Fantasy Publishing Company, Inc.

Fantasy Publishing Company, Inc., or FPCI, was an American science fiction and fantasy small press specialty publishing company established in 1946. It was the fourth small press company founded by William L. Crawford.

Crawford's first company was Fantasy Publications which he started in 1935 in Everett, Pennsylvania, primarily to publish his magazines Marvel Tales and Unusual Stories. However, three books were published under the imprint.

In 1936, Crawford initiated his second company, Visionary Publishing Company, with the intention of publishing books with this imprint. Visionary is notable for publishing the only hardcover book by H. P. Lovecraft that was published during his lifetime.[1]

Later in 1936, Crawford assumed management of publication of Fantasy Magazine from Conrad H. Ruppert and ceased all book publications in order to concentrate on the magazine. After relocating to California, Crawford again published books as "A Crawford Publication".

Finally, he incorporated as Fantasy Publishing Company, Inc. in December 1946. Forrest J. Ackerman served as a partner for the company and many of the books published by FPCI were from authors Ackerman represented as agent. Undercapitalization was a major problem with FPCI and many of the books had a cheap look. FPCI reprinted a number of novels by John Taine, Ralph Milne Farley, Stanton Coblentz and L. Ron Hubbard. FPCI continued publishing books until 1972.

During this period, Crawford also used the Griffin Publishing Company to publish books which were not science fiction or fantasy. Two additional books were published by Crawford in 1978, but a publisher was not cited.