author

William J. McClellan

A little-known science fiction writer from the 1950s, remembered today for a witty, unsettling tale that flips the usual human-and-dog relationship on its head. His surviving work has the brisk, idea-driven feel of classic magazine SF.

1 Audiobook

Earth's Gone to the Dogs!

Earth's Gone to the Dogs!

by William J. McClellan

About the author

Very little biographical information about this author is easy to confirm in reliable public sources. What can be confirmed is that William J. McClellan wrote "Earth's Gone to the Dogs!", a science fiction short story published in Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy in October 1954.

That story has stayed in circulation through Project Gutenberg, which lists McClellan as the author and currently shows this as the only work by him in its catalog. The story's premise is playful but sharp: in a future shaped by atomic war, a discovery from the past threatens to overturn what society believes about the place of humans and dogs.

Because so little verified background is available, McClellan remains one of those mid-century magazine writers known more for a memorable concept than for a well-documented personal history. That scarcity gives his work an air of mystery, while the story itself still offers the clever speculative twist that drew readers to classic pulp-era science fiction.