Number 1949: Machine Gun Grogan steals Machine Gun Kelly’s story

Unlike many crime comics, there is no BASED ON A TRUE STORY! label anywhere In Crime and Justice #1 (1951) from Charlton Comics. But the story of Machine Gun Grogan is based on truth, just not George Grogan. (The most famous person named George Grogan, based on my googling of the name, is a brigadier general in the British Army during World War I. Grogan won the Victoria Cross, so he is not our gangster George Grogan.) The story is based on the famous story of George “Machine Gun” Kelly, and his wife, Kathryn. Why they chose to use fake names for the story I don’t know. It isn’t like famous thirties gangsters like the Kelly couple weren’t fair game for crime comics. See the link below the story for EC Comics’ version of the Kelly story.

The Grand Comics Database doesn’t guess the artist or writer. They use a tagline on the story, “The Wages of Crime is...DEATH!!!” which is true. It is true because the wages of everything is death, whether we live our lives as good, bad or indifferent. (A recent birthday is making Ol’ Pappy philosophical.)

For the EC War Against Crime version of the Machine Gun Kelly story, go to this 2010 posting:

Number 709


What Lee Ames did was a crime!


Lee J. Ames is a famous and popular artist who, among many other things, illustrates books and does the Draw 50... series of art instruction books. At one time Ames was doing comic book work, but I haven't found much information on that phase of his career.  Oh well...based on his fancy signature on the artwork for this story he seemed to have been pleased with what he had done.

(UPDATE: Ames died in 2011.)

This 12-page version of the life of Machine Gun Kelly (misspelled "Kelley" in the splash, tsk tsk), is found in War Against Crime #1, 1948, and I'm presenting it as part of a series this week on EC Pre-Trend comics. The scans are from the Russ Cochran reprint from 2000. War Against Crime! and its partner in crime, Crime Patrol, were just two of many crime comics titles from several publishers in the late 1940s. These two fair-to-middling-selling comics became more famous — or infamous — for introducing the features, The Vault of Horror and The Crypt of Terror, just before these two crime titles morphed into the horror titles.

I posted another version of the Machine Gun Kelly story in Pappy's #11.












Next: Better than the dial-a-number bed, dig that crazy murder bed!

Number 11


Machine Gun Kelly

 


In the 1940s when crime comic books appeared in the form of Crime Does Not Pay, reading about gangsters and criminals was nothing new. Stories about lawbreakers go back as far as the beginnings of human society. What was new was putting them into a form accessible to children. Parental groups opposed to crime comics and even comics in general were around then, but got their public voice with Dr. Fredric Wertham, M.D., who got some steam up in his personal war on comics about the time this story was published, in Crime Does Not Pay #65, July 1948.

This is a story that ol' Doc Wertham would have loved to hate! George "Machine Gun" Kelly" and his wife Kathryn had already entered into legendary status after their crimes and arrest. They were still alive and in prison 15 years later when this story was published.

I don't know who wrote or drew the story. It's a cut above average, even for Crime Does Not Pay. Stories in that magazine were generally well drawn and written (even wordy for comic books). Nobody took credit. You sharp-eyed art spotters out there might be able to identify the artist.

The story might have been edited down to fit, but was for sure edited as to the name of the Kelly's kidnap victim, Charles Urschel, who comes out in this story as "Cashel." Even the pseudonym was edited from its original "Caschel," (probably considered too close to the real name). Whoever did the corrections missed a couple of speech balloons with the original spelling. Editing extended to the real-life arrest of the Kelly's, which was made while both were in bed, sleeping off a night of drinking. In the comic book version they are both standing up and dressed, a nod to the propriety of the times. Even though they were married, they couldn't be shown sleeping together. They could be shown shooting cops and flaunting the law for 7 ½ pages, but not in bed together.

(By contrast, "the Collins boys," on page two, could be shown in bed together.)

Kelly was reputed to have introduced the term "G-Men" into the language by yelling out, "Don't shoot, G-Men!" when he was arrested. I'm surprised the comic book story didn't include that.

Kathryn Kelly, who came from a criminal family, is shown as a bad woman, and you can tell she's bad because in every panel she's dressed in red. That was shorthand in those days. If you wanted to show a woman as a prostitute or gun moll just dress her in red, and voila, she's a scarlet woman. The panel of Kathryn with the cigarette hanging out of her mouth Wertham might have called an "image of comic book womanhood." The image of women didn't fare too well in crime comics.

Kathryn Kelly was to George Kelly what Karl Rove is to George Bush. She deliberately and carefully created his public image. In the Kelly case, Kathryn may be the first PR flack for a notorious criminal.