Bad fast food. A random shooting. And now an aquatic theme park. On my trip to the U.S. I'm experiencing all the most American things. Mario Ferrari returns with this nice cover for 1965's Grossi guai per Tony Hunter, written by Perry Landers for Edizioni Wamp's series Narratori Americani del Brivido (Thrilling American Storytellers). And of course Landers wasn't American, but Italian, working under a pseudonym. Most likely he was Mario Pinzauti, and we say most likely because we can't be 100% sure other authors didn't borrow the same pen name, as often happened. But we don't read Italian anyway, so we're focused on Ferrari's art. It's excellent as always. Click his keywords if you want to see what we mean.
This outfit is itchy, hard to get on, and makes it ridiculously impractical to pee. It better turn you on or you're dead.
In Italy the concept of gialli was literary as well as cinematic, and here you see a typical giallo novel—Traccia profumato, or “scented trail,” by Larry Madison. This appeared in 1966 from Edizioni Aldo Crudo for the series I Super Gialli della Sterlina. Madison is a pseudonym of course. Generally, the credited translator is actually the author, which would make Giovanni Simonelli the brain behind this one. The cover is by Mario Ferrari. It's been a while since we featured him, but he was one of Italy's top paperback illustrators. See supporting evidence here.
Dylan—Rab Dylan, that is—plays in Hong Kong. Above, a nice cover for Azzurro è l'inferno, aka Hell Is Blue, 1968, by Rab Dylan for the Italian publishers Silpe as part of its Giallo 70 line. This was Silpe's first publication of many. The story is espionage set in Hong Kong, with all the James Bond style trappings. The author Dylan was pseudonymous, in this case for Italian writer Gualberto Titta, who we assume was worried people would laugh at his last name. What's notable about this book, at least for us, is that the company was founded by genius illustrator Mario Ferrari, who we've featured several times. And once we knew that, it was suddenly obvious this was also Ferrari's work on the cover. He's top tier, and you can see plenty more from him here, here, and here.
Ferrari shows he’s a finely tuned machine.
Above, a superb cover by Mario Ferrari for Nella morsa del terrore, aka In the Grip of Terror, written by Fred Gable for the series Narratori Americani del Brivido (Thrilling American Storytellers), 1961. Gable was a pseudonym for Italian author Franco Prattico, who also wrote as Rick Donovan, Danny Revak, and possibly others. We think Ferrari’s talent borders on genius. You can see more from him here and here.
They’re on the case faster than you can say passer les beignets. Above are some great covers for Editions ERP’s Super Policier series, which were published in France beginning around 1955. The authors here were all pseudonyms for guys like Mario Pinzauti, Pino Belli, Aldo Crudo, Franco Prattico, and a host of others. You may have noticed the distinctly Italian sounds of those names. Well, they were Italian, because ERP was based in Rome, but published in France. You may also notice, if you’re looking very closely, that the last cover is from ERP’s Super Détective series. We threw that in just because we liked it. The art on at least one of these covers is by Mario Carìa, and a few others are by Mario Ferrari, who we talked about here and here.
He really knows how to take a girl’s breath away. Above, a cover for the thriller Où est le cavadre, which as you might guess means, Where Is the Corpse?, a question the man involved here seems to be asking with some urgency. Well, if you can’t find a corpse you might as well make one yourself. This book, which appeared in France in 1962, actually originated in Italy with Editions ERP, where in 1961 it was published as part of their I Gialle dello Schedario series. The writer, Joe Vivard, was really Pino Belli, and wrote under several names, including Ricky Lambert, Steve Cockrane, and others. The excellent is art by Mario Ferrari, whose work we showed you a while back when we did a post of eleven I Gialle dello Schedario covers. See those here, and see more from Ferrari later.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1910—First Seaplane Takes Flight
Frenchman Henri Fabre, who had studied airplane and propeller designs and had also patented a system of flotation devices, accomplishes the first take-off from water at Martinque, France, in a plane he called Le Canard, or "the duck." 1953—Jim Thorpe Dies
American athlete Jim Thorpe, who was one of the most prolific sportsmen ever and won Olympic gold medals in the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon, played American football at the collegiate and professional levels, and also played professional baseball and basketball, dies of a heart attack. 1958—Khrushchev Becomes Premier
Nikita Khrushchev becomes premier of the Soviet Union. During his time in power he is responsible for the partial de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union, and presides over the rise of the early Soviet space program, but his many policy failures lead to him being deposed in October 1964. After his removal he is pensioned off and lives quietly the rest of his life, eventually dying of heart disease in 1971. 1997—Heaven's Gate Cult Members Found Dead
In San Diego, thirty-nine members of a cult called Heaven's Gate are found dead after committing suicide in the belief that a UFO hidden in tail of the Hale-Bopp comet was a signal that it was time to leave Earth for a higher plane of existence. The cult members killed themselves by ingesting pudding and applesauce laced with poison.
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