Plant Monsters of the 1940s

If you missed the last one…

The 1940s saw a variety of Science Fiction and Horror magazines use plants in different ways. Sometimes they were the giant man-eaters of previous decades, but more and more they were used as part of other ideas. Frank Belknap Long created John Carstairs, Space Detective, a galactic gumshoe who used different kinds of alien plants to deal with murders, invaders or impress his love, Verna Dorne. A. E. von Vogt used the theme to comment on war. Ward Moore on politics. Murray Leinster on evolution, etc.

1940s

“The Thing That Killed” by Paul Chawick (Thrilling Wonder Stories, May 1940) is a pretty standard scientist gets eaten by his giant plant story. Where it is a little different is that Chadwick was primarily a Mystery writer so he frames it like a crime story.

“The Hydroponic Monster” (Strange Stories, June 1940) by Maria Moravsky has a hydroponics gardener who stumbles upon an intriguing weed. He cultivates it, calling it Louette. He later learns the plant is a great terror from ancient Egypt. When he goes to destroy it, he finds it has gone to seed!

“The Tree of Life” by Paul Edmonds (Henry Kuttner) (Astonishing Stories, September 1941) has archaeologists searching for the location of the Garden of Eden. What they find there is a tree but an intelligent one. One that feeds on minds…

“Dead Man’s Planet” by R. R. Winterbotham (Planet Stories, Fall 1941) has an emergency stop on a rock in the Asteroid Belt prove a deadly choice.

“Plants Must Grow” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, October 1941) begins with thieves stealing a rare plant from the planet Uranus. It is up to detective, John Carstairs, to rescue them from their prize. The tentacular plant can grow diamonds but it also has a telepathic attack. For more on the career of Frank Belknap Long, go here.

“Snapdragon” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1941) has Carstairs break an unwilling criminal by planting a St. George’s Dragon on him. The plant resembles a small dragon but also exudes a chemical that acts like a truth serum.

“Lure of the Lily” by Robert A. W. Lowndes (Uncanny Tales, January 1942) was reprinted in Magazine of Horror #15, Spring 1967 as “Lillies”. Weird lillies produce replicas of people to worship their witch queen. The story was too horrific for American markets so Lowndes sold it in Canada.

“The Test Tube Girl” by Frank Patton (Ray A. Palmer) (Amazing Stories, January 1942) has the human race made sterile by Hitler. To save humanity, chlorophyll is injected into a beautiful woman. She becomes a plant woman who thrives in the sunshine but withers in the dark. (Thanks, Andy!)

“Chameleon Planet” by Polton Cross (John Russell Fearn) (Astonishing Stories, February 1940) features many weird evolving monsters but the best one is the “bellow bulb” which explodes with poisonous gas.

“White Land of Venus” by Frederic Arnold Kummer Jr. (Astonishing Stories, February 1940) has vines in the Venusian jungle that grab unsuspecting Earthmen.

“The Lifestone” by Paul Edmonds (Henry Kuttner) (Astonishing Stories, February 1940) has the “cannon flowers”, gigantic blossoms that shoot their seeds like cannon balls. The first issue of Astonishing Stories really was a plant  monster special.

Tarnished Utopia by Malcom Jameson (Startling Stories, March 1942) is a novel about space politics but it does have Martian pitcher-plants.

Winchester examined one of the plants after it was on the ground and unboxed, but he failed to see anything hazardous-looking about it. The thing had a fat, bulbous root some ten feet in diameter that was covered with a leathery skin. Its upper part consisted of a number of fleshy leaves of from six to eight feet in length, temporarily bound together with turns of wire rope.

The gang slid them one by one across the gravelly waste, and lowered them into their holes. By quitting time the entire thirty had been transplanted and the backfill done. Winchester and another man began taking the ropes off the bound leaves. “Hold on,” he warned, as he loosened the last knot. “Let’s get out of reach before we unwind them.”

He jumped back a good ten feet, holding the stray end of the line in his hand. For being so close, he could not miss the fetid breath of the thing, knew without doubt that the plant was carnivorous. But at the same time, Winchester thought he understood its method of attack.

Each of the fleshy leaves terminated in what was the caricature of a human hand. A tough, horny palm divided on one side into three muscular fingers. Growing out of the other side was an opposed thumb.

As the bonds were loosened, the fingers and thumbs kept opening and closing spasmodically, and tremors could be felt running up the leafy arms.

“Plants Must Slay” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, April 1942) has an interplanetary plant-hunter send a vengeful plant creature to the Botanical Gardens on Earth.

“Satellite of Peril” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, August 1942) John Carstairs and Vera Dorne face off against the criminal, Strickland, on the moon of Io. Carstairs wins when he throws a glass filled with plant spores.

“Step Into My Garden” by Frank Belknap Long (Unknown Worlds, August 1942) is a strange love fantasy that involves a garden. One of Long’s most elegantly done stories.

“The Ether Robots” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1942) has the stakes increase as John Carstairs has to save all of humanity. The Ether Robots, used for mining on Jupiter, rebel and it is up to Carstairs to put them down. He does this by using an infra-radiant plant as a bomb.

“The Fungi From Yuggoth” by H. P. Lovecraft was a long sonnet cycle about the fungoid Yuggothians created in “The Whisperer in Darkness” back in 1931. The first of these appeared in The Fantasy Fan. For more on Horror poetry, go here.

“The Skeleton Men of Jupiter” by Edgar Rice Burroughs (Amazing Stories, February 1943) is the final tale of John Carter. Burroughs was starting a new series with JC going to Jupiter. In the middle of the book he encounters a gigantic man-eating tree. For more on Edgar Rice Burroughs in the Palmer magazines, go here.

“The Heavy Man” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, April 1943) begins with a mysterious voice threatening the Earth. John Carstairs goes in pursuit, armed with his strange plants. Lichens to the rescue! (Long wrote of interplanetary lichens back in the 1930s Astounding.)

“The Garden of Hell” by Leroy Yerxa (Fantastic Adventures, May 1943) followed two plant spectaculars in the Palmer magazines in 1939. Ray waited four years before offering this tale by Yerxa. Come to a secret valley where the roses will lull you to sleep with their scent. Unfortunately there are also walking vines who will plunge branches into your heart and suck your blood!

“Wobblies in the Moon” by Frank Belknap Long (Thrilling Wonder Stories, June 1943) has a botanist murdered on the Moon. The culprits appear to be ambulatory plants called Wobblies. (I have to wonder if Long was playing with the term “Wobblies” in reference to unionists.) The real killer proves more human.

 

“Greenface” (Unknown Worlds, August 1943) has a weird green face looking at the swamp dwellers. Until it gets hungry!

“The Harmonizer” by A. E. Von Vogt (Astounding Science-Fiction, November 1944) has a spaceship filled with Ibis plants crash-land on Earth during the time of the dinosaurs. World War II ends when the plants finally send their perfume out to create Peace everywhere.

“The Plant Man” by Arthur G. Stangland (Thrilling Wonder Stories, Spring 1945) has Jefferson Smith, mild-mannered Science teacher, injecting himself with chlorophyll, turning him into a plant man. His experiment is a flop but he gets the girl.

“The Hollow World” by Frank Belknap Long (Startling Stories, Summer 1945) For John Carstairs’ final case, the detective travels to the distant edge of the Solar System, to the twelfth planet. Working with the I. B. I. (Interplanetary Bureau of Investigation) he faces an ancient evil. To do this, he uses a Cobra Fern. His longest and most Lovecraftian of the series.

“Sweet Mystery of Life” by John Russell Fearn (New Worlds #1, 1946) reprinted in Thrilling Wonder Stories, February 1947. Harvey Maxted has a plant-woman mysteriously pop up in his greenhouse. She is from the moon of Venus, and knows many scientific wonders. Too bad the cold killed her.

“The Plants” by Murray Leinster (Astounding Science-Fiction, January 1946) On the planet Aiolo the dominant life form is a plant. Earthmen are stranded on the planet and slowly lose a war against the floral masters. How do you fight an enemy that can read your mind?

“Tree’s a Crowd” by Robert Bloch (Fantastic Adventures, July 1946) The last story was very scientific and serious. Robert Bloch and Left Feep are the exact opposite, playing for laughs. Lefty needs money to pay his alimony. To make some cash he agrees to an experiment for a food scientist. The result is turning into a tree.

“Call Me Demon” by Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore (as Keith Hammond) (Thrilling Wonder Stories, Fall 1946) The Kuttner/Moore team appeared here earlier. They return with children guarding a giant flower that devours adult victims. This is a tale about the differences between kids and their parents.

The Forbidden Garden by John Taine (1947) is a lost race novel set in Tibet. The soil from that forbidden place cause plants to grow into monsters. P. Schuyler Miller (who wrote a plant monster story or two himself) reviewed the book favorably.

Greener Than You Think by Ward Moore (1947) was the author’s first novel. Bermuda Grass takes over California then the rest of the world, pushing out other plants and animals. The satire criticizes government that is unable to face the crisis.

“Fatal Oak” by M. P. Dare (Unholy Relics and Other Uncanny Tales, 1947) has a chair made from the wood of a gibbet tree cause those who sit on it to die.

“The Green Dimension” by N. Wesley Firth (Strange Adventures, February 1947) has an alternate reality filled with crawling plants and bulls perfectly camouflaged in green.

“The Orchid Death” by Alexander Wallace (Jungle Stories, Fall 1947) has a giant orchid worshiped by cultists. Women are sacrificed to the blossom, that shoots red blood when it is finally destroyed. I thought Wallace was a house name, but apparently not.

“Mr. Zytztz Goes to Mars” by Noel Loomis (Thrilling Wonder Stories, August 1948) (I wonder if he is any relation to Mr. Mxyzptlk?) Loomis does a short novel about two Earthmen who search for the origin of the strange Martians plants.

John Carstairs, Space Detective (1949) collects the John Carstairs stories in one volume.

“The Lavender Vine of Death” by Don Wilcox (Fantastic Adventures, September 1948) is a short novel. From the planet Karridonza comes a vine with terrible powers and hungers. The tale feels more medieval than Science Fictional with kings and castles (and ray guns).

“The Citadel of Green Death” by Emmett McDowell (Planet Stories, Fall 1948) is set on a slave colony/experimental station on Asgard. Joel meets Tamis the green girl. What experiments has Dr. Hakkyt been up to? And what of the carnivorous Nigel Trees?

“Come Into My Parlour” by Manly Wade Wellman (The Girl With the Hungry Eyes and Other Stories, 1949) features the Gardinal, a plant monster that looks like a house. Lonely travelers mistake it for shelter and become dinner. For more on Wellman’s monsters, go here.

“Alien Earth” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, April 1949) has Farris, a botanist enter the world of plants with a drug that makes plants seem to move faster. Hamilton got the idea fro watching time-lapse photography. For more on this story and all the plant monsters of Edmond Hamilton, go here.

“Garden of Evil” by Margaret St. Clair (Planet Stories, Summer 1949) Ericson, an outcast drug addict, goes to the planet Fyhon to find the dead city of Dridihad. He follows the plant girl, Mnathl, there for a strange purpose. For more on Planet Stories, go here.

“Invasion of the Plant-Men” by Berkeley Livingston (Fantastic Adventures, September 1949) has space seeds landing on Earth and turning into an invasion force of tiny green men. Bullets don’t hurt them but fire does!

“The Gardener” by Margaret St. Clair (Thrilling Wonder Stories, October 1949) has a bureaucrat who thinks that he is above the law. That law protects the sacred Butandra Tree. The Gardener comes to Hobbs to exact a terrible revenge. The illustration for this tale has swipes from the work of Harry Clarke. Since the artist is uncredited we don’t know who to point the finger at.

Conclusion

The Plant Monsters of the 1940s feel different than those in previous decades, including the 1930s. Less Horror, more humor or other issues, seem to be the case. Science Fiction writers, as always, put them to different uses in their fiction. Writers certainly use more short-hand when dealing with plant critters. There is no need to explain what a plant monster is because they have existed in fiction since 1869. Clare Winger Harris listed them as one of the themes of Science Fiction back in 1931. For a Pulp writer in 1949, there is no need to do much but advance the plot along and let the green devils do their business. There is almost a feeling that the idea has been played out. (The comic books start using them too!) Thank goodness, John Wyndham is on the horizon!

Next… the 1950s and The Day of the Triffids…