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Recognition by 2014. Courtesy Mike Ashley et al., our magazine has become listed in the online SF-Encyclopedia with at least one entry: Deep Outside SFFH later Far Sector SFFH 1998-2007. There is also a stub pointing to this link from Outside: Speculative & Dark Fiction, our initial publication name on 15 April 1998 before threats of a law suit from a backpacking magazine. Brian and I then came up with the new name Deep Outside as a compromise. We soon added SFFH for SEO and as a concept sharpener.
In the course of our ten year run, we* published many talented newcomers, a few of whom went on to Nebula, Hugo, and other major awards or nominations. We also published at least one Nebula Award recipient (the late Pat York), and at least two SFWA officers including Linda Dunna and Dr. Andrew Burt. With the folding of Ellen Datlow's Event Horizon in the fall of 1998, we became the world's oldest web-only magazine without print antecedents, paying SFWA professional rates and following all their rules for a professional organization, until we ended our run in early 2007. By *we, I include such dedicated staffers as A. L. Sirois, Dennis Latham, John K. Muir, and Shaun Farrell. Brian (and Gwen Callahan, who had helped read submissions) left me as sole proprietor in 2001, at which point I kept the magazine but changed its name to Far Sector SFFH (which happened to be a domain name I had recently acquired and wasn't sure what to do with, though I really liked it and still do). We had changed Clocktower Fiction to Clocktower Books, and I became sole proprietor of the publishing house as well (Clocktower Books ISBN prefix 0-7433).
Mike Ashley, historian of 20th Century SFFH Magazines. I have been in touch with Mike Ashley (prominent U.K. anthologist and researcher) over the past few years. He is, among other things, the editor of many Mammoth anthologies. Mike's impressive projects include a signature history of 20th Century SFFH magazines in four volumes, his Story of the Science Fiction Magazines series. Mike originally sought me out a few years ago as he was beginning to plan the fourth and last volume, yet to be released from University of Liverpool Press at this writing (11 July 2014). He is an astute and detailed researcher, and had already done his homework well. He had found us (Deep Outside SFFH, Far Sector SFFH, Clocktower Fiction) on The Wayback Machine among other references (The SF Magazine in Canada; John Labovitz' list from the 1990s; and more). Recently, we pieced together, as best we could from my old notes and folders, a history of this magazine (1998-2007). I will add more notes to this update, but it appears that we are finally going to be on the historical map. Presumably, that means we can soon have a Wikipedia page as well, which should open up a link section to Clocktower Books as well. This is just one of several positive things that are happening this year to put Clocktower Books better on the map. We became a recognized publisher of International Thriller Writers (ITW) in 2009. Mike Ashley's will undoubtedly be the final, comprehensive, and definitive history of SFFH magazines in the 20th Century, and our magazine helps end the final chapters in that saga as the Internet age started breaking open in the late 1990s. More info to follow soon.—JTC
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