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Thursday, June 26, 2014

ARCHIE ANNUAL #1
(On Newsstands in October 1949)

Big things were brewing at MLJ publishing, and not just with Romance knock offs!
Archie Annual #1 hit the stands in October of 1949, with a Bob Montana cover and a whopping 116 pages of new material!

(from Archie Annual #1 - art by Bob Montana) 

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I’m sure in the editorial meetings there was some speculation as to if they could sell a big 25 cent Archie Comic, even if it had 116 pages of all new material, but I guess they figured it was worth a try!

On the inside front cover, they went all out to remind everyone that this was for YOU THE READER and as a FIRST EDITION (all caps!) it just might be worth something some day and it’s all Brand New (in Italics) and yadda yadda yadda...

Sheesh! We like Archie already! We’re gonna buy it!
(from Archie Annual #1 - o/s Oct 1949)



You’ll notice Ray Gill signed the opening splash, but to the right of Archie’s leg we see Samm Scwartz’s (Sam S) scrawled on the floorboard.

According to Grand Comics Database (www.comics.org), this was Gill’s script and Schwartz’s art. Not sure, but my guess is it’s a combination of Gill and Schwartz art, though it’s certainly possible Gill wrote the story (based on a premise we’d seen in Archie before).


(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Notes to You’ - art by Samm Schwartz and Ray Gill)



What we’d see throughout is a collaborative effort from the artists (I believe), here again with art by Samm Schwartz and Ray Gill.

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Notes to You’ - art by Samm Schwartz and Ray Gill)


Archie gets more than he bargained for in a dance with Veronica’s mom... 

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Gym Dandy’ art by Samm Schwartz and Ray Gill)


An ad for Darling Love and Darling Romance...
(from Archie Annual #1)


A Jughead solo story - they should give him his own comic already (heh heh) - Here, Archie checks out a female passerby, as Reggie messes with Jughead.

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Who’s Zoo’ - art by unknown, but it looks like it has some Red Holmdale in it.)


Getting pretty fancy with these ads, putting the actual comic in it!
(from Archie Annual #1)


Here Bill Vigoda and Ray Gill team up...

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘The Rug Cutter’ - art by Bill Vigoda and Ray Gill)



A full page ad for Laugh, Suzie, and Wilbur

(from Archie Annual #1)


Another Jughead solo story (sort of), done by an artist I don’t recognize - anyone have any ideas on it?

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘The Pin-up’ - artist unknown)


Bill Vigoda

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘The Bugaboo Buster’ - art by Bill Vigoda)


Samm has a clever way of signing his name to the art!

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Fat’s the Spirit’ art by Samm Schwartz)



They may have filtered out some of the sexuality, but there are still things you would not see in today’s Archie Comic!
(And there’s actually a good message in the story as Archie learns a lesson.)

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Fat’s the Spirit’ art by Samm Schwartz)


I’m not going to give away the story, but seriously, there’s a good message in it all…

(from Archie Annual #1 - ‘Fat’s the Spirit’ art by Samm Schwartz)



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Thursday, June 12, 2014

DARLING LOVE #1-11
(On Newsstands in Aug 1949 though October 1952)
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Hot on the heels of Darling Romance, came the similarly titled Darling Love!
(from Darling Love #1 - August 1949)


Not to be confused with Gilmore Magazine’s one shot Daring Love #1 (which wouldn’t come out for another 4 years), featuring one of the great one shot covers of the Golden Age AND the first published work of Steve Ditko! (Inside, not on the cover)
(from Daring Love #1 - Oct 1953)


More tales of romance, and longing, and … boating?
(from Darling Love #1 - August 1949)


I wish I knew who some of these artists were…
(from Darling Love #1 - August 1949)


Yeah, I know the melodrama gets ramped up pretty high in these stories, but… ya know… it’s all good fun!
(from Darling Love #1 - August 1949)


Yeah… there was no way I was passing this one up!
(from Darling Love #1 - August 1949)


Ya gotta love tough girls!
With an attitude perfectly suited for Pre-Code Comics!
(from Darling Love #1 - August 1949)


Apparently this kind of behavior is nothing new! 
(from Darling Love #2 - Oct 1949)


Seriously, I could look at these things all day…
(from Darling Love #2 - Oct 1949)


Can you guess what they’re trying to imply is getting ready to happen?
(from Darling Love #2 - Oct 1949)

No girl has ever faced a more difficult decision than mine...!
(from Darling Love #8 - June 1951)

Like Darling Romance, Darling Love went from picture covers to artwork...
(from Darling Love #8 - June 1951)

It held on longer than Darling Romance, but it’s last 3 issues strung out over a year and a half. And just like that the torrid romance phase of MLJ was over… the expansion however was NOT…
(from Darling Love #11 - Oct 1952)




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Find some more modern Archie stories here:





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Saturday, June 7, 2014

DARLING ROMANCE #1-7
(On Newsstands in Aug 1949 though November 1950)

Comic Books were booming business in 1949 and Archie Comics had competition from plenty of places with Buzzy, Candy, Frankie and Lana, Hedy De Vine, Joker Comics, Patsy Walker, and more.

None of them could touch Archie.

But two years earlier, Jack Kirby and Joe Simon’s Young Romance #1 (1947) had set the comic world on fire as the first ‘romance’ comic. Suddenly there was a comic on the stands that could appeal to guys AND girls.

(Young Romance #1 - 1947 - Jack Kirby and Joe Simon)

Tones of imitators followed including ‘Actual Romances’, ‘Love Romances’, ‘Love Tales’, ‘Lovers’, etc., etc. When MLJ decided to give the genre a try, they hit the stands with Darling Romance #1 in August of 1949.

Dig that Bettie Page hair-do, a couple of years BEFORE Bettie Page first started to appear in magazines! The contents page says ‘Cover Girl - Kevin Daley (Miss Army Day 1949)’

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)


Hey! Everything in this comic is written by a female!
Wonder why they didn’t play that up more? Was MLJ way ahead of their time?

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)



Most of the title pages were pieces of art unto themselves. The layout and design, the hook to pull you in... just great stuff!

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)


Hey, one of these stories actually has an artist that thought to sign his name to the work… Bill Fix.

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949 art by Bill Fix)




And of course, teaching a girl how to do her make up is essential…

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)


It may be a romance comic (and I’m ok with that), but… look at that architecture, the design of the page, the late afternoon shadow laying across the building… good stuff!

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)


As melodramatic as most of the stories were (enjoyable, but not overly memorable), it was almost a relief when someone got killed!

(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)


$5 for each ‘Thrill of a Lifetime’ story from one of the readers! That’s like $48.35 in today’s dollars!
(from Darling Romance #1 - Aug 1949)


Darling Romance only lasted 7 issues, a little over a year, and by the time it got to the final issue they’d abandoned the photo cover and went with THIS little slice of headlight work.

(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)


Besides repeating the scene as the splash page, we also get more strangling from Daddy, at a nice provocative angle. It’s the last issue, damn the torpedoes!

(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)


Rebellious girl? Check. Tortured romance? Check? Abusive Dad? Check. Show some panty hose!

(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)


Wow! You can really tell things were ramping up pre-code, eh?
Even at MLJ… 

(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)


Holy Cow! Is that Peter Parker’s mom and dad? 

(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)


I swear, I could just admire these splash panels all day…

(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)


It took them 6 more issue for an artist to actually sign his name to his work… Sam Cooper! (He’d been around for years, even doing some Mr. Justice stories for MLJ!)


(from Darling Romance #7 - November 1950)

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Find some more modern Archie stories here:





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