Number 2565: Rootin' tootin' shootin' romance on the range

Cowgirl Romances was a Western-styled love comic, which seems a natural. Even during shooting wars. In this tale there was time for love while fighting the lawless in another of the all-American love stories of horses, bad outlaws, good guys, girls (both bad and good), guns, and shoot-outs.

I have said before that Maurice Whitman is an artist who has not gotten the kudos for excellence I think he deserves. He was self-taught, and good enough that he did many covers and interiors of various genres for the Fiction House line. When Fiction House folded he went to Charlton. He drew for the mix of titles they published, even the characters Atomic Mouse and Atomic Rabbit.

“The Ranch of Riddles” was the lead-off story from the last issue of Cowgirl Romances. It appeared in Cowgirl Romances #12 (1953).

Number 2191: A cowgirl’s unrequited love

Whoa there, Hoss! I read this six-page story for Cowgirl Romances #10 (1952), only to be kicked by a horse (figuratively, that is) by the ending. It is not what I expect from a love comic.

Checking it with the Grand Comics Database I see it is a reworked filler strip for Fiction House’s Movie Comics #4, originally published in 1947. In the original version, “Mitzi in Hollywood,” the heroine is a movie extra; in the rewritten version she lives on a ranch where a movie is being filmed. In both versions she has a crush on a cowboy movie star.

I guess it would be cheaper for the publisher to have a story — especially one drawn by the great Matt Baker — rewritten than have another artist illustrate a brand new story that follows the usual love comics pattern of girl winning boy in the end. But I ask why they would go to the trouble? They could have just shown the original “Mitzi” story and no one would have cared. As it is, either version is entertaining, and Baker’s work drawing a beautiful girl in cowboy gear makes up for the story’s shortcomings.

Number 1024


Cowgirls, lasso me for romance!


I've told you before about my love for cowgirls...buckskin, short skirts, tall boots and a Stetson. I like to see cowgirls riding frontwards, side-saddle, and even reverse. I told you of the origin of my particular cowgirl thing in Pappy's #667 in 2010, and you can read about it.

Today we fulfill some personal wish-dreams with a Western love story from Cowgirl Romances #4, a Fiction House comic from 1951. As a bonus I'm including a story about a rootin', tootin', straight-shootin' buckaroo-gal (or would that be a buckarette?), Two-Gun Lil, from Crack Western #72, also from 1951.

Saddle up, cowgal, and meet me by the big rock on the mesa. We'll sit by the campfire under the moon and stars, listen to the coyotes wail. I'll pull out my fiddle and we can fiddle around 'til we drop from exhaustion. Now that's a cowgirl romance!