Leeds Clubs

Leeds has been the host to numerous clubs over the years with confusingly similar names:

Leeds SFL

fl. 1930s

This is the Granddaddy of them all. The Leeds chapter of the Science Fiction League was the first prominent fan group in the UK, being active during the 30s. It was founded by Douglas W. F. Mayer. It published the Bulletin of the Leeds Science Fiction League edited by Harold Gottliffe. William A. Dyson was a member.

It organized the first science fiction convention in the UK in Leeds in 1937, which some people feel was the first SF convention anywhere. See Which Was the First SF Convention?

From Fancyclopedia 1, ca. 1944

A chapter of the SFL in Leeds England, which seems to have held apart from the SFA. Publishing house was the Green Jester. Its outstanding member was J. Michael Rosenblum.

Leeds Science Fiction Association (I)

fl. 1937-39

This club was created in the wake of the 1937 Leeds Convention, the first convention in the UK, where fans formed the national SFA. What had been chapters of the SFL (such as Leeds SFL) were all now supposed to become chapters of the SFA. Everyone went along with this except in Leeds, a significant number of whom wanted to remain Leeds SFL. So for a while, in the grand fannish tradition, the Leeds Science Fiction Association (I) was a single group with two factions in it. Conflict eventually arose and it broke into the separate Leeds SFL and Leeds SFA groups.

It might not have lasted long, thanks to the outbreak of WW2, but while it did, Leeds Science Fiction Association (I) was a significant force in UK fandom. The 1950s group (see below) had the same name but otherwise there was no connection between the two.

• For more, see a detailed account of pre-war Leeds fandom by Rob Hansen in Relapse

Leeds Science Fiction Association (II)

fl. 1952 or 1953–end of the 1950s

SF club formed in the UK in late 1952 or early 1953. The founders were Jack Darlington and Jack Smillie, colleagues at a Leeds steelworks, and other members included Mal Ashworth, Ron Bennett, Rick Dalton, George Gibson, J. Michael Rosenblum and Tom White. Its clubzine was Orbit, edited by Gibson and assisted by Bennett with Rosenblum as 'technical advisor'.

The group initially met at an attic room of the Adelphi Hotel on Leeds Bridge. In 1954, after Darlington and Smillie had made painted and decorated the room, the landlord saw the potential of the place and evicted them. Thereafter the group met in the offices of Rosenblum's business. Meetings continued throughout the 1950s albeit increasingly with increasing irregularity and the group faded away around the end of the decade. (All information from Rob Hansen in Then.)

Leeds University Science Fiction Group

fl. 1966-68

A Leeds club founded by Bill Burns in 1966 which lasted for two years. It was mostly a social group that had little contact with other fan groups.

Leeds and District SF Group

fl. late 60s

A club in the Leeds, UK are which was organized by Barbara Mace in 1967. It met on alternate Monday evenings in the Victoria pub behind the Leeds Town Hall.

Leeds University SF Society

Leeds University Union Science Fiction Society

fl. 1973 to present'

A club at Leeds University (also known as LUUSFS) which held its first meeting May 17, 1973, organized by David Pringle, Eve Harvey, and Nicky Hayes. Eve Harvey (then Evelyn Simmons) first met John Harvey at an early meeting. Tom Burke became the first chairman, although he was active for less than a year. Its clubzine, Black Hole, was launched after about a year, in 1974, and Alan Dorey became an early editor.

It is now known as Leeds University Union Sci-Fi & Fantasy (bah!). They ran the Lucon conventions.

Website.

Leeds SF Group

Leeds Group

fl. 1974 - current

Before the end of 1974, more than a year after the Leeds University SF Society started, a parallel group only loosely associated with the university began meeting every Friday evening in a pub called The Victoria and later in one called the West Riding. It was initiated by David Pringle and Mike Dickinson. Some students, notably Alan Dorey, became part of both clubs, but in time the two groups drifted apart. It is no longer very active but very occasionally still gets together and is mainly held together these days by Simon Ounsley and Graham James.

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Fanhistory

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