Gerry de la Ree

(September 7, 1924 – January 2, 1993)

From left, Roy Plotkin, Gerry de la Ree and Roderick Gaetz. From Sun Spots 11, October 5, 1940.

Gereaux de Forrest “Gerry” de la Ree became a fan when he bought the November, 1938 issue of Amazing Stories. He lived in New Jersey, and soon joined the Newark SFL. (John V. Baltadonis was the first to call him “Gerry,” in 1940.)

With other fans, de la Ree formed the Solaroid Club in 1939. Frederik Pohl, at that time editing Super Science Stories, had formed a national SF club called the Science Fictioneers. In 1940, The Solaroid Club became the 4th chapter of The Science Fictioneers. With Gerry as editor, a club organ titled Sun Spots was launched. The 29th issue of Sun Spots, published in September, 1947, to coincide with the fifth Worldcon, Philcon, carried the results of the Beowulf Poll, in which fans ranked all the works of Robert A. Heinlein, Henry Kuttner, Campbell, L. Sprague de Camp, Doc Smith, H. G. Wells, Stanley Weinbaum, A. Merritt, and H. P. Lovecraft. He was part of Vulcan Publications.

Additionally, he produced The Scientifiction Scout, and Space Flight...When? in the early ’40s, three issues of the fanzine Beowulf, Selected Fragments, and After Ten Years -- A Tribute to Stanley G. Weinbaum in the mid-1940s and two issues of Loki in the late ’40s. In the ’70s, he published Clark Ashton Smith -- Artist.

Later in life, he became an internationally known SF collector, small press publisher, and art collector and dealer and published Fantasy Collector's Annual. His collection of Virgil Finlay's art has never been matched, and he published numerous art books under his small press de la Ree imprint:

• 1973 -- Grotesques and Fantastiques by Clark Ashton Smith
• 1974 -- Klarkash-ton and Monstro Ligriv, Bok - A Tribute to the Late Fantasy Artists, Hannes Bok, on the 60th Anniversary of His Birth and 10th Anniversary of His Death, Fantasy Collector's Annual -- 1974
• 1975 -- Clark Ashton Smith - Poet, The Occult Lovecraft, Fantasy Collector's Annual -- 1975
• 1976 -- A Hannes Bok Sketchbook, The Book of Virgil Finlay
• 1977 -- Edd Cartier: The Known and the Unknown
• 1978 -- Art of the Fantastic, Beauty and the Beasts: The Art of Hannes Bok, The Second Book of Virgil Finlay
• 1979 -- The Third Book of Virgil Finlay, The Fourth Book of Virgil Finlay, The Fifth Book of Virgil Finlay
• 1980 -- The Sixth Book of Virgil Finlay: The Astrology Years
• 1981 -- The Seventh Book of Virgil Finlay -- Virgil Finlay Remembered

In mundania, de la Ree was a newspaper journalist and sports editor, spending some 30 years on the sports staff of the Bergen Evening Record.

• Short autobiography in Sol 7 (1952).
• Entry in the Biographical Dictionary of New York Sports.

Fanzines and Apazines:

• After Ten Years -- A Tribute to Stanley G. Weinbaum [1945] (with Sam Moskowitz)
• Beowulf
• Fantasy Collector's Annual 1974
• Loki
• The Scientifiction Scout
• Selected Fragments
• Space Flight...When?
• Sun Spots

Awards, Honors and GoHships:

• 1994 — First Fandom Hall of Fame

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Person

1924—1993

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