history, include the critically-acclaimed account of the great steamboat race between the Robert E. Lee and the Natchez. Wellman's best-known biographical work, Giant in Gray (1949), was based on his namesake, Confederate General Wade Hampton. Wellman wrote and published significant nonfiction works about the Old South, including county histories, throughout the 1950s and would continue to do so through to the 1970s. Most of Wellman's work in the 1950s was devoted to young adult stories and science fiction novels. He produced no fewer than five science fiction novels in this decade, though one was a version of a long story previously published in the pulps. Two of his short stories were filmed in this decade for the television show Lights Out. He also wrote a western novel, Fort Sun Dance (1955), apparently his only venture into that genre. The 1960s: Science Fiction and Silver John Wellman wrote two science fiction novels in the sixties – Island in the Sky and also Candle of the Wicked (1960); which novelized the events leading up to the discovery of the Bender killings. His Captain Future novel The Solar Invasion was reprinted in paperback. His best-known series dates from this period and is composed of stories featuring the Appalachian woodsman and minstrel hero known as "John". These were first published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. The first stories of John were collected in Who Fears the Devil? (1963), based on the personal enthusiasm of August Derleth. Although Wellman only ever called the character "John" or "John the guitar picker", his later publishers Doubleday and Dell labelled the series Silver John as they felt the name was a better way of marketing the books. The 1970s and '80s: Resurgence and Twilight Years The 1970s and 1980s marked a resurgence in Wellman's output and an increased attention to his legacy. Much of his best short general fantasy work over the years was collected by Karl Edward Wagner in Worse Things Waiting (1973), which won Wellman a World Fantasy Award and revived interest in his work. His 1975 novel Sherlock Holmes' War of the Worlds was collected from a series of Sherlock Holmes pastiches stories co-written with his son Wade Wellman and originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction Between 1979 and 1984 Wellman wrote five new novels featuring Silver John and in roughly the same period produced two full length