100 Days of Anime: Day Thirty – Historical Intermission

We’re a little over 3,000 words into our brief history of anime. We’re 30 days and 21,619 words into this anime challenge. I have spent the better part of the last several nights doing some really heavy duty research into anime history, and tonight, time and energy forced me to take a brief break. But the challenge must go on.

The ’90s are proving to be a challenging time period to write about because much of the action shifts toward what’s popular in America, so many of my sources all but ignore the creative happenings in Japan. The plan going forward is to finish up the history of anime over the next three or four days and then double back for an even briefer history of manga.

I did uncover a bit of a mystery figure in my research that I’m not going to include in the ’90s post. In a post on Rightstuf that I suspect is from the late ’90s, they mention fan translator Sue Shambaugh.

If I’m using context clues correctly Shambaugh would charge a small fee to translate videos sent to her and send a script back along with the video. She would then make these translations available to other fans who would read along with the anime.

I did my usual Google snooping, but I’ve come up on a dead end. I see that her name is on a few early guest lists for anime convention Otakun. I have found a Twitter I suspect belongs to her and mention of “VIZ v Sue Shambaugh.” I don’t know if the latter is an actual legal case or just an event. Citizen Nik also found a mention of her related to Legend of the Galactic Heroes. A little more Googling based on this info shows her to have been the first translator for LotGH.

But that’s all I can find. There’s no mention of her impact, no mention of her current whereabouts. The Rightstuf article makes her sound central to the American fan community, but I’m turning up a Shambaugh-shaped hole. If anyone reading this has any good info, there might be a No-Prize in it for you.

Meanwhile, I’m going to go catch up on some anime that I haven’t been watching because I’ve been too busy reading about anime. If you’re not checking out comedy short series Asobi Asobase or intense badminton show Hanebado!, you’re missing out. They’re both on Crunchyroll.