Lasser, David
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1902-1996) US editor and author who worked in various capacities for a number of Hugo Gernsback journals, most prominently as Managing Editor of Air Wonder Stories in 1930, of Amazing Detective Tales in 1930 (see Scientific Detective Monthly), of Wonder Stories Quarterly between 1930 and 1933, and of Wonder Stories from 1930 to 1933. He was notable for his attempts to shift Genre SF away from the crude Space Opera then prevalent; but was fired in 1933 by Gernsback because of his socialism. His most notable sf story was his first, The Time Projector (July-August 1931 Wonder Stories; 2013 dos) with David H Keller. Lasser was a founder of and the first president of the American Interplanetary Society in 1930, and The Conquest of Space (1931), which incorporates a fictionalized description of Space Flight, is the first book in English on the subject (see also Rockets). As a socialist, he was at risk in America after World War Two, and was duly smeared. His record was cleared by President Carter in 1980. [JC]
David Lasser
born Baltimore, Maryland: 20 March 1902
died Rancho Bernardo, California: 5 May 1996
works
- The Conquest of Space (New York: Penguin Press, 1931) [nonfiction/fiction: hb/]
- The Time Projector (Medford, Oregon: Armchair Fiction, 2013) with David H Keller [dos: first appeared July 1931 Wonder Stories: pb/Lawrence Sterne Stevens as Lawrence]
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