American
science fiction (sf) magazines first appeared in the 1920s with the launch of
Amazing Stories, a
pulp magazine published by
Hugo Gernsback.
World War II and its attendant paper shortages interrupted the expanding market for the genre, but by the late 1940s, the market had begun to recover again. From a low of eight active magazines in 1946, the field expanded to 20 in 1950, and a further 22 had commenced publication by 1954. One of these new titles was
Imagination, launched at the end of 1950 by
Raymond Palmer, who had recently left
Ziff-Davis, where he had edited
Amazing Stories. In September 1950, Ziff-Davis made the decision to move to New York from Chicago, and Palmer quickly sold
Imagination to
William Hamling, a Ziff-Davis editor who did not want to relocate and who, like Palmer, chose instead to become an independent publisher. In 1954, Hamling started a fantasy magazine as a companion to
Imagination. He titled it
Imaginative Tales; science fiction historian
Mike Ashley comments that this was surprisingly late for Hamling to start a second title since it might have been more profitable earlier in the sf magazine boom, which was fading by late 1954. When Hamling announced the magazine, in an editorial in
Imagination, he said "We actually don't know whether it's a magazine or paperback in magazine form", adding that it would usually carry book-length works.
Frank M. Robinson, a science fiction writer who was friends with Hamling, suggested changing the title from
Imaginative Tales to
Caravan and printing
men's adventure fiction. Hamling knew
Hugh Hefner, the publisher of
Playboy, and Hefner set up a lunch with
Playboy's distributor to talk over the idea. The distributor was unimpressed, and Hamling instead pitched the idea of a magazine that would compete with
Playboy. The result was
Rogue, By the late 1950s, paperbacks were displacing magazines on newsstands, and there was widespread resistance among dealers to stocking new magazines. A further blow came in 1957 with the collapse of
American News Company, the most important US magazine distributor. The resulting disruption spelled the end for many sf titles. Hamling retitled
Imaginative Tales to
Space Travel with the July 1958 issue, hoping to cash in on public interest in the early years of the space program. There was no impact on sales, though Ashley attributes this to the lack of interest among book dealers in new magazines. At the end of 1958, both the science fiction titles were axed, and Hamling invested the money in
Rogue instead. ==Contents and reception==