[(The additional books proposed for this series are: The Young Atomic Engineers on Mars, or Secret of the Moon Corridors

The Young Atomic Engineers in the Asteroids, or The Mystery of the Broken Planet

The Young Atomic Engineers in Business, or The Solar System Mining Corporation

And at least two more.)]

EDITOR 's NOTE: September 24, 1946. Letter of this date says that editor at Scribner 's liked Young Atomic Engineers.

September 27, 1946: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

Young Atomic Engineers-I am delighted to hear that Alice Dalgliesh [editor at Scribner's] likes this ms. In my letter of 16 March 46 you will find a list of titles for a proposed series of sequels and considerable discussion of what I would like to do in re juveniles, as well as what I think might be done further to exploit this story. I expect to be guided by you in all those matters-my opinions are not final. I certainly would be willing to rewrite to editorial order and to plan stories to fit editorial desires in order to have my book brought out by so distinguished a house as Scribner's.

February 1, 1947: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

I have signed the contract as you advised, but I am returning the contract to Scribner's through you in order that you may reconsider whether or not to ask them to make any changes in the contract...The manuscript has been revised and is now being retyped. It will be delivered to Scribner's by the tenth of February.

SPACE CADET

July 18, 1947: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

Miss Dalgliesh and I agree with you on Space Cadet, but I won't write it until later this year.

February 17, 1948: Lurton Blassingame to Robert A. Heinlein No danger of Scribner's turning down Space Cadet.

August 1, 1949: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

There is a correction to be made in Space Cadet, which I have already given Scribner's for the second edition; it occurs to me that it should be made in the Norwegian, Italian, and Dutch editions. Will you relay it for me? It is quite simple: on the very last page there is a line of dialog: "Never lead with your left." It should, of course, read, "Never lead with your right."

EDITOR 's NOTE: This mistake resulted from the manuscript's having been read by me, Lurton (who was left-handed), and several editors at Scribner's (none of us knew anything about boxing).

January 5, 1951: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

I have written Miss Dalgliesh about the TV scripts [Tom Corbett, Space Cadet}. Did you read them? If so, you know how bad they are; I don't want an air credit on that show (much as I appreciate the royalty checks!) and I am reasonably sure that a staid, dignified house like Scribner's will feel the same way. It has the high moral standards of soap opera.

RED PLANET

November 18, 1948: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

Enclosed is a copy of notes for a new novel [Red Planet] for Miss Dalgliesh, plus a copy of the letter to her...Read the letters, read the notes as well, if you have time. Advice is welcomed.

The decision to postpone the ocean-rancher yarn [Ocean Rancher was supposed to be the third book in the Scribner's series, but it was never written.] called for a revision of my writing schedule. These are my present intentions: while Miss Dalgliesh is making up her mind, I intend to do one short story, 4,000 words, intended for adult, slick, general market, with Post, Colliers, Town and Country, This Week, and Argosy in mind. I should be able to show this to you by the middle of December.

If Miss Dalgliesh says yes, I will write the boys' novel next, planning to complete it before January 31. While she is looking it over, I expect to do another 4,000-word slick, following which I will revise the novel for Miss Dalgliesh. That should take me up to the end of February.

March 4, 1949: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

There is actually no need for you to read this letter at all. It will not inform you on any important point, it will contain nothing calling for action on your part, and it probably will not even entertain you. I may not send it. I have a number of points to beef about, particularly Miss Dalgliesh; if Bill Cor-son [a friend who lived in Los Angeles] were here, I'd beef to him. He not being here, I take advantage of your good nature. I have come to think of you as a friend whom I know well enough to ask to listen to my gripes.

If Miss D. had said Red Planet was dull, I would have had no comeback. We clowns either make the audience laugh or we don't; if we entertain, we are successes; if we don't, we are failures. If she had said, "The book is entertaining but I want certain changes. Cut out the egg-laying and the disappearances. Change the explanation for the Old Martians," I would have kept my griping to myself and worked on the basis that the Customer Is Always Right.

She did neither. In effect she said, "The book is gripping, but for reasons I cannot or will not define I don't want to publish it."

I consider this situation very different from that with the publisher in Philadelphia who first instigated the writing of Rocket Ship Galileo. He and I parted amicably; he wanted a book of a clearly defined sort which I did not want to write. But, from my point of view, Miss Dalgliesh ordered this particular book; to wit, she had a standing arrangement for one book a year from me; she received a very detailed outline which she approved. She got a book to that outline, in my usual style. To my mind that constitutes an order and I know that other writers have been paid their advance under similar circumstances. I think Scribner's owes us, in equity, $500 even if they return the manuscript. A client can't take up the time of a doctor, a lawyer, or an architect, under similar circumstances without paying for it. If you call in an architect, discuss with him a proposed house, he works up a floor plan and a treatment; then you decide not to go further with him, he goes straight back to his office and bills you for professional services, whether you have signed a contract or not.

My case is parallel, save that Miss Dalgliesh let me go ahead and "build the house," so to speak.

I think I know why she bounced the book-I use "bounced" intentionally; I hope that you do not work out some sort of a revision scheme with her because I do not think she will take this book, no matter what is done to it.

I think she bounced the book from some ill-defined standards of literary snobbishness-it's not "Scribner's-type" material!! I think that point sticks out all through her letter to me. I know that such an attitude has been shown by her all through my relationship with her. She has .spoken frequently of "cheap" books, "cheap" magazines. "Cheap," used in reference to a story, is not a defined evaluation; it is merely a sneer-usually a sneer at the format from a snob.

She asked me to suggest an artist for Rocket Ship Galileo; I suggested Hubert Rogers. She looked into the matter, then wrote me that Mr. Rogers' name "was too closely associated with a rather cheap magazine" -- meaning John Campbell's Astounding S-F. To prove her point, she sent me tear sheets from the magazine. It so happened that the story she picked to send was one of my "Anson MacDonald" stories, "By His Bootstraps" -- which at that time was again in print in Crown's Best in Science Fiction]

I chuckled and said nothing. If she could not spot my style and was impressed only by the fact that the stuff was printed on pulpwood paper, it was not my place to educate her. I wondered if she knew that my reputation had been gained in that same "cheap" magazine and concluded that she probably did not know and might not have been willing to publish my stuff had she known.

Rogers is a very fine artist. As an illustrator he did the trade editions of John Buchan's books. I am happy to have one of his paintings hanging in my home. In place of him she obtained someone else. Take a look at the copy of Galileo in your office-and don't confuse it in your mind with the fine work done by [Clifford N.j Geary for Space Cadet. The man she picked is a fairly adequate draftsman, but with no ability to turn an illustration into an artistically satisfying composition. However, he had worked for Scribner's before; he was "respectable."