Science Wonder Quarterly 1930 Winter

Science Wonder Quarterly

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Published: Jan 25, 1930

Magazine: Science Wonder Quarterly, Winter 1930

Description:

1215. THE MOON CONQUERORS. 
Science Wonder Quarterly, Winter 1930. 
Ill. Paul; photo and sketches by "Dorothy Brewster." 
 *  Novel. 
 *  Time: early 1940s through 1952. 
 *  Place: Arizona and the Moon. 
 *  The first section of the story is the narrative of Dorothy Brewster, daughter of the eccentric millionaire scientist William Brewster, who has built a one-hundred-foot reflecting telescope on a new light-gathering principle. Dorothy sees little of her father when she is growing up, but when she leaves college as a well-trained, highly intelligent astronomer, she joins him at his establishment in Arizona. The new telescope, which is just operational, is fantastically successful, showing the moon from a close distance. As Dorothy watches, she sees a flying sphere move across a crater, then discharge a handsome young man, whom the men in the sphere maroon. While Dorothy watches, the question is whether the man can reach shelter before the harsh lunar night begins. Unfortunately, Dorothy shatters the telescope, and does not know (for a time) what happened next. The implication of all this is that the Moon definitely has an atmosphere, even though it is not visible from Earth. 
 *  The second section of the novel consists mostly of the recorded narratives of George L. Davis, a newspaper reporter, and Dr. William Haverfield, a college president, who are members of the Brewster expedition to the Moon. 
 *  Dorothy Brewster, whose wealth is incredible, has subsidized research on the design of a spaceship. She has settled on a complex vehicle that will be flung off the Earth by a linear motor and propelled in space by light pressure and rockets. The Astronaut takes off with Miss Brewster and three men, reaching the Moon after an uneventful trip. Miss Brewster had insisted on a particular landing site, which turns out to be near the place where she saw the handsome Lunarian. The Moon has an atmosphere, and locomotion is easy enough. 
 *  In a very short time Dorothy rescues the Lunarian, whose name is Baklo. Since being marooned by political rivals, he had been living in a cave. A romance immediately begins. Baklo summons friends by radio, and soon Lunar spheres come and remove him and our friends to a city on the other side of the Moon. The spheres then blast the Astronaut. The incident is misinterpreted in various ways: Watchers on Earth think it signals the death of the explorers; the explorers think it is a hostile act; but actually it is simply a precaution to prevent the spread of terrestrial germs on the Moon. 
 *  The explorers are first quarantined, then subjected to various medical treatments both to remove bacteria and to rejuvenate them to some extent. (The Lunarians have very long life-spans thanks to advanced medicine.) 
 *  The Earthmen, when they have learned sufficient language for communication, are taken before the Lunarian ruler and his council. Surprisingly, the Lunarians are somewhat hostile, despite Dorothy's rescue of Baklo, for the Moonmen cherish a long grudge against Earth because of incidents in the past. The Lunarians also consider the Earthlings to be barbarians and members of an inferior race. 
 *  At this time Romans offers a very long statement of interplanetary history. The human race ultimately originated outside our solar system, no details known. But it developed on Bodia, the nowmissing fifth planet, where there were two races, blacks and whites. The blacks, who soon developed a supercivilization, enslaved the whites, who remained at a much lower level of development. On one occasion, while a black liner (with white slaves) was on an exploration voyage to the small planet that is now our moon, Bodia exploded, probably from the experimental release of atomic energy. The surviving blacks thereupon settled on the Moon, which was then a hospitable world. Over thousands of years escaped white slaves took refuge in Lunar caverns and isolated areas, developing small independent states and a lesser science. 
 *  The great catastrophe came about 34,500 years ago when another sun and attendant planets entered the solar system. One of the new planets passed close by Luna, capturing it as a satellite. This new planet was our Earth. Earth also stripped away Lunar atmosphere and water, which had been concentrated in a deep sea on the other side of the Moon. Some Lunar whites, led by a magisterial scientist, sealed themselves off in caverns when they saw the impending disaster; most died, but about 30,000 survived to form the present Lunar race. The Lunar blacks either died or moved en masse (with white slaves) to Earth. The companion novelette, #1216, "The War of the Planets" gives details of what happened to the blacks and their slaves, but the result was the destruction of black civilization. Occasional recent Lunar expeditions to Earth, the last about five hundred years ago, revealed only contemptible savagery. 
 *  To return to the story: The Lunar authorities permit the Earthmen to live and accept Lunar education into advanced science, but the Earthlings are considered second-class citizens, and Dorothy and Prince Baklo are not permitted to marry. 
 *  Five years after arrival, however, the explorers turn the tables on their hypercritical hosts. Dorothy and Haverfield, in concerted attack on the Lunar council, prove that Earthlings are not inferior to Lunarians, but actually superior. In five years the explorers have mastered sciences and arts that take the Lunarians considerably longer, and in the last five hundred years Earth culture has progressed far more rapidly than has Lunarian. The Lunarians grudgingly agree. Dorothy and Baklo marry, and in 1955 the other expedition members return to Earth in a Lunarian sphere. 
 *  Miscellaneous: Despite their high material science, the Lunarians seem to be somewhat afflicted by lassitude and cultural fatigue. 
 *  Lunarian science, in addition to rejuvenation techniques, possesses antigravity, atmosphere-creating machinery, and many scientific marvels. 
 *  There is a native Lunarian life-form that is much like a kangaroo with enormous flat feet. 
 *  Mercury, too, is a new planet brought in by the wandering sun. 
 *  The ancient blacks, called Vuduites (of obvious derivation), were a bloodthirsty group who practiced human sacrifices. 
 *  The varied voices of the first part of the novel are a reasonable Vernian exposition, but the deadly and unnecessary middle historical section is likely to make most readers put the magazine aside. The ending, of course, is very contrived. 
 *  For a companion story see, #1216, "The War of the Planets." 
 
983. THE OSMOTIC THEOREM. Science Wonder Quarterly, Winter 1930. Ill. Barker. Novelette. 
*  Time: 1945-1955. Place: significant action in the Gobi Desert. 
*  Meek's version of "When the Earth Screamed." 
*  Lawrence, a publicity agent, is in love with Professor Hurlburt's underage daughter Alice, and to win the professor's approval for a marriage, agrees to help the professor with publicity. Hurlburt theorizes that the interior of the Earth is not a tremendously hot core of iron, but a saline liquid that is colder than the surface of the world. He presents his theory in more detail and with more buttressing than is likely to interest the reader. Hurlburt plans to test his theory by drilling, and it is Lawrence's job to arouse public interest and investments. 
*  All goes well, and the professor settles on a site in the Gobi Desert as perhaps the place where the outer membrane is thinnest. The problem is that the area is wild, subject to raids and extortion by local warlords, plus heavy bribery to a weak Peking government. As a result the dig is as much a fortified encampment as an excavation. But with a new superdrill the work progresses. 
*  Just as the project seems drawing to a conclusion, there is a political shift and the Americans come under attack by a particularly vicious Cantonese [sic] warlord who has a personal grudge against Hurlburt. Things look bad, but Cantonese shells penetrate the shaft, piercing the last layer before the inner core. The professor was right; the Earth is filled with water, which emerges and drowns all the Cantonese. There are also worldwide catastrophes as the Earth's surface shrinks with water lost, but Meek skips over these in a sentence or two. 
*  Possibly Meek's worst story. 

*  900. INTO THE 28TH CENTURY. Science Wonder Quarterly, Winter 1930. Ill. Paul Short story. 
*  Time: prologue and epilogue material 1932; otherwise around 2730. Place: Corpus Christi, Texas, and its future equivalent. 
*  The nameless narrator is boating in the Gulf of Mexico when he is suddenly seized by an unknown force and ripped into the future. He finds himself on a gold-plated futuristic battleship (vintage 1980) that is filled with a merry group of young men and women in Classical garb, tunics and robes. 
*  The future people, particularly the handsome young woman Iris, thereupon take the narrator on what amounts to a guided tour of an eutopia with strong occult elements. 
*  The future civilization of 2730: The economy is a true socialism, with about two hours of work a day. The world government, which consists of a "king" and a few officials, is elected for a yearly term by an elite group. The chief function of the government consists of regulating education, which involves formal college training, then a year on a floating college, whence the ship that took in the narrator. 
*  The guiding principle of the society is a mixture of science and philosophy, plus attunement with a divine principle (not personal) that permeates the universe. From such foundations an incredible civilization has been built, including thought-controlled apparatus of various sorts. Disintegrator and reintegrator apparatus (the latter of which creates matter suitably from free particles) are important aspects of the culture. Attunement with the divine also endows the future people with near immortality and eternal youth. Once the external sources of illness were removed, internal disorders disappeared. There is no religion per se, but all live a relationship with the divine. 
*  Strict birth control is practiced, with special permits required to create a child, which on conception is reared in vitro. Marriage is more or less monogamous, although there are no strict rules about it, but encouragement is given to interracial unions. (The author, who is a Texan, lists racial components, which include whites, Orientals, American Indians, Indian Indians, but not blacks; what happened to the black race she does not say.) Eugenics is also practiced, with superior persons encouraged to breed. False shame has been eradicated, and males and females bathe together nude. 
*  The new city of Nirvania is beautiful, with parks and spacious homes. Transportation is accomplished by gravitycontrol surface vehicles and individual flying wings. 
*  All this is in the fourth dimension, which is time. 
*  During the narrator's tour of the culture with the charming Iris, she takes him to the tower of the Mad Inventor Holden, which tower has been preserved from the narrator's past. While meddling about, the narrator opens a casket, breathes in a certain dust, and finds himself back in 1932. 
*  Holden, who is present and enraged when the narrator suddenly appears in the tower, nevertheless explains matters. Time travel of the sort that the narrator underwent is a matter of changing vibratory rate, which can be done in various ways. While the future people had a mechanical time dredge, Holden has a compound of Oriental drugs that will accomplish the same thing and return the narrator to the twentyeighth century and Iris. The narrator finishes his manuscript and presumably leaves. 
*  In the middle of the narrative the author inserts a long future history. During the 1940s and 1950s industrial dictators arose who controlled the world's economy. These dictators, who oppressed the workers severely, also established thought control. Special brain operations removed all initiative and inserted a desire only to work. This system prevailed for a time, but fell to a revolution of the young people, who had a disintegrator ray. In the new world that followed, after some excesses, a matriarchy of sorts was established. The author is vague, but the rise of a new cult of chivalry, in addition to social equality, seems to have given women the edge in the future culture. While men perform the actual administration and work, the women seem to be the spiritual center, with a matriarchy of sorts. It must be admitted, however, that the author is far from clear (even self-contradictory) on this point. 
*  A curious semi-eccentric work, mushy and sentimental, archaic for its time. Ms. Lorraine, who was not overburdened with modesty about her literary ability, may well have taken it seriously. 

1654. UNDERGROUND WATERS. Science Wonder Quarterly, Winter 1930. Ill. Paul. Short story. 
*  Not science-fiction. 
*  The water supply of the town of Hillsboro, normally a matter of civic pride, fails. Professor Caldwell, a geologist, investigates, and with his potential sweetheart descends into a cave system that contains an enormous underground lake. A jealous lover maroons them, and things look bad, but the professor attracts rescuers by sending up little messages through the water pipes. 
*  Amateurish.