{{Short description|American writer and editor (1917–2019)}} {{Infobox person | name = Frances Yerxa Hamling | image = FrancesYerxaHamling1970.png | alt = A middle-aged white woman with hair in a bouffant style | caption = Hamling, from a 1970 newspaper | birth_date = September 23, 1917 | birth_place = Onondaga, Michigan, US | death_date = March 3, 2019 | death_place = Caldwell, Idaho US (buried in hometown) | occupation = Writer, editor | spouse = {{plainlist| * Leroy Yerxa, * WIlliam L. Hamling }} | children = 6 }}
'''Frances Ferris Yerxa Hamling''' (September 23, 1917 – March 3, 2019) was an American science fiction writer and editor.
== Early life == Frances Ferris was born in Onondaga, Michigan, the daughter of Harry Longley Ferris and Ora M. Sherd Ferris.<ref name=":0">{{Cite news |date=1935-12-16 |title=Ferris-Yerxa Vows Said at Farm Home |pages=13 |work=Lansing State Journal |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109591209/ferris-yerxa-vows-said-at-farm-home/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> She graduated from high school in 1935.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Toronto |first=Richard |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-mMtqtZMoNYC&q=Frances+&pg=PA177 |title=War over Lemuria: Richard Shaver, Ray Palmer and the Strangest Chapter of 1940s Science Fiction |date=2013-04-25 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=978-0-7864-7307-6 |pages=54–58, 177–178, 241 |language=en}}</ref>
== Career == Frances Yerxa wrote essays and science fiction, under various bylines (possibly including "Frances M. Deegan", though this may also have been a separate writer).<ref>{{Cite web |title=Summary Bibliography: Frances Yerxa |url=https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?16058 |access-date=2024-05-23 |website=ISFDB}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Bio: Frances M. Deegan |url=https://isfdb.org/wiki/index.php/Bio:Frances_M._Deegan |access-date=2024-05-23 |website=ISFDB}}</ref> She also assisted her second husband in editing pulp magazines. She was managing editor of the magazines ''Imagination'' and ''Imaginative Tales'' from 1953 to 1958,<ref>[http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/yerxa_leroy "Leroy Yerxa"] ''SFE: The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'' (August 12, 2018).</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Davin |first=Eric Leif |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZoNDebTvUnsC&dq=Frances+Hamling&pg=PA133 |title=Partners in Wonder: Women and the Birth of Science Fiction, 1926-1965 |date=2006 |publisher=Lexington Books |isbn=978-0-7391-1267-0 |pages=132–133 |language=en}}</ref> and executive editor of ''Rogue'', a men's magazine. As an officer of Greenleaf Publishing, she was a co-defendant with her husband in 1965, when the company was charged with copyright infringement.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Grove Press, Inc. v. Greenleaf Publishing Company, 247 F. Supp. 518 (E.D.N.Y. 1965) |url=https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/247/518/1956600/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |website=Justia Law |language=en}}</ref> In 1976, her ex-husband Hamling served several months in prison for publishing obscene works.<ref>{{Cite news |date=1976-01-04 |title=Publisher, Editor, Heading for Jail |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1976/01/04/archives/publisher-editor-heading-for-jail-terms-start-tomorrow-in-obscenity.html |access-date=2022-09-15 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>
Yerxa's essays for science fiction publications were on various topics, from comets and telescopes to "ancient barbering customs", Cambodian dance, and Atlantis. She chaired the auction and registration committees at the tenth World Science Fiction Convention, known as Chicon II, in 1952.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Worldcon |url=http://archive.org/details/chicon-ii-worldcon |title=Chicon II |date=1952}}</ref>
In 1964, Frances Hamling and her husband bought a fully-furnished Arthur Elrod house in Palm Springs, California, but promised the former owner that they would not change it in any way. Rugs, appliances, even ashtrays and a candy dish were left in place for years;<ref>{{Cite web |last=McKenna |first=Joan |date=2018-12-31 |title=Arthur Elrod Escape House Exactly as He Left it in 1964 |url=https://www.palmspringslife.com/arthur-elrod-escape-house/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |website=Palm Springs Life |language=en-US}}</ref> the house is still considered "an incredible time capsule" of mid-century modern decor.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Cygelman |first=Adele |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WTeEDwAAQBAJ&dq=Frances+Hamling&pg=PT219 |title=Arthur Elrod: Desert Modern Design |date=2019-02-12 |publisher=Gibbs Smith |isbn=978-1-4236-4879-6 |language=en}}</ref>
== Personal life == Frances Ferris married twice; her first husband was writer Leroy Yerxa; they married in the 1935<ref name=":0" /> and had four children together before Leroy died in 1946. She remarried in 1948, to magazine editor William Lawrence Hamling. She had two more children with Hamling; they divorced in 1967, but continued to live together for some time after that.<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite news |date=1971-06-21 |title=Admit One Or More Hungry Guests' It Read |pages=6 |work=The Desert Sun |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109599755/admit-one-or-more-hungry-guests-it/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> She was active in Palm Springs society,<ref>{{Cite news |date=1970-06-01 |title=DH Auxiliary Names Officers and Award Winners |pages=8 |work=The Desert Sun |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109600060/dh-auxiliary-names-officers-and-award/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=1971-01-21 |title=Hamlings to Sponsor Sun Gala |pages=6 |work=The Desert Sun |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109611256/hamlings-to-sponsor-sun-gala/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> including the League of Women Voters.<ref>{{Cite news |date=January 21, 1967 |title=League of Women Voters Holds Organizational Meet |pages=8 |work=Desert Sun |url=https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=DS19670121.2.45&srpos=5&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN-Frances+Hamling-------1 |access-date=September 15, 2022 |via=California Digital Newspaper Collection}}</ref> She also lived in Nampa, Idaho in her later years.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2019-03-05 |title=Obituary for Frances Hamling (Aged 101) |pages=C5 |work=The Idaho Statesman |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109611742/obituary-for-frances-hamling-aged-101/ |access-date=2022-09-15 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> She died in 2019, in Caldwell, Idaho at the age of 101.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Frances Ferris-Yerxa-Hamling Obituary |url=https://www.vickersfuneralhomes.com/obituaries/Frances-Ferris-Yerxa-Hamling?obId=21268434 |access-date=2022-09-15 |website=Vickers Funeral Homes}}</ref>
== References == {{reflist}}
== External links ==
* Jean Marie Stine, [https://books.google.com/books?id=a_pcDwAAQBAJ ''Pink Winds, Green Cats, Radiant Rocks & Other Classics by the Forgotten Woman of Science Fiction's Golden Age''] (A&T Books 2005). A collection of Deegan's works. * Eric Leif Davin, [https://parsec-sff.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/December-2017-Issue-381.pdf "Brief Bios: Frances Yerxa (Hamling)"] ''Sigma 381'' (December 2017). {{authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yerxa, Frances}} Category:American science fiction writers Category:20th-century American women writers Category:People from Eaton Rapids, Michigan Category:1917 births Category:2019 deaths Category:American women centenarians