Bill Hillman's

Volume 574
Presents
A reprint of an article that appeared in
ERB-apa No. 69 ~ Spring  2001

Bill Hillman's Volume 574 ERBapa Hardcopy Edition v01 n02 Our online expanded illustrated version  will be featured sometime in the future at: www.mts.net/~hillmans/erbzine.html

BILL HILLMAN Aka JoN: Jeddak of the North Aka WILLIAM G. HILLMAN B.Sc. (4 Yr. Honours), B.Ed. (5 Yr.), M.Ed. 41 Kensington Crescent, Brandon, MB  R7A 6M4  Canada 204.728.4673 ~ hillmans@westman.wave.ca BILL & SUE-ON HILLMAN ECLECTIC STUDIO http://home.westman.wave.ca/~hillmans

JoN ~ Dejah - Ja-On ~ Robin ~ China-Li Ma-Ri: The Hillman Family
CONTEST: Each illustration has major ERB refs/inflluences.
WIN: An all-expenses-paid weekend in Helium if you spot 'em all.


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ERB Flashback: A Giant Rare Edition

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The long-awaited re-issue of John Carter and the Giant of Mars in Amazing Magazine in the spring of 1961 was an exciting event. I was in Grade XII, my final year of high school and preparing for entrance into Brandon College. Our small town high school, Strathclair Collegiate, didn't have any of the facilities we take for granted today: no course options, no gym (we played tackle football on the snowbank-covered playing fields all winter), no canteen, no nothin'. As a lark, a buddy and I signed up for a correspondence course in touch typing . . . not for formal credit, but just to learn how to do it. When the rare Giant finally appeared in Amazing, I decided that the best way to get my keyboarding chops up would be to type out the whole story onto 8 1/2" x 14" paper. It was a slow grueling task but this very rare edition is still in my ERB collection -- typos and all. I finished this very academic project in June, just before graduation . . . and around the time that a flood of rare ERB stories arrived at the post office: Beyond Thirty and the Man Eater - SFFP, and British imports: Methuens and Pinnacles.

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ERB GOES TO COLLEGE

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One of the highlights of my first year in college, '61-'62, was the discovery of so many Brandon stores that sold new and used books.  This search for books eventually led me to  a treasure trove of  imported British ERB paperbacks in Smart's Bookstore. For me the ERB paperback boom began early. According to the dates inscribed in those books I bought my first seven British Four Square Tarzan books on March 20 and 23. I went on to buy 10 more that year. This was many months before the first Ace editions of Tanar and Chessmen appeared on December 19. At the end of this first college year I took a job at Canadian Joint Air Training Command Base, Rivers, painting PMQs, hangars, the rec hall, fuel tanks, etc. I stayed in air force barracks and ate at the mess much of the time but regularly took the military shuttle bus, carrying my guitar and amp, 30 miles to Brandon to play with various bands. I set aside most of my pay cheque for next year's tuition but used much of the band money to support my ERB habit. The end of the first year of college in the spring of '62 coincided with the appearance of the Canaveral and Dover series of ERB editions. The first of a long line of Canaveral purchases began on July 7, 1962 with Moon 'Men' and A (The) Fighting Man (Men) of Mars. This was also the time I acquired my first ERB pulp magazines: five issues of  Synthetic Men of Mars in Argosy pulps along with The Man Without a World and The Lightning Men by the Burroughs boys in Thrilling Wonder  Stories.

By checking the dates written on my books I've noticed that my college years were more productive than I realized. From 1961 through 1965 I bought at least 44 hardcovers and 30 paperbacks - twice as many Burroughs books than I had amassed between 1954 and 1960. Sometime during these college years I contacted Vern Coriell and joined the Burroughs Bibliophiles and subscribed to fanzines. I also played in about six bands, played guitar on daily and weekly TV shows and spent most of my afternoons in movie matinees. Now that's an education -- I just couldn't convince any of my profs of the worthiness of these academic pursuits. In 1965, I left college and returned to my hometown to be closer to my Princess and to teach high school in the classrooms I had left just a few years earlier.



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Enter the Princess

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Sue-On and I were married on August 30, 1966. In an attempt to explain my unusual obsession with a long-dead pulp writer I cajoled my Princess into reading ERB's first novel: A Princess of Mars. Luckily for me, she became interested and went on to read most of the Mars series and many Tarzans -- and she somehow understood.  All through our married life she has tolerated and supported all of my many compulsive hobbies and interests. It wasn't too long, though, before she may have had some second thoughts about giving this encouragement. Soon I was corresponding with Vern Coriell and Bob Hyde of the Burroughs Bibliophiles requesting information on buying back issues of the Burroughs Bulletin. I was unsuccessful in this but did order other House of Greystoke publications and their official Tarzan and the Golden Lion lapel pin. I then renewed contact with Pete Ogden and Camille Cazedessus and re-subscribed to ERBANIA and ERB-dom. Money was tight but I scraped together enough to send away for a set of reel-to-reel tapes of the first 77 episodes of the 1932 Tarzan radio series - shows that I would soon parlay through dub trading into a collection of over 10,000 OTR shows. I mentioned the shows to Vern Coriell and he offered to send me all of his Greystoke Press publications in exchange for dubs of the tapes.

It was also around this time I received my first letter from another ERB fan who saw my name listed in the BB directory: Bruce Salen from Brooklyn. After quite a few letters we eventually lost contact but were amazed to "bump into each other" again 30 years later on the Internet. Surprisingly, most of my ERB collection has survived the early years. I still have much of the correspondence, many of the book catalogues, most of the comics and all of the books. The only missing major item appears to be my hardcover bound copy of the Thrilling Stories pulp magazine which contained The Lightning Men by Jack and Hulbert Burroughs.



Roots and Wings Part III
is featured in
ERBzin-e 575

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