Actually, darling, the moment you left I starting having this tremendous stiffness in my lower body. Another day, another ripe Midwood cover. The art on these are always like visual punchlines, which is why people love them so much. This particular effort is from Victor Olson, who painted covers for many men’s magazines, including Saga, Stag, Male and others. Laura Duchamp was a pen name used by author Sally Singer, one of the few sleaze writers who was actually female. She was also prolific as March Hastings. Goodbye, Darling appeared in 1964.
*sigh* Okay, lesson learned—new sexual orientation, same old crushing regret.
Above is a piece of classic Midwood sleaze, The Drifter, by March Hastings, aka Sally Singer, 1962, with Paul Rader cover art and the staggeringly funny tagline: Any port in a storm—and one of the ports was Lesbos. In the story, a woman has an impotent but deviant husband who seems to be sexually inspired only by his sister, so wifey flees and the drifting begins. As does the slumming, self-hating, and everything else. Since lesbianism is universally understood in mid-century sleaze to be a mental disorder, it's no spoiler to reveal that our heroine doesn't stay docked in Lesbos permanently, but rather learns the usual dubious lesson imparted by these books: the love of a good man fixes everything. It's a sex conversion fantasy written for a male market, and not to be taken seriously in any way. As a side note, since Lesbos is a Greek isle, that means we have a bit of a theme today (see below).
You know, they make pills for guys with this issue. Just saying. What is “the soft way,” according to the author March Hastings, aka Sally Singer? It's not having to make any effort. For instance, life can be “soft” for a guy. The main character in The Soft Way, who's named Jeff, has three girlfriends and life is definitely soft for him. So the cover blurb basically means the female character has to take Jeff on his own terms. It has nothing to do with the need for pharmaceutical intervention to do it the hard way, as implied by our subhead. But maybe it should—we bet the book would be especially interesting then. 1963 copyright on this, with Paul Rader art.
Sometimes you just need a little pussy. Duet was published in 1966 by Laura Duchamp, who was a pseudonym of author Sally Singer. The story is standard Midwood fare. It concerns young Phyllis Campbell, whose unsatisfactory sex life with a series of clumsy and/or brutish men causes her to turn to a woman for “a form of sensuality as complete as it was condemned.” The rear cover blurb is a bit funny, unintentionally so. It says that Duet is a story that must rank as one of the finest of its kind ever to be published as a Midwood book (italics ours). Looking at Midwood’s catalog, this is not high praise. Anyway, what we really like here is the unusual cover art, painted by the prolific Irv Docktor in a different style than that usually seen on Midwood fronts.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1939—Holiday Records Strange Fruit
American blues and jazz singer Billie Holiday records "Strange Fruit", which is considered to be the first civil rights song. It began as a poem written by Abel Meeropol, which he later set to music and performed live with his wife Laura Duncan. The song became a Holiday standard immediately after she recorded it, and it remains one of the most highly regarded pieces of music in American history. 1927—Mae West Sentenced to Jail
American actress and playwright Mae West is sentenced to ten days in jail for obscenity for the content of her play Sex. The trial occurred even though the play had run for a year and had been seen by 325,000 people. However West's considerable popularity, already based on her risque image, only increased due to the controversy. 1971—Manson Sentenced to Death
In the U.S, cult leader Charles Manson is sentenced to death for inciting the murders of Sharon Tate and several other people. Three accomplices, who had actually done the killing, were also sentenced to death, but the state of California abolished capital punishment in 1972 and neither they nor Manson were ever actually executed. 1923—Yankee Stadium Opens
In New York City, Yankee Stadium, home of Major League Baseball's New York Yankees, opens with the Yankees beating their eternal rivals the Boston Red Sox 4 to 1. The stadium, which is nicknamed The House that Ruth Built, sees the Yankees become the most successful franchise in baseball history. It is eventually replaced by a new Yankee Stadium and closes in September 2008.
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