I had no idea he was that old!

Exactly my reaction. He was the Alien Critic, right?

Yes, he was.

I cut my fannish eyeteeth on Dick Geis' artificial vagina. (Now there's a sentence you won't see written very often!)

Geis' SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW, in 1968, was the first "real" fanzine I'd seen. (I'd seen a few samples of comics fanzines prior, mostly ad-based.) It was an eye-opener. Not just for the discussion and *ahem* vigorous dialogues about science fiction, but because he was the first person I'd encountered in my entire life who was willing to write openly and un-self-censored about sexual matters like masturbation (including with the aforementioned artificial vagina) and writing porn for a living.

(No, literally, at age 16, he was the first person I'd seen do that, and he did it in a public forum. Get back on my lawn, kids, and I'll tell you how desperate teenagers were in the 1950's and 60's for ANY kind of sexual facts or information, and how unavailable it was. But you won't believe me.)

That openness has been a big influence on my own life and writings. I'm nowhere near as open and uninhibited at the typewriter as Geis was, but I'm open enough to occasionally make people uncomfortable. Overall, I think that's a good thing.

-- Bruce Arthurs

And I remember you fondly from that same venue a few years later.

That really is an amazing sentence.

One of my first faanish contacts as well. Never met him in person, like the SF Review in the late 70s.