An Amazing Contest

see original cover by F. W. Small

Hugo Gernsback favorably compared "The Metal Man" by Jack Williamson to Abraham Merritt's story "The Moon Pool". I read "The Moon Pool" as re-published in the May 1927 issue of Amazing Stories, however it is beyond my Sci Fi event horizon. 😕 Luckily, while taking a dip in the Moon pool, I ran into some interesting stories in old issues of Amazing...

Disappearing Continents. Merritt's story features the 100,000-years-old remnants of an ancient civilization and makes mention of the sinking continent of Muria. We lost Muria? Wait... I thought we had lost Lemuria. Before the 1920s, when it was widely recognized that chemical rockets could send Sci Fi adventurers into outer space, there was a seemingly endless number of adventure stories about trips to remote corners of the Earth where aliens dinosaurs mad scientists lost civilizations secretly existed, waiting for their chance to take over the planet.

Gernsback's comments on "the editors"

No Fairies Zone. It is fascinating to read the old editorials by Gernsback that he wrote in the late 1920s while creating the science fiction genre. In 1927 he was still using the older term "scientifiction". Was "The Moon Pool" magical fantasy or science fiction? Let's find out.

Holger Behr's map

 Maps. I admit that I'm a sucker for any story that includes a map. Probably my favorite example of a fictional map is found in Trullion by Jack Vance. While mentioning Vance, I must say that he was better than Merritt at describing strange locations and events. Merritt could write an entire page about eerie moon light, which might have delighted readers in 1920, but that is over the limit for readers' patience in this millennium. Shown to the right on this page is an image depicting Nan Madol, an archeological site in the middle of the Pacific ocean. 

A review of early visits by Europeans to Pohnpei can be downloaded here. 

Internal art for "The Moon Pool" from the May 1927 issue.

In his article, Christophe Sand describes visits by westerners to Pohnpei going back to the early 1800s. One of F. W. Christian's photographs of the site from his 1899 book is shown. Christian is mentioned in "The Moon Pool".

Shown to the left is the map that can be found in the 1927 version "The Moon Pool".

In his imagination, Merritt vastly expanded this archeological site and invented the idea of a hidden chamber under the TAU islet; the location of the titular Moon Pool. The huge swinging door at the entrance to the Moon Pool only opens during full moon when the moonlight-sensitive detectors on the door detect enough moonlight.

The second Moon Pool illustration from the May 1927 issue.

Gernsback seems to have been pleased by Merritt's story because there is occasional discussion of the possible technological basis for the seemingly magical events in the story. I love the idea of technically advanced folks on Earth in ancient times and I've even imagined underground bases for the pek (see Slave Craton and River of Time), but Merritt did not hesitate to imagine an entire sub-oceanic civilization beneath the Pacific ocean.

In amongst sciensy sounding things like "Becquerel ray condensers" we also get mention of giant chamats,  a nisse, banshees, the "green people" and ghostly devils flying across the ocean to carry out alien devilish abductions of passengers from cruise ships. Is there a scientifically plausible explanation for mythical creatures such as banshees?

In Part 2, next week: "The Dingo took my baby!"

cover art by Frank R. Paul

Merritt crafted "The Moon Pool" around Dr. Scully Dr. Goodwin, who is depicted as continuously seeking a scientific explanation for the strange phenomena that are encountered. After stating authoritatively that there was once an entire continent in the Pacific where only scattered islands remain, Goodwin proclaims that the volcanic islands of the Pacific are "honeycombed with caverns and vast subterranean spaces, literally underground lands running in some cases far out beneath the ocean floor". So, not only was there a lost continent, but a lost race and as the continent sank under the waves, the residents were eventually trapped in their underground caverns. Dr. Goodwin also states his belief that the "lost race" had/has SuperDuper™ advanced technology and he worries that "this lost race is planning to emerge again upon Earth's surface!" (cue menacing music)

the Moon Pool

One of the wonderful things about old stories such as "The Moon Pool" is that they are full of references to real people. The fictional Dr. Goodwin cites Herbert Spencer and William Beebe as authorities behind ideas such as there being "a basis in fact for every myth and legend" and the idea that subterranean residents of islands such as Papau will soon burst out of their hiding places.

The Dweller. When the Moon is full, seven magical beams of moonlight reach the Moon Pool and draw forth the "Dweller" (see the image to the left). Merritt provided a very long-winded "explanation" of how sunlight reflected off the Moon attains the power to animate the Dweller. I'm going to blame Herbert Wells for popularizing long-winded fake science "explanations" for his fantasy stories. The goal seems to be reaching the point where you have thrown enough sciensy sounding verbiage at the reader or the magazine editor so that you can either 1) get your story published or 2) bamboozle your scientifically-illiterate readers. "There would be nothing scientifically implausible about such a process."

Dr. Goodwin's "scientific" theory of how moonlight animates the Dweller

In the Ekcolir Reality: The plant people of Muria!

I've never understood the popularity of stories (even in 2021) about magical Moon power, but who am I to question an authority such as the Great Kubalski?

For Merritt, Germans are Evil™ and it is a bit of a shock when Dr. Goodwin arrives at Nan Madol Nan-Matal and is told that a German, Dr. Hetzdorp recently went to investigate the archeological Dweller-haunted site. This is like Indiana Jones traveling to the distant South American city of crystal skulls only to find that Nazis got there before he did. Damn!

More Super Science™. Hetzdorp has determined that the liquid in the Moon Pool is like radium, but way cooler. Literally. When it burns human skin, it feels cool. Luckily, there is another passage way that leads downward and avoids the Moon Pool. 

see the original 1951 cover art

Having sunk down into a great hole under Nan-Matal, Dr. Hetzdorp mentions the theory that the Moon was formed from the Earth, leaving behind the Pacific ocean. Then the adventurers from the surface of Earth meet some of the residents of Muria: plant people! Just kidding. But conveniently, there are plenty of glowing rocks in the underworld so that the green dwarfs, red dwarfs, frog people and other residents can be seen. And luckily both Dr. Goodwin and Dr. Hetzdorp know how to speak the language that is spoken in the underworld, since it is related to some languages of Pacific islanders.

I'm amazed that Gernsback was so enthusiastic about "The Moon pool. Maybe it gets better in parts 2 & 3 of the story, but I'll have to take a break from this fantasy adventure below the Pacific ocean. I'll report back if and when I finish the story.

interior art for "The Ultra-Elixir of Youth"

Moving On. While excavating through the issues of Amazing Stories that hold the three parts of "The Moon Pool" I came across stories by Alpheus Hyatt Verrill and read "The Ultra-Elixir of Youth" in the same issue of Amazing that holds "The Tissue-Culture King".

In "The Ultra-Elixir of Youth" a new chemical element (Juvenum) is discovered that reverses the aging process, causing biological organisms to grow younger. Tests are performed on experimental animals and a bird goes through reverse aging and turns into an egg. The next day, the egg disappears. 

the power of tubes

You might think that scientists studying the reverse aging process would exercise caution, but no, they can't resist exposing themselves to the magic potion and they also regress to babies and then disappear. A fire burns down the research lab and thus we were saved from further experiments on Juvenum (apparently a hard-to-find gas that was only discovered "by accident").

I was left wondering how such a silly story of fictional biology and chemistry came to be published in Amazing. I think the secret to being published in Amazing was to include mention of magical Sciensy™ rays in your story. In "The Ultra-Elixir of Youth", exposure to Juvenum is lethal unless you are also exposed to emissions from the glowing tubes of a radio receiver. Having read that Verrill was a "naturalist" and that he had a father who was a biologist I hoped to find some interesting speculative biology in his works, but no....

cannibals of the inner world; interior art by Frank Paul

I was intrigued that in the July 1927 Amazing Stories there was "The Voice from the Inner World" by Verrill, "The Lost Continent" by Cecil B. White and the third part of "The Moon Pool". I felt compelled to investigate this mini-collection of lost world stories.

In "The Voice from the Inner World", a ship full of people is lifted out of the ocean by a UFO and taken through the mouth of a tall volcano and on down into the "Inner World" where cannibalistic females reside.

The world got to hear the story told in "The Ultra-Elixir of Youth" because a diary was left behind describing the discovery and effects of Juvenum. 

promotional blurb for "The Voice from the Inner World"

Don't Forget Your Radio! For "The Voice from the Inner World", one passenger on the ship had a gas mask and was able to protect himself from the knockout gas used during the alien cannibal abduction. Using a radio transmitter, calls are sent to the surface of Earth from the Inner World explaining how the cannibals can be defeated. Once again, mere mention of a radio apparently allowed another silly fantasy story to be published in Amazing.

cover art by Frank R. Paul

What about "The Lost Continent" by Cecil B. White? Like "The Voice from the Inner World", "The Lost Continent" was submitted to Amazing as part of a contest. Gernsback had asked for 10,000-word "scientifiction" stories inspired by the cover illustration that appeared on the December 1926 issue. Verrill's story about cannibal women of the Inner World closely matched the image (shown to the left on this page).

Cecil B. White was a pen-name used by astronomer William Henry Christie. Most Sci Fi short story writers might content themselves with creating a story about time travel or a story about anti-gravity, but Christie's Dr. Lamont (a physicist) casually invents both a time travel machine (sadly, Lamont's time machine only sends things into the past) and an anti-gravity device. 

promotional blurb for "The Lost Continent"

I've previously commented on John Campbell's enthusiasm for a fake anti-gravity device that had interesting similarities to the fictional anti-gravity device in "The Lost Continent". While Verrill simply imagined the ship-hoisting UFO as appearing magically from the Inner World, in "The Lost Continent", a couple of junior physicists build the gigantic gravity-defying craft in just 9 months, using blueprints supplied by the crafty Dr. Lamont.

small demo model anti-gravity sphere
interior artwork by Frank R. Paul

As envisioned by Christie, the anti-gravity flying sphere was propelled by ionic thrusters composed of huge x-ray tubes. The power source was nuclear energy generated by a light-weight power source (sadly, taken for granted and not explained by the Super Genius™ Dr. Lamont).

Think of all you could do with a gigantic flying time machine! All Dr. Lamont can think about is visiting the lost continent where Atlantis once (14,000 years ago) existed. Dr. Lamont takes along an ocean liner holding many members of the International Geological Survey (possible a fictional analogue of the IGU) who can serve as witnesses.

Golly Mr. Science! From the October 1928 issue of Amazing.

interior art by Frank Paul

Apparently, the only other science fiction published by Christie was a two part story that began with "The Retreat to Mars" in the August 1927 issue of Amazing Stories. An expedition in Africa finds a set of records left behind by visiting Martians, 500,000 years ago. Those ancient records suggest that humans may have evolved as descendants of the visiting Martians. I'm a complete sucker for stories about aliens visiting Earth long ago, so I had to also read the sequel story...

The second part of the story, "The Return of the Martians" was published in the April 1928 issue of Amazing Stories. 500,000 years after first visiting Earth, the Martians are now able to better deal with conditions on Earth. They begin to transform primitive Earthly society into a more advanced civilization, one like the ancient SuperCool™ civilization on Mars.

image source

It is quite a relief to see a story depicting Martians as peaceful folk who are not intent on going to war with Earth. However, the biology in Christie's Mars stories is hard to swallow. The Martians have sophisticated medical imaging technology, but the idea of genes as molecular information storage devices was seemingly quite unfamiliar to Christie. Thus, we get no discussion of the molecular differences (if any) between Earthly and Martian life.

There are some interesting similarities between Christie's stories about Mars and Carl Sagan's "Contact". It would be interesting to know if Sagan ever read "The Return of the Martians".

the Atlantis Clones

I'm glad that I investigated "The Moon Pool" because doing so allowed me to discover the science fiction stories of the astronomer William Henry Christie. 

I find it fascinating that all the elements of alien abduction stories were established long before the classical era of "flying saucers" that began in the 1940s. It is an interesting concatenation of events that just when the scientific study of plate tectonics made it impossible to sustain the market for lost continent stores (with hidden civilizations inside Earth), the arrival of rocket science made possible an explosion of stories about space aliens coming to Earth from distant planets. 

experimental mice

 Related Reading: Alley Oop

Next: Road to Siteq

See Also: Part 7 of "Telepaths of Site Q".