Donald Featherstone & Wargamer's Newsletter

The Don gets mentioned in quite a lot of my blog posts - his was the major influence during my formative years as a wargamer in the late 1960s and early 70s. I also have a bit of a soft spot for old wargaming magazines, so I was very pleased recently to be steered towards a site which has pdf versions of most of the editions of Wargamer's Newsletter, the legendary gaming fanzine produced by Mr Featherstone from 1962 to 1980. 

This online collection is a remarkable record, with only the very early magazines from 1962-64 missing. It is fascinating to see how the magazine developed and improved over the years, from the typed, copied and stapled early productions with their barely discernable illustrations to the really rather professional final editions. I have 4 original copies at home, including one from November 1964 which I managed to get on eBay a while back. The other 3 are from 1979, which I actually bought over the counter at the old Tradition shop just off Picadilly when I worked in London. I hated the job but loved to get out in my lunchbreak to places like Tradition and the Charing Cross Market where there was a great record stall.

Believed to be from the April 1964 edition,
one of those missing from the online collection.

If you're up for a bit of nostalgia, I'd highly recommend visiting the site. Truth be told, apart from nostalgia, the magazines themselves often have little to offer the contemporary gamer. What I'm usually looking for are scenarios, but they are surprisingly few and far between. This is an area where modern magazines score quite highly over the older publications. But there is always the possibility of finding something really interesting. For example, the January 1966 edition features some Napoleonic wargames rules by a certain Philip Barker - which extend to a magnificent two and a bit typewritten pages. What is clear is that the magazine was a genuine attempt to bring gamers together and give them a voice, in a pre-internet world.

Talking of interesting snippets, I found the following editorial in the August 1964 edition, the oldest in the collection. Rather than quote from it, I'll give you the whole thing. What interested me is the relevance to a post of mine from August regarding the professionalisation and commercialisation of the hobby, and the possible conflict of this process with the hobby's amateur roots. I won't labour the point, but the subject was obviously concerning Donald Featherstone all of sixty years ago. 

Click to expand and read more easily.

So, if you have half an hour to fill, dipping in to this resource is certainly worth it. For gamers of my age it's pure nostalgia, and for younger gamers it's a pretty good insight into our hobby in its early years.

'Til next time!