Helen Finn

(June 4, 1904 – July 6, 1943)

Helen Finn, Dorothy Finn, Eleanor O'Brien, Peggy Finn and Paul Freehafer, clockwise from upper left, at the 1941 LASFS Xmas party.
Photo by Russ Hodgkins.

Helen Finn (née Warner) was the first woman Director (president) of LASFS, and possibly of any fan organization, elected in 1942. Forrest J Ackerman, writing in Shangri L'Affaires for January 1942, said she was “Virtually swept into Office.” She had previously been the club Librarian.

4E reported that Helen had begun reading sf with Edgar Rice Burroughs’ books and Argosy magazine in 1921 and “almost was published herself in Weird Tales in the early 1930s. She was in Mexico when she read about LASFS and joined after returning to LA. Her favorite old-time writers were A. Merritt and Otis Adelbert Kline; of newer sf, she enjoyed Henry Kuttner and Robert A. Heinlein, but disliked Isaac Asimov.

She bought nearly all of Art Joquel’s sf collection.

She was born in Indiana and married John Finn sometime before 1923. Her two daughters were also LASFans, and married within the club, Peggy to William Crawford and Dorothy (briefly) to Henry Hasse. The California Death Index reports that Helen Finn died on July 6, 1943; we have not found a report of her death in fannish publications, which seems a bit odd considering her position in LASFS.

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Person

1904—1943

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