Some interesting trivia from Knowledge@Wharton:
In The Victorian Internet, author Tom Standage recounts the tale — apparently gleaned from the 1849 publication Anecdotes of the Telegraph — of a marriage ceremony conducted over the telegraph. With the bride in Boston and the groom in New York, telegraph operators transmitted the couple’s vows and the words of the magistrate performing the ceremony over the wires. Thus, the world’s first electronic communications network was called into service to connect people in an intimate way.
… During the period of the Second World War, comic books became the nexus of youthful entertainment. For many young people, reading comics was a lonely experience with little opportunity to connect with like-minded fans. Until, that is, 1961 when DC Comics editor Julius “Julie” Schwartz made a small change to the letters page of The Brave and the Bold #35: He included the full name and address of the readers whose letters were published. This seemingly minor change opened the floodgates of fandom. Comic book enthusiasts could now find each other, and a network of connections began to grow that spawned everything from a cottage industry of self-published fan magazines to the rise of comic book conventions.
In the early 1960s, DC rival Marvel Comics — always quick to jump on an emerging fad — began to print the names of members of their fan club, the Merry Marvel Marching Society. I remember scouring each issue for any listings in my hometown. After eventually spotting someone from my hometown, I looked up the name in the phone book and called him. Which titles did he read? Did he have anything to sell or trade? Through this technique — and after convincing my mother to drive me all the way across town to close the deal — I managed to score a copy of The Amazing Spider-Man #4 (featuring the first appearance of the Sandman)…
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