The Esoteric Order of Dagon

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(Did you mean an Australian club and its fanzine or the FAPA group?)


The Esoteric Order of Dagon is an apa founded in 1973 and is devoted to scholarship related to H. P. Lovecraft and the works of the Weird Tales school of writers. S. T. Joshi is OE.

Dagon is an H. P. Lovecraft reference. (The APA is unconnected with FAPAn Order of Dagon and also should not to be confused with the occult order known as the Esoteric Order of Dagon, which used Lovecraft's work as a basis for occult experiments and publishing).

Quarterly mailings of the apa are often used as a test-bed for critical work on Lovecraft and other Weird Tales writers. All mailings are permanently archived in the Lovecraft Special Collection at John Hay Library of Brown University.

History[edit]

As early as 1971, an APA dedicated to the study of the life and works of Lovecraft had been proposed by Texan writer Joseph F. Pumilia (a member of the famous Turkey City Writer's Workshop) and Bill Wallace. In April 1973, Roger Bryant, an Ohio devotee, began the EOD under its current name.

Early charter members included Claire Beck (who had printed and published, under his Futile Press imprint, an edition of Lovecraft's Commonplace Book and Clark Ashton Smith's Nero and Other Poems (1937); Harry Morris, Jr.; Meade Frierson; Stuart David Schiff, publisher of Whispers (Magazine/Anthologies); R. Alain Everts; Ben Indick (now deceased); Kenneth W. Faig, Jr. (who joined with 7th mailing and was been continuously in the APA until 2014); Dirk W. Mosig; David Drake; Robert Weinberg; J. Vernon Shea (now deceased); Chet Williamson; Tom Collins; Crispin Burnham; Will Hart; Glenn Lord.

Further members came and went—those still in the EOD today include S. T. Joshi; Scott Connors; David E. Schultz; Donald R. Burleson; and Leigh Blackmore; Past members include George Wetzel; Bernadette Bosky; Larry Baker; Robert M. Price; David C. Smith

With the 14th mailing, Roger Bryant stepped down as Official Editor and Joe Moudry was elected in his place as EOD's second Official Editor. Moudry relinquished his place as Official Editor with the 26th mailing and the OEship passed to Bernadette Bosky, whose term was short-lived. In Oct 1980 Mollie Werba became the EOD's fourth Official Editor. Werba (who married member Donald Burleson) continued until 1987, when S. T. Joshi became the fifth Official Editor of the EOD, a position he has continued to occupy for almost thirty years.

The Modern E.O.D. Amateur Press Association[edit]

Joshi brought in new members including Marc Michaud of Necronomicon Press, A. Langley Searles (died 7 May 2009) and others. Further members included Steve Mariconda, Ken Neily and other important scholars in the field of Lovecraft studies.

By the beginning of 1992, EOD was well past its 70th mailing and in Sept 1997 celebrated its 100th mailing. The 150th mailing occurred in April 2010 and it was still active as of 2024.

More recent members have included Douglas A. Anderson, John Goodrich, Alan W. Gullette, and Todd Fischer.

Longtime member and EOD historian Ben Indick died in September 2009.

Other current members include Scott Briggs, the noted Lovecraftian poet Fred Phillips, Charles Danny Lovecraft (Australia), Martin Andersson (Sweden), Jim Dapkus, T. R. Livesey, John Haefele, Steve Walker, Graeme Phillips (UK), Henrik Harksen (Denmark), Michael Ashley (UK), Derrick Hussey (publisher of Hippocampus Press), John Navroth, W. H. Pugmire, T. E. Grau and Juha-Matti Rajala (Finland).

Contributors and Apazines:[edit]

OEs[edit]

Issues Dates OEs
1-3 -September 1973 Roger Bryant
1979 Bernadette Bosky
1981 Joe Moudry
1983 Mollie Burklesoin
S. T. Joshi


Publication 1973
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