Back in 1976 I created a booklet to give out as a Christmas card. It was a little commentary on the commercialization of Christmas by me and some really nice drawings by Stephen T Riley and Stuart Gilson. I made a bunch of copies to mail out to people I knew. James Hall took 3 or 4 of them and bound them in hardback form. I kept one, one went to each artist, a possible 4th one James kept for himself. I'm not in contact with James anymore so I can't ask him. I lost track of Stu but had heard from him in the early part of the century when the Decadent Winnipeg Fandom guys were talking about getting together. It didn't work our and we all drifted apart again. Stu is a professor in one of those big fancy colleges you might of heard about. .
I had lost track of Steve in the 80's and hadn't even known he had died until I found a mention of it on a web page. The other day I had Goggled Steve's name and found a listing on Ken Lopez Bookseller's site for the copy that had been sent to Steve. I emailed Ken and found that he had become the recipient of books and fanzines from Steve's collection. I asked Ken if he can put me in contact with the man who had gotten Steve's collection and passed along some of it to Ken. Perhaps I can fill in more of Steve's story.
I thought that the book had come out pretty good when it was new but today I see a lot of the type is awfully crooked. It was typed on a Selectric typewriter and pasted out by hand. I sure seem to have invented some odd hyphenations. The title page is rub on lettering and it too is a bit crooked.
There's nothing wrong with the art, I think it's still great. I have all the pieces and the cover mounted and framed. That was done by Steve in 1977. He mailed the huge frame, with unbroken glass, to me. It occasionally gets hung up on my wall. To see the whole booklet find the link in the post and click it.
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