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American science fiction magazines first appeared in the 1920s with the appearance of Amazing Stories, a pulp magazine published by Hugo Gernsback. The beginnings of science fiction as a separately marketed genre can be traced to this time, and by the end of the 1930s the field was undergoing its first boom,^[2] but World War II and its attendant paper shortages led to the demise of several titles. By the late 1940s the market began to recover again.^[3] From a low of eight active magazines in 1946, the field expanded to 20 in 1950, and a further 22 had commenced publication by 1954.^[4] Imagination was launched in the middle of this publishing boom.

The groundwork was laid in 1947, when Clark Publishing, the company that would publish the first issue of Imagination, was incorporated in Evanston, Illinois, by Raymond Palmer. He worked for Ziff-Davis as the editor of Amazing Stories and did not leave until the end of 1949, but he launched two magazines under the Clark name before that date: Fate, in the spring of 1948, and Other Worlds, the first issue of which was dated November 1949.^[5] Both of these magazines listed their editor as "Robert N. Webster", a pseudonym Palmer adopted while he was still at Ziff-Davis because of the conflict of interest. The second issue of Other Worlds reported that Webster and Palmer were going to edit together; by the third issue, dated March 1950, the pretense had been dropped and although there was no masthead listing the editor, the editorial was simply signed "Rap" (for "Raymond A. Palmer"). At the 1949 World Science Fiction Convention in Cincinnati, held over the weekend of 3–5 September, Palmer announced that he had left Ziff-Davis and described his plans for Clark Publishing. He also met and hired Bea Mahaffey, a 21-year-old science fiction fan attending her first convention, as his assistant editor.^[6][7]