Julian Parr

(August 3, 1923 – "late" 2003)

Julian (Frederick) Parr was a UK fan active from the 1938 to at least early 1960s. He was a founder of the Stoke-on-Trent Science Fiction Club and the SF Club Deutschland and a member of the British Interplanetary Society, the N3F, the BSFA and the Fortean Society.

Parr founded the Stoke-on-Trent Science Fiction Club (giving the date as 1938) and was a reader of Futurian War Digest from at least 1940. Through its pages he suggested the Fandom GPO circular correspondence system, and J. Michael Rosenblum created it in early 1941. Parr was called up for the Royal Air Force in early 1942.

In Then, Rob Hansen recounts that in the early 1950s Parr worked for the British Consulate-General in Düsseldorf (he was living in nearby Cologne by 1961 and listed his job as "market research", whether within the consulate's commercial section, or elsewhere). He contacted the pioneering West German fans and played a large part in the formation of the Science Fiction Club Deutschland (SFCD), in 1955, having the member number 2 and becoming its "foreign relations officer". He reported on the Wetzcon, the first ever German SF convention in January 1956, for Triode #6 and in 1958 he was a founding member of the BSFA. He was a member of Loncon in 1957. In Who's Who in Fandom, he repeatedly stressed

one-time member of all German SF clubs until 1958 […] Attended German national cons in 1955, 1956 and 1957 […] complete collection of all West German fmz published up to 1958

suggesting some degree of fafiation (Blu Buhs notes he mentioned being very busy) at that time.

Harry Warner, Jr. wrote in A Wealth of Fable, chapter 17 called "Parr Value":

As the 50's were winding down, one tribute (in Sirius) to Parr said that he "made an essential contribution regarding the formation of German Fandom, and its foundation would have taken place years later without his active assistance and precious advice."

Parr was an enthusiastic Fortean, and thus a close collaborator and correspondent of Eric Frank Russell; he spread Forteanism in Germany.

While not mentioned among "senior civil servants" in Beyond Fandom, Parr was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire in wikipedia:1986 New Year Honours "for services to British commercial interests in Cologne." Blu Buhs wrote he knew next to nothing about Parr's family, but searching for his traces also finds mentions of one Julian Parr in the UK diplomatic service in early 1920s, and another Regional Manager at Oxfam in India around 2010; might they be three generations?

In a letter to Then, Malcolm Edwards said that Parr's fanzine collection ended up in the Science Fiction Foundation library.

Anton Ragatzy

Parr used the pseudonym Anton Ragatzy at various points. It would have to be an extreme coincidence if the name were not intended to refer to the character of the unorthodox osteopath (either he cures you or cripples you) in the 1931 and 1939 UK film (and 1923 play) The Outsider.

In VoM #27 (Sep 1943) he writes (as Parr), 'When Anton Ragatzy forwarded VOM to me …', Hellzapoppin (March 1941) also mentions receiving LoCs from, i. a., "…, Parr, Ragatzy, …" and what is printed from earlier ones (editor Douglas Webster: "while Ragatzy’s criticism is reasonable, I must be spiteful & agree with JFParr") suggests he may have intended Ragatzy as an alter ego to stir the debate. Further research would have to be undertaken to see how much this was an open-secret in-joke, or a serious attempt to create a hoax.

Parr perhaps kept the pseudonym after the War to (somewhat) better hide fanac, at least in print, from his extremely sercon mundane job, but confirming it in 1961 Who's Who in Fandom. Later articles by Ragatzy appeared on the Continent in Alpha (October 1955) and Sol Reader (“Science Fiction and Poetry”, April 1962; reprint from earlier Sol-Kwiat?), possibly elsewhere.

• Julian F. Parr in Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Julian F. Parr as a Fortean, biographic article by Joshua Blu Buhs
• see also the brief "Julian Parr 1923–2003" by Wolf von Witting, CounterClock #14 (May 2013), p. 6, some more discussion and a Wetzcon reminiscence follows in #16
• Parr's obituary in German is in Fandom Observer 184

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Person

1923—2003

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