even a model with a built-in flashgun that takes so-called peanut bulbs. The problem with those is that bulbs have to be removed before you can take another shot with the flash, and they get very, very hot. Kodak, working together with Sylvania Electronics, has come up with a solution: the flashcube.

As the name suggests, it’s a cube with a mount that connects to the camera on the bottom, and four flashbulbs around the sides. Trigger the shutter, the flash goes off, the cube rotates 90° and it’s ready for another picture immediately. Plus, by the time you’ve taken the fourth picture, parts of the cube should be cool enough to touch, so you can replace it right away. This should mean lots more candid snaps and a lot less dragging everybody outside to squint into the sun at family gatherings. A big innovation in a very small package.


$100 is a little pricey, but there are less expensive models, and we are talking about a lifetime of memories

An electrifying performance

The folk world had their horizons expanded last week, perhaps to their dismay. Despite his bad boy antics off stage last year, Bob Dylan was the most eagerly anticipated act at this year’s Newport Folk Festival, but his performance was met with a chorus of boos. It seems young Mr. Dylan felt that Alan Lomax was rather condescending when introducing the Paul Butterfield Blues Band at a workshop on Saturday the 24th and decided he would play electric to prove to the organizers they couldn’t keep it out. He hastily assembled a band from a couple of members of the Butterfield Band and some others and spent Sunday afternoon rehearsing. The crowd was shocked at the sight of Dylan accompanied by an electric band, and the short set of “Maggie’s Farm”, “Like a Rolling Stone” and “Phantom Engineer” was met with both boos and cheers. MC Peter Yarrow (of Peter, Paul and Mary) dragged Dylan out for a quick acoustic encore of “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue”. The crowd exploded and begged for another encore.

So why the booing? Ask three different people and you’ll get four different answers. Some say it was folkies mortally offended at the mere presence of electric instruments or a rock sound, others that fans were upset at the shortness of the set and the fact that the band used most of their allotted 15 minutes for tuning and switching instruments and/or poor sound quality. Some will tell you it was definitely the fans booing, others blame the press or even the organizers. We may never know the truth of the matter, but there’s no question that Bob Dylan has made another big impact on music.

Dylan with electric guitar and harmonica. Completely different from his usual acoustic guitar and harmonica. (Band not shown)

The Mysterious Doctor X

If you drop by your local library and take a look at the Sunday New York Times for July 25th (assuming they carry it and it has already come in) and flip to the list of best sellers, you’ll see a new title, Intern by Doctor X. It is, by all reports, a rather harrowing account of a young doctor’s period of interning at a hospital a few years ago, taken from his daily journal. The names, as Jack Webb would say, have been changed to protect the innocent, and the doctor has chosen a pseudonym to further protect confidentiality. “What has that got to do with science fiction,” you ask. Well, a little bird told me that Doctor X is in fact a reasonably well-known science fiction writer. Since he has good reasons for concealing his identity, I won’t give it away, but I will say that I once thought he was a pseudonym for Andre Norton and that his last name closely resembles a different medical profession mostly practiced by women.

Another hint: It’s not Murray Leinster or James White

It’s bigger, but is it better?

As promised last month, IF is now 32 pages longer, making it the same size as its bi-monthly sister publication Worlds of Tomorrow. Fred Pohl claimed that’s enough for two more novelettes, four or five short stories, a complete short novel, or an extra serial installment. How well did the editorial team make use of that extra room this month? Let’s take a look.


A deadly duel begins. Art by McKenna

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[January 26, 1965] Down the Rabbit Hole…Again (February 1965 IF)

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by Gideon Marcus

TV Triplets

Back when the Young Traveler and I were watching The Twilight Zone, we accidentally picked the wrong time to turn on the set and ended up getting introduced to Mr. Ed, Supercar, and The Andy Griffith Show, in that order.  It made for an amusing night, and we learned a lot about the prime-time schedule for that season.

Recently, we once again fell down the rabbit hole, though not quite by accident. 

It all started with an amazing new import form England.  You may have seen the American rebroadcast of Danger Man back in the summer of '61.  It was a smart spy show starring NATO agent, John Drake, played by Patrick McGoohan.  Well, he's back, and this time his episodes are a full hour rather than just half.  It's gripping stuff, albeit a bit heavier and more cynical than the first run.  Realistic, idealistic, and respectful of women, it's a delightful contrast to the buffoonish Bond franchise.

So gripping was the show that we ended up somehow unable to change the channel when Password came on.  This game show is sort of a verbal version of Charades where a contestant tries to get their partner to say a word using single-word clues.  Play goes back and forth until one team gets it right.

It's kind of a dumb show for the viewer because we already know the answer.  On the other hand, the contestants always include celebrities, and it's fun to watch them struggle through the rounds.


Gene Kelly looked like he wanted to kill his partner.  The whole time!


Juliet Prowse, on the other hand, was adorable and funny.

After half an hour of that, we had summoned enough energy to reach toward the television remote…until we heard the bugle strains heralding the arrival of Rocky and Bullwinkle (and friends).  It had been my understanding that the show had completed its five year run, but it has apparently gone into reruns without missing a beat.  Since we had missed the first couple of years, well, we couldn't turn off the television now!

The only thing that saved us was the subsequent airing of Bonanza, a show I am only too happy to turn off.  Who knows how long we'd have cruised The Vast Wasteland otherwise.  Of course, now we're stuck watching all three shows every week (homework permitting).

Print Analog

Science fiction magazines are kind of like blocks of TV shows.  They happen regularly, their quality is somewhat reliable, but their content varies with each new issue.  This month's Worlds of IF Science Fiction defined the phrase "much of a muchness".  Each (for the most part) was acceptable, even enjoyable, but either they were flawed jewels, or they simply never went beyond workmanlike.  Read on, and you'll see what I mean:


This rather goofy cover courtesy of McKenna, illustrating Small One

The Replicators, by A. E. van Vogt

Steve Maitlin is an ornery SOB, a Marine veteran of Korea who knows the world is all SNAFU, especially the moronic generals who run the show.  Not only does this attitude make life miserable for those around him, but it also brings the Earth to the brink of interstellar war.  It turns out that the alien BEM Maitlin shoots one day on the road to work is just one of an infinite number of bodies for an IT, and the replacement body ends up with Maitlin's cussedness as part of its basic personality.

Said IT also has the ability to replicate any weapon the humans throw against it, but magnified.  Shoot at it?  It builds a big-size rifle.  Bomb it?  It comes back with an extra-jumbo jet and a bigger nuke.  In the end, Maitlin is the only one who can stop the thing, which makes karmic sense.  But can the vet change his nature in time to meet minds with the alien?


by Gray Morrow

This story doesn't make a lot of sense, but Van Vogt is good at keeping you engaged with pulpish momentum.  Three stars.

Reporter at Large, by Ron Goulart

In a future where mob bosses have replaced politicians (or perhaps the politicians have just more nakedly advertised their criminal nature!) power is entrenched and hereditary.  Only an honest journalist can bring about a revolution, but when any person has his price, only an android editor's got the scruples to speak truth to power.

Ron Goulart writes good, funny stories.  Unfortunately, while I see that he tried, he failed at accomplishing either this time out.  Two stars, and the worst piece of the mag.

Small One, by E. Clayton McCarty

A young alien has exiled himself as part of its first stage of five on the journey toward maturity.  Its isolation is disturbed when a tiny bipedal creature lands in a spaceship nearby and finds itself trapped in a cave.  The child-being establishes telepathic contact with the intruder (obviously a human) and an eventual rapport is established.  But everything falls apart when the Terran's rapacious teammates land and fall into conflict with the alien's infinitely more powerful family…


by Jack Gaughan

I am a sucker for first contact stories, especially when told from the alien viewpoint.  This one is good, but it suffers from a certain lack of subtlety, a kind of hamfisted presentation of the kind I normally see from new writers.  That makes sense; this is his (her?) first story.

Three stars, and my favorite piece of the magazine.

Blind Alley, by Basil Wells

A year after settling the planet of Croft, the human colonists and their livestock all become afflicted with blindness.  Against the odds, they survive, shaping their lives around the change.  But can their society take the shock when a new arrival, generations later, brings back the promise of sight?

Blind Alley treads much of the same ground as Daniel Galouye's excellent Dark Universe from a few years back.  The question is worth asking: when is a "disability" simply a different way to be able?  That said, Wells is not as skilled as Galouye, and the story merits three stars as a result.

Gree's Commandos, by C. C. MacApp


by Nodel

On a thick-atmosphered planet, Colonel Steve Duke assists a race of Stone Age flying elephants against the interstellar aggressors, the Gree, and their mercentary cohorts.  It's a straight adventure piece with virtually no development, either of the characters or the larger setting.  Somewhat similar to Keith Laumer's latest novel (The Hounds of Hell, also appearing in IF), it doesn't do anything to make you care.  Sufficiently developed, it could have been good.

Two stars.

Zombie, by J. L. Frye

Here is the second story by a brand new author…and it shows.  In the future, it becomes possible to transplant a personality in the short term to a physically perfect body.  Said transfers are used almost exclusively for espionage and sabotage — it's not much fun living in a shell of a form that can't really feel or enjoy anything other than the satisfaction of a job well done.  Indeed, the only people willing to endure the hell of personality transfer (back and forth) are the profoundly crippled.

This story of a particularly hairy mission has its moments of poignance, but again, Frye is not quite up to the challenge of a difficult topic.  Plus, he needs more adjectives in his quiver; I count seven times he used "beautiful" to describe the sole female character.  Even Homer varied between calling Athena "grey-eyed" and "owl-eyed".

Three stars.

Starchild (Part 2 of 3), by Frederik Pohl and Jack Williamson

Last up is the second installment of three (that number again!) in this serialized sequel to The Reefs of Space.  It's a short one, barely long enough to cover the harsh interrogation of Bowsie Gann.  Gann was the loyal spy servant of The Plan, returned to Earth at the same time the star-reef-dwelling Starchild began to turn off the local suns to scare Earth's machine-run government.


by Nodel

It's a most unpleasant set of pages, with lots of torture and cruelty (something Fred Pohl does effectively; viz. A Plague of Pythons).  That said, Pohl and Williamson can write, and I am looking forward to seeing how it all wraps up.

Three stars.

Stay Tuned

Like much of the Idiot Box's offerings, IF continues to deliver stuff that's just good enough to keep my subscription current.  I'd like editor Fred Pohl to tip the magazine in one direction or another so I can either stop buying it or enjoy it more…

Until then, I guess my knob stays tuned to this channel!

[If you have a membership to this year's Worldcon (in New Zealand) or did last year (Dublin), we would very much appreciate your nomination for Best Fanzine! We work for egoboo…]




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