Lunarians

Officially, the New York Science Fiction Society (which no one uses or remembers) or the NYSFS (ditto), the Lunarians was a NY City area fan club which sponsored Lunacons. Post-World War II, it was probably the most important and certainly the most long-lived club in NYC.

The first meeting of the Lunarians was held on Sunday, November 18, 1956, as "a social organization for mature fans who are sincerely interested in science fiction as well as fandom." The founding members were Belle Cohen (Secretary), Martha Cohen, Frank Dietz (Treasurer), Bill Donaho, Allen Glasser, Dave Kyle (President), Ruth Landis, Dave McDonald, Sam Moskowitz, Dave Pollard, and George Nims Raybin.

For many years, it met once a month on Saturday night at Belle and Frank Dietz's apartment at 1750 Walton Ave. in the Bronx to socialize. Belle Dietz (the former Belle Cohen) would usually make muffins or cookies, and it would quickly turn into a fangab though a Hearts game also played a big role. In the ’60s, other members included John Boardman, Charlie Brown, Ed Meskys, Julius Postal and out-of-town members Jack Chalker, Ted Pauls, and Mark Owings who would drive up from Baltimore to attend.

The Lunarians’ focus on a monthly party at the Dietzes’ ended when their neighborhood deteriorated and they moved to New Jersey. By the late ’60s, meetings had moved to the home of John and Perdita Boardman and the club had become much more formal, with meetings run by Robert's Rules of Order and more of the entertainment derived from debating the club's constitution and by-laws than from anything else. File 770 20, p. 3 recounts an amusing anecdote about this.

The Lunarians gave out the Isaac Asimov Memorial Award. The club was part of the New York Fandom Council.

1970s–2000

By around 2000, the Lunarians' tendency to focus on hairsplitting over rules combined with the traditional fractiousness of New York fandom had led to a largely fixed and consequently slowly shrinking membership, with fewer meetings and, ultimately, none. (The club had decided that the notice of the election meeting had been improperly distributed and consequently, the elections were invalid. Without officers, no one knew how to call a meeting to remedy the problem....) The treasury was depleted subsidizing money-losing Lunacons and with no meetings, no new officers were elected. By 2010, the club was moribund.

Lunarians (2)

In 2015, the New York Science Fiction Society was formally discontinued and replaced by "The New York Science Fiction Society - the Lunarians (2), Inc.," and meetings were held about every month in Manhattan for a while. The Lunarians (2) sponsored Lunacon 2016 and Lunacon 2017, but then both the club and the con fizzled.

Well-Known Lunarians

• John Boardman
• Perdita Boardman
• Charlie Brown
• Marsha Brown
• Brian Burley
• Sherna Burley
• Gale Burnick
• Jack Chalker
• Eli Cohen
• Walter Cole
• Genny Dazzo
• Genevieve DiModica
• Ann Dietz
• Belle Dietz
• Frank Dietz
• Bill Donaho
• Allen Glasser
• Ted Greenstone
• Dave Kyle
• Ruth Kyle
• Deborah Langsam
• Devra Langsam
• Fred Lerner
• Elan Litt
• Don Lundry
• Ed Meskys
• Sam Moskowitz
• Ted Pauls
• Andrew Porter
• Julius Postal
• Frank R. Prieto, Jr.
• George Nims Raybin
• Art Saha
• Sharon Sbarsky
• Joe Schaumburger
• Al Schuster
• Judi Sephton
• Elliot Shorter
• Joe Siclari
• Roger Sims
• Jon Singer
• Lee Smoire
• James V. Taurasi
• Gary Tesser
• Robin White
• Ted White
• Ben Yalow

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Club

1956—2018

This is a club page. Please extend it by adding information about when and where the club met, when and by whom it was founded, how long it was active, notable accomplishments, well-known members, clubzines, any conventions it ran, external links to the club's website, other club pages, etc. When there's a floreat (Fl.), this indicates the time or times for which we have found evidence that the club existed. This is probably not going to represent the club's full lifetime, so please update it if you can!