There’s an amazing 1963 documentary over at the Internet Archive titled Ray Bradbury: Story of a Writer by David L. Wolper that you should all rush over and watch. It’s wonderful seeing Bradbury, now almost 90, at age 43, more than half his lifetime ago.

Go, enjoy, but I’d like you to pay special attention to a particular section that fascinated me. Beginning at 18:20, we see Bradbury workshop his short story “Dial Double Zero.” The narrator tells us, “Every other Friday for the past 14 years, Bradbury and a group of friends have met to read and criticize each other’s work.” But—who are these friends? They’re unidentified in the documentary, and I don’t recognize them. Are they members of the California SF community at the time? Or local non-SF writers we wouldn’t know?

There were seven writers in attendance for the filmed session, two of whom are only visible in a long shot from the backs of their heads. Below are screen grabs of the five who could be seen in close-ups.

Can you name them?

UPDATE: Mark Walsh pointed out that one of the women pictured is Mrs. Bradbury. And based on 21:52 in the video, which shows Bradbury’s wife in bed editing his manuscript, it seems clear that the first of the two women pictured is indeed his wife. Good catch on his part!

The other four participants remain unknown.