Number 956
Blackmail Terror!
Sparkle Plenty, daughter of B.O. Plenty and Gravel Gertie, becomes a child star on a TV show patterned after the real-life Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts, then is kidnapped by a pervert ("Come sit on my lap!" "No! I don't set on strangers' laps, dadburn it!"), whose plan is to extort money by hijacking her income.
This is Harvey Comics Library #2, from 1952, a one-shot issue set apart from the usual comic, Dick Tracy Monthly, which Harvey also published. It's clever the way Harvey Comics packaged a well-known strip like Dick Tracy under the provocative title, Blackmail Terror. They did it with Rex Morgan, M.D. in Teenage Dope Slaves, also. I suppose they did it to attract comics buyers used to more lurid comics in the pre-Comics Code era.
Al Avison, who could mimic other cartoonists like Chester Gould, drew the cover, which was offered in 2004 on Heritage Auctions, where I downloaded this scan of the original artwork.
According to the inside front cover, today is Sparkle's 64th birthday. Happy birthday, Sparkle!
Happy belated birthday Sparkle! Gould is Great, Pappy...I even dig the comic book re-edits...nothing BUT fun and good stories!
ReplyDeleteI shoulda baked a cake, Jeff, and invited everyone over!
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