Carl Jacobi (1908-1997) has been called a Weird Tales also-ran but that is to miss so much about this fascinating writer. He was very much a Master of the Weird Tale as this post calls him but he was so much more. Unlike contemporaries like Robert Bloch, Fritz Leiber or Henry Kuttner, Carl never wrote novels. He was a short story writer through-and-through. No comic books, no screenplays. He wrote a series of stories over seven decades in the Horror (and Shudder Pulps), sea adventure, Mystery and Science Fiction genres. Great range for a guy from Minnesota. (Ironically, he didn’t write Westerns.) The writer he most reminds me of is another under-rated master, Frank Belknap Long.
Carl was a journalist by trade. He attended the University of Minnesota in 1929 and 1930, where he was a classmate of Donald Wandrei. He met August Derleth in 1931. Derleth would publish much of his work after the Pulps died. He later held correspondence with other famous writers including Hugh B. Cave and Arthur O. Friel. Clifford D. Simak became his friend when he moved to Minneapolis in 1939.
During the time of this post, Carl would publish his first collection, Revelations in Black (1947) with Arkham House. The majority of the stories in that book came from Weird Tales, including the titular tale. Farnsworth Wright originally rejected the vampire classic then wrote Jacobi back, asking for it. The images in it haunted his mind. Wright knew he had to publish it. Weird Tales has often been described as being not a magazine, but a club. Carl Jacobi was definitely a member of that club.
For more on Jacobi’s life, go here.
1920s
1928
“Mive” (Minnesota Quarterly, Fall 1928) reprinted in Weird Tales, January 1932
“Rumbling Cannon” (Secret Service Stories, September 1928)
1929
“The Borgian Chandelier” (Minnesota Quarterly, Fall 1929)
1930s
1930
“Enter Stephen Benedict” (Minnesota Quarterly, Winter 1930)
“The Masked Orange” (Minnesota Quarterly, Spring 1930)
“The Cravin’” (Ski-U-Mah, May 1930)
“Moss Island” (The Quest, May 1930) reprinted in Amazing Stories February 1966
1931
“The Haunted Ring” (Ghost Stories, December 1931/January 1932)
1932
“Moss Island”, (Amazing Stories Quarterly Winter 1932) revised from earlier version.
1933
“Revelations in Black” (Weird Tales, April 1933)
“The Last Drive” (Weird Tales, June 1933)
“A Pair of Swords” (Weird Tales, August 1933)
“The Tomb from Beyond” (Wonder Stories, November 1933)
1934
“Smoke of the Snake” (Top-Notch, January 1934)
“The Bantam Ben Hur” (Wild West Stories and Complete Novel Magazine #105, March 1934)
“The Cane” (Weird Tales, April 1934)
“Crocodile” (Street & Smith’s Complete Stories, April 30, 1934)
“The Satanic Piano” (Weird Tales, May 1934)
“Phantom Brass” (Railroad Stories, August 1934) reprinted in Railroad Magazine December 1961
“Jungle Wires” (Street & Smith’s Complete Stories, September 24, 1934)
“Letter of Dismissal” (Top-Notch, October 1934)
“Satan’s Roadhouse” (Terror Tales, October 1934)
1935
“Three Brass Cubes” (Street & Smith’s Complete Stories, January 28 1935)
“Deceit Post” (Street & Smith’s Complete Stories, February 18 1935)
“The Man from Makassar” (Marvel Tales, Summer 1935)
“Sumpitan” (Top-Notch, October 1935)
“Quarry” (Dime Adventure Magazine, December 1935)
1936
“Death Rides the Plateau” (Thrilling Mystery, May 1936)
“The Face in the Wind” (Weird Tales, April 1936)
“Black Passage” (Thrilling Adventures, May 1936)
Letter (Weird Tales, July 1936) in which Carl praises the artwork of Virgil Finlay.
1937
“Spider Wires” (Thrilling Adventures, January 1937) as Jackson Cole
“Dead Man’s River” (Thrilling Adventures, January 1937)
“The World in a Box” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, February 1937)
“Tiger Island” (Thrilling Adventures, May 1937)
“Satan’s Kite” (Thrilling Mystery, June 1937)
“East of Samarinda” (The Skipper, July 1937)
“Balu Guns” (Thrilling Adventures, September 1937)
“A Film in the Bush” (Doc Savage, September 1937)
“Wings for a Monster” (The Phantom Detective, October 1937)
“Head in His Hands” (Thrilling Mystery, November 1937)
“Death on Tin Can” (The Skipper, December 1937)
1938
“The Bells Toll Blood” (Thrilling Mystery, January 1938)
“Holt Sails the ‘San Hing'” (Short Stories, January 25 1938)
“The Devil Deals” (aka “The King and the Knave”) (Weird Tales, April 1938)
“Leopard Tracks” (Short Stories, July 10 1938)
“House of the Ravens” (Thrilling Mystery, September 1938)
“Cosmic Teletype” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, October 1938)
1939
“Murder for Medusa” (Thrilling Mystery, January 1939)
“The War of the Weeds” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, February 1939) reprinted in Fantastic Story Magazine March 1953.
“Death’s Outpost” (Thrilling Mystery, May 1939)
“Drowned Destiny” (12 Adventure Stories, May 1939)
“Flight of the Flame Fiend” (Thrilling Mystery, July 1939)
“Sagasta’s Last” (Strange Stories, August 1939)
“Trial by Jungle” (Thrilling Adventures, September 1939)
“Spawn of Blackness” (aka “A Study in Darkness”) (Strange Stories, October 1939)
“The Twenty-One Crescents” (Thrilling Adventures, November 1939)
1940s
1940
“Sky Trap” (Science Fiction, March 1940)
“Laughter in the Wind” (Thrilling Mystery, May 1940)
“Captain Jinx” (Red Star Adventures, August 1940)
1941
“The Phantom Pistol” (Weird Tales, May 1941)
“The Street That Wasn’t There” with Clifford D. Simak (Comet Stories, July 1941)
“Redemption Trail” (Thrilling Adventures, October 1941)
1942
“Hamadryad Chair” (10 Story Mystery Magazine, February 1942)
1943
“Cosmic Castaway” (Planet Stories, March 1943)
“Assignment on Venus” (Planet Stories, Fall 1943)
“Black Lace” (Thrilling Adventures, November 1943)
1944
“Submarine I-26” (Doc Savage, March 1944)
“Canal” (Startling Stories, Spring 1944)
“The Cosmic Doodler” (aka “Writing on the Wall”) (Startling Stories, Fall 1944)
“Doctor Universe” (Planet Stories, Fall 1944)
1945
“Double Trouble” (Planet Stories, Spring 1945)
“Carnaby’s Fish” (Weird Tales, July 1945)
1946
“Tepondicon” (Planet Stories, Winter 1946)
“Enter the Nebula” (Planet Stories, Fall 1946)
1947
“The Random Quantity” (Avon Fantasy Reader 5, 1947)
“The Corbie Door” (Weird Tales, May 1947)
“The Digging at Pistol Key” (Weird Tales, July 1947)
“Lodana” (Startling Stories, September 1947)
“Portrait in Moonlight” (Weird Tales, November 1947)
1948
“The Lorenzo Watch” (Weird Tales, January 1948)
“The La Prello Paper” (Weird Tales, March 1948)
“Gentlemen, the Scavengers!” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, April 1948)
“The Jade Scarlotti” (Short Stories, July 10, 1948)
“Incident at the Galloping Horse” (Weird Tales, November 1948)
1949
“Factual Fantasies” (The Arkham Sampler, Winter 1949)
“Matthew South and Company” (Weird Tales, May 1949)
