Black Gate

This is the sixth post in a series reflecting on the world of the 1920s as a background to early issues of Weird Tales. Imagine that you’re an American in a big city in 1923, and you’re taking a walk to the newsstand to buy the first issue of a new pulp fiction magazine. What sort of things might you see? What do those things suggest about ways people think? Or about the stories they tell?

Perhaps, just possibly, you’ll walk past a hotel or other building with a display of flags of the world. In which case you might see a flag representing Canada. You won’t find a Canadian consulate or legation, as Canada doesn’t have any of those in 1923. The reason why not will be hinted at by the Canadian flag you’ll see. Officially, the national flag of Canada in 1923 is the Royal Union Flag, also known as the Union Jack. But there is another flag more specifically associated with Canada: the Canadian Red Ensign. The original Red Ensign, flown by British merchantmen, is a field of red with the Union Jack in the upper left corner. The Canadian Red Ensign formerly added the coat of arms of the nine provinces to the red field; in 1922 when King George V granted Canada a coat of arms the new heraldry replaced the provincial insignia. The Red Ensign’s not an official flag, and in fact will only be formally authorised for use on Canadian government buildings outside Canada in 1924, but it’s widely-used nevertheless and during the Great War was a common symbol of Canadian identity. You will certainly not see a red-bordered flag with a red maple leaf against a white background; in 1923, you’re more than 40 years too early for that.

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This is the sixth post in a series reflecting on the world of the 1920s as a background to early issues of Weird Tales. Imagine that you’re an American in a big city in 1923, and you’re taking a walk to the newsstand to buy the first issue of a new pulp fiction magazine. What sort of things might you see? What do those things suggest about ways people think? Or about the stories they tell?

Perhaps you’ll see a bank. Bank architecture in the 1920s typically follows traditions going back to the 18th century, in terms of what the architecture is supposed to convey and how. Neo-classical buildings speak of power and security. You can leave your money in one of these temple-like structures, and feel safe. The bank will not disappear, it will not collapse, it will not fall before the bombs of a robber or a revolutionary. That matters; in an age before the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation the collapse of a bank can wipe out a depositor’s savings. And certainly this is an age that has recently seen many panics and controversies revolving around money and the economy; therefore often also revolving around politics, and around labour.

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The fourth issue of Weird Tales, dated June 1923, keeps the same format as the issue previous — starting with the large bedsheet size, about 9 inches by 12. The trade dress of the cover is the same, with the same logo. The design of the cover, with a splash of red in which one story is advertised in black writing, is the same. Unfortunately, the actual cover art, by regular Weird Tales artist William Heitman, isn’t very good.

There’s a lady, there’s an ape, and the latter seems to have surprised the former in her room. The majority of Weird Tales readers were likely able to place the image at once as a scene from Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders In the Rue Morgue,” which is reprinted this issue. The problem is that it’s not a particularly evocative image, and the poses of the characters seem odd at first glance and make less sense the more you look at them.

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