Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine

Number 34

COVERING IT: Classic Covers Of Golden Age Comics

."Hey Rocky! Watch me pull a rabbit outta my hat!"

"Hokey smokes, Bullwinkle! That's no rabbit! It's a head! A decapitated, shrunken head!"

Ah yes, cartoon-lovers and friends…welcome to Pappy's, where we consider nothing too gruesome, gory or gross to be shown to our pals.

This cover of Weird Mysteries #6, from 1953, reminds me of the story of EC Comics publisher William Gaines in front of the Senate subcommittee investigating comic books and juvenile delinquency. When they pulled out the famous Johnny Craig Crime Suspenstories cover with the decapitated head Gaines was asked, "Do you consider this to be in good taste?" to which he replied, "Yes, for a horror comic."*

Gaines' argument as to what would make the cover in bad taste would be if it had shown the neck dripping with blood. We get that here in this cover by the redoubtable Bernard Baily, whose covers likely caused a few nightmares amongst comic book readers, but apparently no Senate committee members.

You last saw a classic Bernard Baily cover in Pappy's Number 31. Another classic!

*I don't have the exact quote in front of me so I'm paraphrasing. The exact testimony is available in several places but I don't have the time or energy to look it up. So sue me. Just go to behead-all-lawyers.com.