Jim Ratigan

Jim Rat(t)igan (right) with (from the left) Mike Wilson, Fred Robinson, Vin¢ Clarke and Bob Shaw, possibly working on 'Our 'Zine and thus in 1952. From Vin¢'s collection, courtesy Rob Hansen

(February 3, 1929 – April 1989)

Jim Ratigan, also known as James Rattigan (for which see discussion below), was a London fan and pro artist active in the 1950s and to some degree into the 1960s. He married fellow fan Dorothy Jacobs sometime between the June 1952 London SF Con (where they were already a couple, but it was her first convention) and the May 1953 Coroncon.

He appeared in fandom at the start of the 1950s; he is not listed as a member of the Loncon of 1949 but he is for Festivention of 1951. Ratigan was then in charge of publicity for the 1952 convention. He was also a talented artist and had cover art on six issues of Nebula between 1954 and 1958, though apparently no other pro work anywhere, at least under his name.

He seems to have largely dropped out around 1960. He may have attended the 1960 London Eastercon – his wife Dorothy was there – but there's no published membership list and no evidence of his presence. 'Jim and Dot Rattigan showed up for a while' on the Sunday of RePetercon in March 1964 (per Bob Shaw's report in Hyphen #36, p.9), not appearing on the membership list.

Name variants: Ratigan versus Rattigan, James and Jim

Contemporary fanzines use both 'Ratigan' and double-T 'Rattigan', sometimes in the same publication e.g. Post War (1952; this in two letters referring to the same article by 'James Rattigan'). He is also referred to as both James and Jim, although this is at first less remarkable as the latter is a common diminutive of the former.

Rob Hansen has theorised in personal correspondence that 'Ratigan' is correct as this is the name used on Dorothy's apazine Satan's Child, presumably typed by herself. The cover of the souvenir book for the 1952 London SF Con gives the person in charge of publicity as 'J. Ratigan' and the single-T version is used in all editions of Ron Bennett's Directory of Science Fiction Fandom for 1955 to 1961.

However, Eye #4 which was co-edited by Jim uses both: p.4 has 'JRattigan' in the editors' list and 'Illos by AVC & J.Rattigan', there is even a letter from 'Dorothy Rattigan' (p.6), but a hand-drawn header of a collaborative article at p.11 has 'Dorothy & Jim Ratigan' among authors. Some articles in Science Fantasy News are credited to 'James Rattigan', their 'film reporter'. On the other hand, 'J. Ratigan' also contributed two film reviews to Vector #1 (p.21). And there is compelling evidence for 'Rattigan' in the form of Nebula where the six covers are credited to 'James Rattigan' and some, e.g. #13 or #16, clearly signed JAMES RATTIGAN.

Archie Mercer provides further confusion in Ploy #6 (June 1956) where in describing Cytricon II he refers to, 'The Rat(t)igans, Jim and Dorothy, a delightful couple with the utterly fannish habit of allocating three "t's" among their two surnames to the general bewilderment'.

However...

Research by Bill Burns at an ancestry site failed to locate any person called James Ratigan or Rattigan in the greater London area for the approximate timeframe, assuming a date of birth in the late 1920s or early 1930s. It did identify a Jim Ratigan born in Croydon in the first quarter of 1929, and what seems a matching death record in Bromley more precisely fixing the birth date as February 3, 1929, with the death registered in April 1989. Croydon and Bromley are south London suburbs, close to one another and to the district of Sydenham when Jim and Dorothy lived in the 1950s. And the forename is specifically given as Jim in these records and not 'James'. Further evidence comes from a 1957 London telephone directory which lists Jim Ratigan at the Sydenham address given in Bennett’s directories.

This suggests that his legal name was Jim Ratigan, although for some purposes he used ‘James Rattigan’ and it is unclear why. Aside from the Nebula covers, the name appears as a byline in some issues of Science Fantasy News, and this may suggest it was a kind of transparent penname or working name, as SFE puts it, similar to Iain Banks using Iain M. Banks. It may even be a reflection of the general tendency of others to misspell his name and a conscious decision to lean into that. Sadly, most if not all the people in a position to know are no longer around to ask.

Fanzines and Apazines:

• Eye [#4 May 1955 only, co-editor with Vin¢ Clarke, Joy Goodwin, Stuart MacKenzie, and Ted Tubb]
• 'Our 'Zine [1952] (one-shot, co-editor with Vin¢ Clarke, Fred Robinson, Bob Shaw and Mike Wilson)

Links

• James Rattigan in Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• J. Ratigan in Internet Speculative Fiction Database

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Person

1929—1989

This is a biography page. Please extend it by adding more information about the person, such as fanzines and apazines published, awards, clubs, conventions worked on, GoHships, impact on fandom, external links, anecdotes, etc. See Standards for People and The Naming of Names.