The Mutant
Issue 2.2 May 1948
Cover art by Norman Kussuth
The Mutant was a science fiction fanzine published in the late 1940s by Ben Singer in Detroit, Michigan, U.S.A.
The first issue was released in October 1946; the second in December 1946. For these issues, the Assistant Editor was Walter A. Coslet (The Scientifictionist), and the Associate Editors were Henry Elsner (The Scientifictionist, Thots), Joe Kennedy (Vampire), Rick Sneary (Moonshine), Tigrina (Hymn To Satan), and Gerry Williams.
In October 1947, Singer started the numbering over again, and the zine became the Official Organ of the Michigan Science Fantasy Society. This second series ran at least eleven issues, with issue #4.4 coming out in August 1949.
Contributors of prose included Norman Ashfield (Alembic), Redd Boggs (Sky Hook, The Lovecraftsman), Donn Brazier (Frontier), Raymond L. Clancy, Bill Groover, Wiiliam James, David H. Keller, Joe Kennedy, C. Stewart Metchette, Radell (Ray) Nelson, Art Rapp (Spacewarp), Hal Shapiro (Hallucinations), Bill Warren (De Profundis), H.S. Weatherby (Shivers), George H. Young (Tailgate), and the editors.
Contributors of poetry included Richard E. Avery, Redd Boggs (as Theophilus Alvor), Isabelle E. Dinwiddie, E.E. Eischied, Gerald Gordon, Con Pederson (IF!, The Outlander), Arthur H. Rapp, Genevieve K. Stephens (Loki), Tigrina, and Bill Warren.
Cover art was by John Cockroft (Stellarite) (#1.2, first series), Algis Budrys (Slantasy) (#1.1, second series), Norman Kussuth (#2.2), Rick Sneary (#4.4), and others.
Ben Singer also published a zine titled Singeroid. He is probably the most notorious member of the Michigan Science Fiction Society, where antics such as attempting to cross the border to Canada in the 1950s at the height of the "Red Scare" carrying a copy of the book Banish Gods From the Skies and Capitalists from the Earth made him infamous in science fiction fandom.
