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Sci-Fi Sundays: Galaxy, February 1965

Looking at the cover above, you might be tempted to assume that my scanning skills are waning. While it is true that sometimes an edge lifts, or the warped pages produce a muddy scan (especially when I’m worried about completely destroying the spine), this is not one of those cases. The little halos that you can see particularly well around the tiny astronauts, are actually there in the print. This is fairly common for this era of magazine, and a good reminder that these weren’t very costly, or at least the printer didn’t spend for high quality printing.

I really like the design of the ship on this cover, it is a bit different that what we usually see in this time period. The alluring poses of the obviously feminine tentacle creatures seems like a fairly clever way of using sex to sell the issue while skirting the stigma of having naked women on the cover.

Publication:Galaxy

Issue: February 1965, volume: 23 No. 3

Cover art:Wright from Planet of Forgetting

The inside cover advertisement. Interesting to me that even in 1965 cheap cameras were not as valued as the film itself.

Finlay for On The Storm Planet

Finlay for On The Storm Planet

This is probably my favorite from this issue. The submarine, on treads, but also having oars, is an odd vehicle, but I’d drive it.

Finlay for On The Storm Planet

Finlay for On The Storm Planet

This art work is a somewhat generic collage of “science” items. Some of it stands out and makes sense to me, there’s a rocket, some waveforms of some kind that could be spectrographs, a ceolcanth, and a steam engine. What I’m curious about though, is the significance of that beetle. 

I know it is just a small drawing, but it really appears to be a Glorious Scarab, which has two scientific names; Plusiotis Gloriosa or Chrysina Gloriosa. Oddly, when I decided I wanted to try to learn to paint, this was the subject I chose.

I can’t seem to find any historical scientific significance though. Does anyone know of a reason it would have been included? Is it possibly some other beetle? (doesn’t look like a Darwin beetle at all)

The article itself sheds no light on the subject. As I said, this appears to be a generic opening piece because the article is about an orrery and the history of armillary spheres.

Orrerys are fascinating machines. Ever since the movie The Dark Crystal, I’ve wanted to make one. Machining an orrery is a lot of work though, as you can see in this video of someone doing exactly that.

Lady on the left? Man on the right? I only see one thing in this illustration that could be a person and they are located in the bottom left area, sitting in front of the armillary sphere.

Morrow for The Man Who Killed Immortals

Morrow for The Man Who Killed Immortals

Morrow for The Man Who Killed Immortals

I generally try not to criticize the illustrations. After all, they’re all better than what I could produce. However, all I see when I look at this woman is that it would appear she’s wearing someone else’s face as a mask.

Gaughan for Planet of Forgetting

Gaughan for Planet of Forgetting

 

I scanned the story and found no mention of the ship being upside-down. It is possible that I missed it. It is possible that the artist was simply bored. It is also possible that the layout was accidentally placed incorrectly.

Gaughan for Planet of Forgetting

Gaughan for Planet of Forgetting

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