Number 2092: Vampire under the big top

My hand is in the air, waving wildly, and I have a question. How did Countess Elyra Barovna get her job as a trapeze artist with the circus? She did not demonstrate her abilities to Lortiz Hugenberg, the circus owner. He just took her word that she could swing!

The Countess has feminine charms, and since she is a vampire (I hope I didn’t ruin the surprise for you) perhaps she used the vampiric mind control trick to get her own way. It happened between the panels, I suppose, since we don’t see it. Were I in Mr Hugenberg’s position I would wonder about taking on a new performer and then finding others in my troupe drained of blood. He had to have been hypnotized.

What I really like about “Big Top Nightmare” is the dynamic artwork by Lin Streeter. Streeter is an artist about whom not a lot is known, but whose name pops up in comic books going back to the very early days (circa 1940), for various publishing companies.

The story appeared originally in The Beyond #5 (1951), from Ace Comics.

Number 1748: Meandering through the mists of midnight

Young lovers Neil and Audrey are out for an evening, and walking in the creepy swamp where they had their first date. (Neil must be pretty cheap.) Little do they know that Audrey is about to become a target of some malevolent beings who want to drag her into the “ectosphere.” I’m not sure where the ectosphere is, but I’ll stay away from it, if you don’t mind. No wonder, when explaining what she saw in the swamp, her boyfriend thinks she is in need of some serious help. No wonder her boss has to fire her because she can’t keep her mind on her job while worrying about the supernatural beings after her.

This is an ACG story, so love conquers all. (Gosh, I hope that doesn’t ruin it for you.) To protect Audrey’s reputation Neil has prepared a white lie to tell her boss, which is what ends this little opus from Forbidden Worlds #2 (1951). The lie story is well illustrated by Lin Streeter.

Number 1311: Two Aces

Ace Horror is a blog in English which comes from Germany. It spotlights pre-Code horror comics from Ace. Ace is the comic book company from publisher A. A. Wyn who simultaneously published the fantastic and collectible Ace paperback books (including Ace Doubles, a special love of mine). Ace's comic books have grown on me over the years as I've seen more of them. The Ace Horror website is an invaluable resource for anyone studying Ace comics, or just interested in 1950s horror comics.

I’ve shown both of these stories before, and the Ace Horror website links to both of my original postings. If you check them out you can see the differences in my scans, then and now.

Both are from Web of Mystery #13 (1952). First up, a werewolf tale illustrated by Lou Cameron, from a time in his career when he was still finding his way artistically, and before he began signing his work. Next, Lin Streeter drew one of my favorite Ace horror tales, “Syr-Darya’s Death Song,” which is well illustrated, and contains one of my favorite single comic book panels. You can see it at the top of this page. As someone pointed out to me years ago when I created a privately printed postcard of the panel, "It's kinky without being real kinky, y'know? There’s a chick whipping a guy, calling him 'Dog' but they both have all their clothes on.” Ohhhh-kay. Sounds about right to me.

Number 1033


The zombie death


With Halloween approaching I suppose I need to make at least a token attempt to have some sort of Halloween theme. I don't care to celebrate Halloween, especially by giving out candy to trick-or-treaters, lest my curmudgeon status with neighborhood children be endangered. That they shriek in terror and scatter when I approach them waving my walking stick and hollering, "Get off the sidewalk, you damn little monsters!" is enough Halloween celebration for me.

Today I have a zombie story from Adventures Into the Unknown #20, "The Zombie Death," with art by Lin Streeter. These zombies are the pre-George Romero zombies, back before the preferred method of getting rid of zombies was to shoot them so their heads explode like watermelons. As is usual with this ACG fare the story is not only illogical, it's awfully silly. I like those things when they come from ACG.

Number 520


America's Joan of Arc


Years ago Mrs. Pappy had a paper due for a class and came to me for help. At the time I was working for a bookstore, cataloging a major Golden Age comics collection. I've mentioned before that she doesn't like comics, but I told her I could give her some information on comics and she could write the paper. She was OK with it, as only someone with a paper due in 24 hours can be.

I told her to write about patriotic heroes of World War II, which were the comics I was then cataloging. I listed patriotic heroes for her: The Shield, Captain America, Captain Freedom, Minute Man...on and on until the last name, Pat Patriot. When she got up in front of the class and read the paper she got to the name Pat Patriot and the place dissolved into laughter. She got an A on the paper, maybe because she was so entertaining.

OK, so here's Pat Patriot, "America's Joan of Arc." This appearance is from Charles Biro and Bob Wood's Daredevil #11, June 1942. Pat has a villain worthy of his name, The Mallet. He's a torturer, and we get some juicy panels with some bondage and torture. The Grand Comics Database claims Lin Streeter is the artist, and for scripter they give Bob Wood the question mark treatment, as Bob Wood? which means they're guessing.