WOMEN OUTLAWS "Trigger Tess"

Here's a short about how not to handle a gun...

...featuring a gunslinging girl who's not quite up on gun etiquette!

I'm not sure if that's really true, but it's a kool idea.

This never-reprinted short from Fox's Women Outlaws #2 (1948) was apparently illustrator John Belcastro's (aka John Bell) first published comic book work.

His short, but prolific, career encompassed sci-fi, horror, Western, war, and even humor work from 1948 to 1954.

Visit Our

Women Outlaws

Comic Collectibles Store

TIM HOLT "Target: RedMask"

You know you've "arrived" as a hero...

...when a criminal mastermind actually sets up a training program just to teach people how to kill you!

You may note that Frank Bolle's artwork for this tale from Magazine Enterprises' Tim Holt #39 (1953) has a very "open" feel with characters constantly "breaking" the panel borders.
That's because it was created during comics' brief flirtation with 3-D in the 1950s.
The process used red and blue line-art along with red and blue glasses to create three-dimensional effects from flat artwork as shown HERE.
However, Magazine Enterprises didn't go that route!
Instead, they directed their artists to do exactly what you saw here to create a pseudo-three dimensional effect...and labeled it as "3-D in Full Color".

Visit our 
 Masked Western Heroes online store...

...for duds and provisions!

"Calculating Killer"

Here's a short tale that redefines "armed and dangerous"...

...originally presented in Dell's Wagon Train #5 (1960), but not using any of the characters from the tv series!

Illustrator Alex Toth did a number of these 4-page "fillers" for Dell's Western comics, which were used whenever the page count for a book came up short.

You can see other examples HERE and HERE.

Visit our 
Western Comics online store...

 ...for duds and provisions!

DEATH VALLEY "Long Winded Killer"

Anthologies without ongoing characters were a popular format for Western comics...

...allowing for life-or-death situations that sometimes actually resulted in a tale's feature characters ending up on Boot Hill!

The first issue of Comic Media's Death Valley (1953) was a showpiece for Ross Andru and Mike Esposito to demonstrate their storytelling prowess in all four stories.
Besides the one we're running today, we presented two other stories HERE and HERE.

Visit our

Western Comics Adventures Store

BOB COLT "Flying Fists"

Many Western stars including John Wayne and Buster Crabbe had their own comics...

...so when a new Western star (and his horse, Buckskin) came along in 1950, Fawcett Comics immediately gave him his own title, complete with backstory...

Here's one of the tales from his first issue...

This never-reprinted tale from Fawcett's Bob Colt #1 (1950) was drawn by George Evans, but the writer is unknown.

Wanna know a secret?

Bob Colt didn't exist!

Well, the guy who portrayed him on the covers did exist, and if you've ever read "high adventure" paperbacks, you've seen him...

...on almost every Doc Savage book cover from1964 to 1972!

(Not to mention The Avenger, James Bond, two different incarnations of The Spider, even as puppet character Steve Zodiac from the 1960s tv series FireBall XL5...

...and, he was the second on-screen Flash Gordon [after Buster Crabbe], on a 1950s one-season TV series filmed in Europe!)

He's male model Steve Holland, who served as the visual template for Bob Colt, and posed for every cover during the book's run.

Fawcett was testing the waters with a plethora of new characters who were portrayed by actors/models on their covers including...

...Vic Torry...

and Bill Battle!

Perhaps they were hoping to sell the properties to tv production companies with the actors used on the covers as the series' stars?

None of them went beyond their comic book incarnations, but Bob Colt was the longest-lasting of the new characters, with a 10-issue run!

ADVENTURES OF ALAN LADD "Guns of Smoke Valley"

Was there any manly movie star of the 1940s who didn't have his own comic?

Personally, I'm surprised there wasn't an Errol Flynn or Tyrone Power title, but it's probably because the licensing rights would've been too expensive.

The scripter of this tale from DC's Adventures of Alan Ladd #1 (1949) is unknown, but we do known it was illustrated by Ruben Moreira, one of the first Puerto Rican artists in comic books.

Among his credits during his twenty-year comics career are a two-year stint on the Tarzan newspaper strip and co-creation of DC Comics characters Rip Hunter: Time Master and Roy Raymond: TV Detective.

Like other titles featuring cross-genre stars like John Wayne and Buster Crabbe, Adventures of Alan Ladd ran stories in other categories like crime and contemporary adventure.

Unlike those titles, AoAL played up the fact that Ladd was, first and foremost, an actor, with the level of fame his profession brought him ("Gosh, you're that movie star...Alan Ladd!"), and a guy who wasn't used to doing the strenuous stuff stuntmen did in his films!

The title ran nine issues, with almost every issue featuring a Western-themed tale.

Check out our 
Western Comics store...

 ...for duds and provisions!

One-Page Features

Dell Comics ran very few ads inside their books...

From Four Color #1125, art by Gil Kane and Russ Heath

...instead running one or two-page illustrated features and text pages, usually on subjects related to the main story, written and illustrated by the same creators.

From Four Color #1125, art by Gil Kane and Russ Heath

Since stagecoach travel was a major plot point in the Laramie stories in Four Color #1125 (1960), the features were about...stagecoaches!

The next Laramie issue, #1223, had tales about criminals using a ghost town for a hideout and a crooked Indian Agent.

Guess what the features were about?

From Four Color #1223, art by Gil Kane

From Four Color #1223, art by Gil Kane

The next issue, #1284, ran stories about the series characters being isolated by a snowstorm and a Native American who was considered a traitor by other Indians because he worked with settlers.

The feature pages were about...

From Four Color #1284, art by Gil Kane

From Four Color #1284, art by Gil Kane

Who says comics ain't educational?

Visit our 
Western Comics online store...

...for duds and provisions!