This vibrant image shows an imagined future in which people traveled in floating spheres on a lunar colony. Rudolph Belarski’s illustration graced the 1953 cover of Orbit magazine and surely grabbed the attention of those browsing the selections of a newsstand. The cover story by August Delerth titled A New “Tex Harrigan” Adventure: A Traveler in Time follows a New York City-based reporter who becomes acquainted with a man named Vanderkamp. The eccentric inventor claims he has successfully designed a time-traveling machine. Derleth’s short story continues with anecdotes of Vanderkamp’s journey back to the Dutch Colony of New Amsterdam in 1650, now the present-day Bowery of New York City.

Berlarski was born in a mining town of Pennsylvania to Galician immigrant parents. He started working in the local coal mines at the age of twelve and labored for ten years, all the while taking night art courses. At 22, he moved to New York City to study at the Pratt Institute which launched his career as an illustrator for adventure pulp magazines. Too old to enlist in World War II, Belarski lent his talents to the United Service Organizations and drew portraits of hospitalized servicemen. In 1956, Belarski joined the Famous Artists School as an instructor of correspondence art until he retired from his professional career.