Archie Comics had initially started out in the 1940s as MLJ, and their early features were superhero characters like the Shield (the first patriotic superhero) and the Hangman. Archie himself didn't come along until Pep Comics #22, and wasn't featured on a cover until #36. But he rapidly eclipsed the other characters in MLJ's line, which proved fortunate as the superheros began dying out shortly after the war for almost all the publishers. Archie even got the rare tribute of having a radio series, which popularized the character even more.
In the late 1940s and 1950s, the Archie brand exploded. Archie's buddy Jughead got his own magazine, as did his girlfriends Betty and Veronica. The character proved so popular that they even started publishing Little Archie, the adventures of our hero as a tyke.
But at the same time, the publisher wanted to diversify. In 1959, Jack Kirby was between his short-term gig at DC Comics (where he created Challengers of the Unknown) and his famed period at Marvel. Archie Comics commissioned Joe Simon and him to create a new superhero, initially known as The Fly (later redubbed Flyman). For the next several years Archie Comics labored to create a superhero universe with The Jaguar, a resurrected Shield, Steel Sterling and other superheroes, collectively known as the Mighty Crusaders.
Ironically, nothing worked except a female version of Archie named Josie. Josie had pretty much the standard backup cast for a teen comic. There's Josie's ditzy blonde friend Melody, her (initially beatnik) boyfriend Albert, wealthy Alexander, and brainy (but plain-looking) Pepper. The comic does not appear to have been a big success at first; I don't remember ever seeing these in the spinner rack in my hometown. But it got lucky. In 1968-1969, a Saturday Morning show featuring Archie in the inevitable rock band was picked up by CBS. It was a huge success, and the group who recorded under the name The Archies came up with a smash hit in the song Sugar, Sugar. Josie quickly became a rock star too, her comic was renamed Josie and the Pussycats, and their Saturday morning cartoon debuted in 1970.
All that was far in the future at the time this issue came out. As you can probably guess, this issue featured Josie and her pals going to the New York World's Fair of 1964-65. Comics often did tie-ins to major events like this, although I confess this is one of the only ones that I can remember for that World's Fair. Which is remarkable, because Marvel's characters were all set in the New York metropolitan area at that time. The story starts out with Josie announcing that she and her pals are going to enter a contest:
And so the goal becomes to amass a horde of Crispy Crunchy boxtops. Josie gets two from her house. Albert contributes three, but only after getting sick from eating all those boxes of the cereal. Melody uses her charm:
And Alexander just buys up a warehouse of Crispy Crunchies. They're certain to win, right?
Fortunately for the story, Alexander decides to simply foot the bill for the trip to New York:
I believe the only structure still remaining at the site is that globe known as the Unisphere:
But Alex loses his wallet while riding the monorail. A kid in a cowboy hat picks it up, and the next several pages are consumed with the teens chasing him around the fair.
That's pretty interesting, because as you may recall, Alan Shepard did hit a few golf balls on the moon: Melody eventually turns up with the kid in tow; he's apparently been following her. Unfortunately, he gave the wallet to his mom, and now he's lost. They suggest putting him on the TV at the fair, but:
Nice mom! So now they go chasing after the mother, but it turns out that she gave it to a policeman. Fortunately she immediately spots the officer in question, and he actually has the wallet. Unfortunately, they are all so worn out from chasing around the fair that they decide to go home. But it turns out that their escapades with the Crispy Crunchies caused a flurry of publicity for the company, and so:
Comments: Entertaining fluff. Incidentally, there was a guest cameo:
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lecuongle on Chủ Nhật, 25 tháng 9, 2011
Sharing two comics based on the life of two famous presidents of USA.
Some interesting material found at net about Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) & John F. Kennedy (1917–1963).
Both presidents' last names (Lincoln and Kennedy) have 7 letters.
Both presidents have five syllables in their full name (which counts Kennedy's middle initial).
Both presidents were elected to the House of Representatives in '46.
Abraham Lincoln was elected to Congress in 1846
John F. Kennedy was elected to Congress in 1946.
Both were runners-up for the party's nomination for vice-president in '56.
Both presidents were elected to the presidency in '60.
Abraham Lincoln was elected President in 1860.
John F. Kennedy was elected President in 1960.
Both presidents were concerned with the problems of black Americans and made their views strongly known in '63. Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862, which became law in 1863. In 1963, Kennedy presented his reports to Congress on Civil Rights, and the same year was the famous March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
Both presidents were shot in the head.
Both presidents were shot from behind.
Both presidents were shot in presence of their wives.
Both presidents were shot on a Friday.
Both presidents were accompanied by another couple.
The male companion of the other couple was wounded by the assassin.
Both wives lost a son while living in the White House.
Both were assassinated by Southerners.
Both were succeeded by Southerners (their Vice Presidents).
Andrew Johnson, who succeeded Lincoln, was born in 1808. Lyndon Johnson, who succeeded Kennedy, was born in 1908.
There are 6 letters in each Johnson's first name.
John Wilkes Booth, who assassinated Lincoln was born in 1839. Lee Harvey Oswald, who assassinated Kennedy was born in 1939.
Both assassins were known by their three names.
Both names are made of fifteen letters.
Mr. Booth shot Lincoln in a Theatre called "Ford". Lee Harvey Oswald, shot Kennedy in a car called "Ford" Lincoln.
Booth ran from a theater and was caught in a warehouse. Oswald ran from a warehouse and was caught in a theater.
Both John Wilkes Booth and Lee Harvey Oswald were killed before they could be put on trial.
A month before Lincoln was shot he was in Monroe, Maryland.
A month before Kennedy was shot he was with Marilyn Monroe. _______________________________________
There are so many simaliries. Can we count one more - both life history as comics was published by same publisher DELL. Enjoy!:)
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lecuongle on Thứ Sáu, 23 tháng 9, 2011
I've talked in the past about his silly notion of convincing Foggy and Karen that his hitherto-unseen brother Mike was actually Daredevil. That was ludicrous enough (although reasonably entertaining), but things got really bizarre when he came up with an even wilder idea of how to protect his secret identity:
See, he fakes a pilot's license and hires a plane, and then blows it up:
Resulting in this headline:
So now DD's problems are over.
Well, except for one thing; Matt Murdock's cane which doubles as Daredevil's billy club, is at the office. So he heads over there, but:
Despite his understanding, he follows her home and steals the cane. No, I am not kidding:
Okay, so at least he feels guilty about it, eh?
Now remember, Matt's not just a lawyer; he's supposed to be one of the best in the business. And what is it lawyers are supposed to be good at? Figuring out all the ramifications of a possible decision, right? I mean, that's why we hire them to look over our contracts, and why our contracts get more and more detailed over time.
But Matt hasn't thought this idea through. It's not half-baked--it isn't even defrosted! For example, there are the little things, like, oh, a place to sleep. And bigger things, like putting the girl whom he supposedly loves through the agony of believing that he's dead. And even the idea that he should not have blown up an airplane that didn't belong to him.
Longtime reader Mike F sent this analysis along and I thought it was interesting enough to post. I will append my own thoughts at the end.
At the start of the Silver Age, DC comic books were 10 cents and had 24-25 pages of story, plus filler (gag strips, letter pages, etc.). Then in 1962 the price went up to 12 cents.
Today, a typical DC comic is 2.99 with only 20 pages of story (and maybe 1-2 pages of filler).
The analysis at the end of this e-mail is an attempt to do an apples-to-apples cost comparison (using a CPI calculator.) The CPI calculator is probably not 100% accurate but it is probably in the ballpark enough for this purpose.
What it shows is that we are paying more than 4-5 times as much for comics as we were in the Silver Age.
I believe there are several factors that may explain this.
1) Writers and artists are paid more, including residuals 2) Paper used is slick, not pulp. 3) Printing quality is higher 4) Sales figures are 1/5 to 1/10 the size meaning production costs are spread across fewer sales 5) Most comics are sold through comics shops which need a higher sales price to stay in business (see lower sales figures)
Now to make things worse, most comics in the Silver Age had 1-3 stories per issue with considerably more text (dialogue and captions).
All in all, todays comics are vastly more expensive than they were in the Silver Age.
And of course, there is no comparison with the Golden Age when comics were ten cents and had around 60 pages of story and art.
$ Value 1956 2010 $0.10 $0.80
1962 2010 $0.12 $0.87
We will multiply each number by 20/25 (80%) to account for the drop in story pages.
$ Value 1956 2010 $0.08 $0.64
1962 2010 $0.096 $0.69
DC Price Today Vs. CPI
Un-Normalized Percentage Difference 1956 ($2.99/.80) x 100 = 373.75% 1962 ($2.99/.87) x 100 = 343.68%
Normalized for page count difference 1956 ($2.99/.64) x 100 = 467.19% 1962 ($2.99/.69) x 100 = 433.33%
What do you think?
Thoughts by Pat: Not sure I get all the math here, but this analysis does comport with an observation I came up with independently. Back in 1968, when I first started collecting comics, I earned money for at least part of the year by mowing lawns. I could make about $2.00 per hour whacking the grass, and with comics running 12 cents apiece, that means that I could translate my efforts into about 16.5 comics per hour. I'm not sure what the going rate is for yard work these days, but in order to afford 16.5 comics kids today would have to be earning around $50.00 per hour, and I suspect strongly that they'd be more likely to get $10-$12, which would mean an effective price increase of 300-400% or more.
Another thought: Do you remember how DC used to fiddle with the comic sizes every time they pushed through a price increase after 1969's jump to 15 cents? For example, look at Batman #214, the first issue with the new pricetag. Batman #234 saw a jump to a quarter, but DC confused the issue by increasing the total page count to 52. You can slice and dice that a lot of ways, but at least the price increase was accompanied by a value increase. The new size and price lasted until #243 (1972), when the comics returned to the old size and the price "dropped" by a nickel. Of course, the net effect was actually a nickel increase, hidden by the brief 52-page period. The price jumped all the way to 50 cents with Batman #253 (1974), but they also bumped the page count to 100 (with most of the new pages coming from reprints). Then the old size returned in Batman #263 (1975), but not the old price, which was now a full quarter. Along the way, real page counts dropped as well; Batman #214 had a 23-page story, while Batman #263 only featured 18 pages of story and art. So from 1969-1975, the cover price increased by 67%, but the price per page more than doubled. And this was fairly well-concealed by the brief period of bigger issues.
