Titles that made it from the 1940s to the 1960s 2 2

[rjpb]

As we all know the 1950s was a tumultuous time for the comic book industry, as even without the CCA, tastes changed, and what sold in 1949 wasn't what sold in 1961, though those two years represent the end of the Timely hero titles and the first of the Marvel hero books, so what comes around, goes around. 

Here is a list of titles that made it from Dec. 1949 or before to Jan. 1960 or later with uninterrupted publishing (Black Cat doesn't qualify). I also wouldn't count continued numbering, but with title/genre changes like All-Star/All-Star Western. Feel free to add to it, but as importantly, express your opinion of what the last GA issue of these titles are, with pix if you can. Debate encouraged, because arguing about when the Golden Age ended never gets old.

Action

Adventure

Adventures into the Unknown

Andy Panda

Archie

Batman

Blackhawk

Blondie

Bugs Bunny

Classics Illustrated

Detective

D. Tracy

Donald Duck

Felix the Cat

First Love Illustrated

Girls' Love

Girls' Romances

Joe Palooka

Katy Keene

Laugh

Little Lulu

Looney Tunes

Love Romances

Kid Colt

Lone Ranger

Mickey Mouse

Mighty Mouse * (this one is complicated, with 3 different publishers, slight title changes, and both MM and Adventures of MM being published for several years, but in the end there was always a Mighty Mouse book coming out in the time span)

Millie the Model

My Own Romance

My Romantic Adventures

Nancy and Sluggo  * (annual issues from 1949-1954, continuing cover feature on Sparkler from 1948 until title/publisher change to Nancy & Sluggo in 1955 )

New Funnies

Patsy Walker

Pep

Popeye 

Porky Pig

Raggedy Ann and Andy

Roy Rogers

Sad Sack

Secret Hearts

Superboy

Super Duck

Superman

Tarzan

Tip Top 

Tom and Jerry

Treasure Chest

WDC&S

Western Comics

Wonder Woman

Woody Woodpecker

World's Finest

Young Romance

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 20, 2021 by rjpb

[adamstrange]

Adventures into the Unknown

Archie

Detective

Joe Palooka

Laugh

Looney Tunes

My Romantic Adventures

Pep

Roy Rogers

Superboy

 

Edited April 17, 2021 by adamstrange

[sfcityduck]

I feel it may be cheating, but there are probably a number of Dell titles that started as Four Colors in the 40s and evolved into their own title and survived through January 1960 not on the list, such as Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, etc.  

Also, might be cheating, but what about Classics Illustrated?

Of course, another one that might be cheating is March of Comics.

 

 

[Jayman]

This is a bit of a cheat but worth noting. DCs House of Mystery lasted from 1951-1983!

[rjpb]

2 hours ago, adamstrange said:

Adventures into the Unknown

Archie

Detective

Joe Palooka

Laugh

Looney Tunes

My Romantic Adventures

Pep

Roy Rogers

Superboy

 

Thanks, I added them to the list in my first post. I can't believe I forgot about Detective and the Archie titles. I had no idea Joe Palooka lasted that long though it reminds me that Tracy belongs on the list.

[rjpb]

1 hour ago, sfcityduck said:

I feel it may be cheating, but there are probably a number of Dell titles that started as Four Colors in the 40s and evolved into their own title and survived through January 1960 not on the list, such as Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, etc.  

Also, might be cheating, but what about Classics Illustrated?

Of course, another one that might be cheating is March of Comics.

 

 

I'll add CI, as there was definitely a thematic continuity to the title, and the numbering was typically displayed, but I'd agree that Four Color and March of Comics would be cheating as no one at the time even thought of these comics as part of a series, but as just whatever the featured title was. 

[rjpb]

I was going to add Wilbur, but realized he came up a month short, with the last issue being dated Dec. 1959, until 2 more came out after a three and half year hiatus, but that's too long a gap to count as continuously published. 

[Dr. Love]

So, as far as romance, which mostly flamed out hard and early in the early 50's - some few titles had staying power.  As mentioned previously by adamstrange, Romantic Adventures was a surprising entry by ACG.  A publisher that wasn't well represented in the market, at least in the comic racks I would see!, with a romance title that couldn't have sold that well, lasting from '49-'64 - now that's a commitment.  I guess the numbers were there, those guys didn't throw away money on stone cold losers.

One from Harvey, one from Prize, and as expected, DC and Marvel.  Even though the dates don't line up with a traditional transition from GA to SA in '55, many romance started out as photo covers, and the shift to line art ('51-'52) would be a farewell to GA and at least hello to Atomic.

First Love Illustrated

Girls' Love

Girls' Romances

Love Romances

My Own Romance

Secret Hearts

Young Romance

 

 

[sfcityduck]

1 hour ago, rjpb said:

I'll add CI, as there was definitely a thematic continuity to the title, and the numbering was typically displayed, but I'd agree that Four Color and March of Comics would be cheating as no one at the time even thought of these comics as part of a series, but as just whatever the featured title was. 

If you are not going to recognize the Four Colors as part of series like Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, etc., then you need pull Donald Duck off your list as it was Four Colors until 1952 just like Bugs and Mickey.

[OtherEric]

Here’s the next question: who else here has the complete run of a title from December 1949 to Jan 1960 with no holes?

[rjpb]

19 minutes ago, sfcityduck said:

If you are not going to recognize the Four Colors as part of series like Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, etc., then you need pull Donald Duck off your list as it was Four Colors until 1952 just like Bugs and Mickey.

I recognize them as part of a series in respect to ongoing individual titles like DD and MM. I may have misunderstood your initial post, as I consider the Four Color title itself to be more of an inventory organizing tool for tryouts to avoid filing a new title with the Post Office, than an actual ongoing series as we typically think of them.

I'll add Mickey Mouse, Bugs, Porky and Woody Woodpecker to the list, and any more that you can think of.

[rjpb]

1 hour ago, Dr. Love said:

So, as far as romance, which mostly flamed out hard and early in the early 50's - some few titles had staying power.  As mentioned previously by adamstrange, Romantic Adventures was a surprising entry by ACG.  A publisher that wasn't well represented in the market, at least in the comic racks I would see!, with a romance title that couldn't have sold that well, lasting from '49-'64 - now that's a commitment.  I guess the numbers were there, those guys didn't throw away money on stone cold losers.

One from Harvey, one from Prize, and as expected, DC and Marvel.  Even though the dates don't line up with a traditional transition from GA to SA in '55, many romance started out as photo covers, and the shift to line art ('51-'52) would be a farewell to GA and at least hello to Atomic.

First Love Illustrated

Girls' Love

Girls' Romances

Love Romances

My Own Romance

Secret Hearts

Young Romance

 

 

Thanks, I'll add these. I knew there were a lot of Romance titles that qualified, but I couldn't recall which ones

[rjpb]

So other than Dr. Love, no opinions on when the GA ended for these titles?

I guess the first question is do we recognize there is a space between Gold and Silver for many books, one we might ignore when organizing for simplicity, and that these eras aren't chronologically universal (just because one accepts Showcase #4 as the first SA comic, doesn't mean that all books that share its cover date are part of the Silver Age).

It also seems a bit arbitrary to make the advent of the CCA stamp the end of the GA, even if convenient, and of course it doesn't apply to Dell books, or CI, though for the latter I'd just go with #80 (HRN 79) as being the last GA issue, as it was the last with a 10¢ cover price, and the last original with a line drawn cover. For Dell I'd say the GA ends in late '51/early '52 with the last of the 52 page issues.

 

 

 

 

[sagii]

5 minutes ago, rjpb said:

So other than Dr. Love, no opinions on when the GA ended for these titles?

 

 

 

 

 

Well i'd say for Looney Tunes you could use #165 (July, 1955) as sort of an end of an era for the run, as with the next issue (#166), they cut '& Merrie Melodies' from the title. 

[OtherEric]

8 minutes ago, rjpb said:

So other than Dr. Love, no opinions on when the GA ended for these titles?

I guess the first question is do we recognize there is a space between Gold and Silver for many books, one we might ignore when organizing for simplicity, and that these eras aren't chronologically universal (just because one accepts Showcase #4 as the first SA comic, doesn't mean that all books that share its cover date are part of the Silver Age).

It also seems a bit arbitrary to make the advent of the CCA stamp the end of the GA, even if convenient, and of course it doesn't apply to Dell books, or CI, though for the latter I'd just go with #80 (HRN 79) as being the last GA issue, as it was the last with a 10¢ cover price, and the last original with a line drawn cover. For Dell I'd say the GA ends in late '51/early '52 with the last of the 52 page issues.

 

 

 

 

I would honestly say the GA for Looney Tunes ran until the title ended in 1962.  There just isn't a dramatic shift in the style or the storytelling throughout the 50's, there IS a massive shift when the titles go to Gold Key  The borderless panel look is just completely different and feels like a massive shift.

[sfcityduck]

1 hour ago, rjpb said:

I recognize them as part of a series in respect to ongoing individual titles like DD and MM. I may have misunderstood your initial post, as I consider the Four Color title itself to be more of an inventory organizing tool for tryouts to avoid filing a new title with the Post Office, than an actual ongoing series as we typically think of them.

I'll add Mickey Mouse, Bugs, Porky and Woody Woodpecker to the list, and any more that you can think of.

More Dells:

Andy Panda

Tracy (Dell through issue 24 / Harvey issue 25 on)

Lone Ranger

Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies

New Funnies

Popeye 

Porky Pig

Raggedy Ann and Andy

Tarzan

Tip Top (UF/St. John/Dell)

Tom and Jerry

 

Edited April 17, 2021 by sfcityduck

[sagii]

@sfcityduck is on the case 

[sfcityduck]

Eras don't apply to titles.  If every title has a different start and end date for each "era," than the "era" is an entirely ridiculous and unhelpful term.

The "Golden Age" is really the "Golden Age of Superhero Comics" commencing with the first superhero comic - Action 1 - which led to a proliferation of superhero titles.

The "Silver Age" is really the "Silver Age of Superhero Comics" commencing with the first successful reboot of a GA hero - Showcase 4 - which led to a renaissance and proliferation of superhero titles.

Collectors tend to use GA and SA for all books because superhero comics rule the roost for most collectors.

Those "eras" don't really have any direct application to the contents of Donald Duck or Roy Rogers, etc., which are not superhero titles.  Which is why for some genres the better demarcations are "pre-code" and "post-code," etc. which had no relevance to superhero comics.  (Atom-Age doesn't really work for anything in my book.)  So seems like a pointless exercise to try and debate when the SA of Andy Panda began.

[rjpb]

16 minutes ago, sfcityduck said:

Eras don't apply to titles.  If every title has a different start and end date for each "era," than the "era" is an entirely ridiculous and unhelpful term.

The "Golden Age" is really the "Golden Age of Superhero Comics" commencing with the first superhero comic - Action 1 - which led to a proliferation of superhero titles.

The "Silver Age" is really the "Silver Age of Superhero Comics" commencing with the first successful reboot of a GA hero - Showcase 4 - which led to a renaissance and proliferation of superhero titles.

Collectors tend to use GA and SA for all books because superhero comics rule the roost for most collectors.

Those "eras" don't really have any direct application to the contents of Donald Duck or Roy Rogers, etc., which are not superhero titles.  Which is why for some genres the better demarcations are "pre-code" and "post-code," etc. which had no relevance to superhero comics.  (Atom-Age doesn't really work for anything in my book.)  So seems like a pointless exercise to try and debate when the SA of Andy Panda began.

I'd generally agree with that, and its probably the main reason dealers traditionally listed Dells in their own section in their catalogs, outside the groupings of Gold and Silver. I do think the collecting community has gravitated to using these terms for chronological eras, regardless of genre, and it's not unreasonable to think of pre-code crime and horror as being part of the "Golden Age" for an example. It does get trickier with genres that saw little impact from the code though, especially funny animal books. 

I suppose in many respects, the Golden Age ends in 1949, when Timely stops publishing Superhero books, and DC folds or changes the genre of all their superhero books other than the Batman/Superman/WW related titles and All-Star, as that truly seemed like the end of an era to earliest generation of comic book collectors. This (or even earlier) tended to be the general opinion when the term was coined, as it did apply specifically to superhero eras, but I think the collecting interests of comic fandom in books  rom the the 40s and 50s has diversified a lot since those days, and it's legitimate to think of other genres having been part of the Golden Age. 

[rjpb]

The one superhero title I'd given a bit of thought to as to when does its Golden Age end is Batman. The last 44 page issue is 87, the last pre-code issue is 89, and 92 with the first appearance of Bat Hound, feels like the start of the oddball supporting cast batman would gain in the late 1950s, along with Batwoman, Batgirl and Bat-mite. This is a case where one could arbitrarily pick the last non-code issue as the end of the GA and not be far off, though 99 is the last Penguin appearance for a number of years, who along with Catwoman and Two-Face disappears from Batman's universe for the rest of the 10¢ era, and even the Joker only has one or two non-cover appearances until the 1960s.

From a collecting perspective, I suppose you could just wrap up a GA Batman collection with #100 to keep it simple.

With Detective you have the last Catwoman in 211 (definitely GA in my book), the code arriving with issue 217, and Martian Man-hunter showing up in 225, who is definitely a SA character, even though he predates Showcase #4. Here again you could just go with the last non-code issue as being the end of an era. The art and writing doesn't show a dramatic shift in 1955 for Batman related comics (that wouldn't come until 1964), but there is definitely a difference between early 50s content and late 50s content when you step back and look at the whole decade, and that shift seem to come with the shelving of Batman's more famous foes, and the introduction of new characters, and eventually more emphasis on sci-fi related stories.