Leon Pois
(January 16, 1891 – November 1965)
Leon Pois was a magazine collector and presumably dealer from New York. In 1934 he claimed to be 'world's largest individual holder of scientification magazines' although it would be stretching a point to call him a fan as he also claimed that he'd never read a copy.
In 1999 UK fan Greg Pickersgill found a rubber stamp on the contents page of an issue of Amazing Stories from September 1927.
YVETTE & ODETTE POIS 2101 GRAND CONCOURSE, NEW YORK WORLD'S LARGEST HOLDERS OF SCIENTIFIC FICTION MAGAZINES
The use of the term 'scientific fiction' pointed to these being old-time magazine dealers with the stamp perhaps even being contemporary with the magazine's publication. But who were they?
An annotation in Vin¢ Clarke's fanzine catalogue led to something Donald Wollheim wrote about one Leon Pois in his 'Sun Spots' column for Phantagraph V4 #1 (July 1935):
Leon Pois is the world's largest holder of science fiction magazines but has never read a copy! He accumulates stf magazines purely for the investment, as he thinks they will go on increasing in prices. 'Whenever I have a chance to obtain a copy, I buy it. My reward will come in time' he says. This is a man to watch out for. A pure profiteer and hoarder of copies, who himself derives no enjoyment from them.
Did Wollheim, then resident in New York himself, know Pois?
Pois also wrote a letter to Astounding that was published in the August 1934 issue:
I wonder whether any of your readers can challenge my contention of being the world's largest individual holder of scientification magazines. I am the proud possessor of about 1,700 copies, which I have been collecting for years, as I think they will have quite some value in time.
Mike Ashley's The Time Machines: The Story of the Science-Fiction Pulp Magazines from the Beginning to 1950 identifies about 600 issues of science fiction and fantasy magazines published until the end of 1934, suggesting Pois had an average of three copies of everything, many more if he were adopting a more purist approach to 'scientification magazines' and excluding overt fantasy titles.
It's unclear how long Pois carried on accumulating magazines against the day when he could realise his investment. Presumably he did start to sell them, trading on his claim to be the 'world's largest holders of scientific fiction magazines'.
Online records say that Leon Pois married Rachel 'Ray' Pois (née Zebrenetsky) and they had two daughters, Odette (later Odette Taft) and Yvette (later Yvette Seskin). Leon Pois died in 1965 and so it seems his daughters carried on the family business. The address given on the stamp – which had clearly been applied some years after the magazine was published given Yvette was born in 1928 – was the same as the address given by Leon Pois in that Astounding letter of 1934.
| Person | 1891—1965 |
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