The British Science Fiction Adventures began life as a foreign edition of the American magazine by the same name, established in November 1952 under the editorship of Lester Del Ray. The British editor, John Carnell, agreed in September 1956 to publish a British version as 'down-market' companion to the magazines New Worlds and Science Fantasy. The first British edition appeared in January 1958. The first five issues of the British Science Fiction Adventures were not issue-for-issue reprints of the American periodical, but drew material from a number of American issues.
The American parent publication ceased in April 1958, but sales were sufficiently good to justify the continued production of the British edition. By the sixth issue, Carnell dropped the American content, and Science Fiction Adventures became a British magazine. According to Mike Ashley, 'it is the only example of a foreign edition of an sf magazine taking on an identity of its own and outliving its parent' (p.167).
Source: Mike Ashley, Transformations: The Story of Science-Fiction Magazines from 1950 to 1970, Liverpool University Press, 2005.
