If was an American science fiction magazine launched in March 1952 by
Quinn Publications, owned by James L. Quinn. After a series of editors,
including Paul W. Fairman, Larry T. Shaw, and Damon Knight, Quinn sold
the magazine to Robert Guinn at Galaxy Publishing and in 1961 Frederik
Pohl became editor. Under Pohl, If won the Hugo Award for best
professional magazine three years running from 1966 to 1968. In 1969
Guinn sold all his magazines to Universal Publishing and Distribution
(UPD). The magazine was not as successful with Ejler Jakobsson as
editor and circulation plummeted. In early 1974 Jim Baen took over from
Jakobsson as editor, but increasing paper costs meant that UPD could no
longer afford to publish both Galaxy and If. Galaxy was regarded as the
senior of the two magazines, so If was merged into Galaxy after the
December 1974 issue, its 175th issue overall. Over its 22 years, If
published many award-winning stories, including Robert A. Heinlein's
novel The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, and Harlan Ellison's short story "I
Have No Mouth and I Must Scream". Several well-known writers sold their
first story to If; the most successful was Larry Niven, whose story
"The Coldest Place" appeared in the December 1964 issue.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_%28magazine%29>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
96:
Following the assassination of Roman Emperor Domitian, the Roman Senate
appointed Nerva , the first of the Five Good Emperors, to succeed him.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerva>
324:
Constantine the Great decisively defeated Licinius in the Battle of
Chrysopolis, establishing Constantine's sole control over the Roman
Empire, and ultimately leading to the conversion of the whole empire to
Christianity.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Chrysopolis>
1809:
The second theatre of the Royal Opera House in London opened after a
fire destroyed the original theatre one year earlier.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Opera_House>
1931:
The Mukden Incident: A section of the Japanese-built South Manchuria
Railway was destroyed, providing an excuse for the Japanese to blame
the act on Chinese dissidents, and thus giving a pretext for the
Japanese occupation of Manchuria.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukden_Incident>
1948:
The Donald Bradman-led Australian cricket team completed the
unprecedented feat of going through an English summer without defeat.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Bradman_with_the_Australian_cricket_team_in_England_in_1948>
1998:
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a
non-profit organization that manages the assignment of domain names and
IP addresses in the Internet, was established.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICANN>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
pangram (n):
A sentence that contains every letter of the alphabet
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pangram>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
As it is necessary not to invite robbery by supineness, so it is our
duty not to suppress tenderness by suspicion; it is better to suffer
wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to
trust.
--Samuel Johnson
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Samuel_Johnson>
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