THAT OLD BLONDE MAGIC

You know the old saying. Once you go witch you'll never want to switch.
Since we mentioned the television show Bewitched recently, here’s its star, the lovely Elizabeth Montgomery, bringing some supernatural qualities to a nightgown in this 1963 photo made to promote her comedy flick Who’s Been Sleeping in My Bed? She was born into show business as the daughter of legendary actor and director Robert Montgomery, who boosted Elizabeth’s fortunes by casting her in thirty episodes of Robert Montgomery Presents. Having launched her career in television, she worked mainly in that medium going forward but appeared in a few movies, notably in 1963’s Johnny Cool. She accumulated credits on some sixty television shows, sang on three soundtracks, and even lent her voice to cartoon characters on The Flintstones and Batman: The Animated Series.

We’ve been enjoying Bewitched immensely. As a classic sitcom, it mixes a lot of zany problems into a suburban marriage, and enlivens the proceedings with a bit of low wattage sexiness. We think Darrin Stevens, as played so far by Dick York, is a terrible husband, but part of the fun is watching the twerp try to stop Samantha from using her magical powers. It was a plot contrivance meant extol the virtues of earning what you obtain, but these days reads more like marital domination, mansplaining, and unsupportiveness. Whereas we’d be, “You wanna do what? Zap us over to Budapest for the weekend? Well, sure, honey, I suppose I could free up time for that.” Since Montgomery didn’t make much in the way of pulp style entertainment she may not appear here again, but what an appearance. See another Montgomery here.

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

1901—McKinley Fatally Shot

Polish-born anarchist Leon Czolgosz shoots and fatally wounds U.S. President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. McKinley dies September 12, and Czolgosz is later executed.

1939—U.S. Declares Neutrality in WW II

The Neutrality Acts, which had been passed in the 1930s when the United States considered foreign conflicts undesirable, prompts the nation to declare neutrality in World War II. The policy ended with the Lend-Lease Act of March 1941, which allowed the U.S. to sell, lend or give war materials to allied nations.

1972—Munich Massacre

During the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany, a paramilitary group calling itself Black September takes members of the Israeli olympic team hostage. Eventually the group, which represents the first glimpse of terrorists for most people in the Western world, kill eleven of the hostages along with one West German police officer during a rescue attempt by West German police that devolves into a firefight. Five of the eight members of Black September are also killed.

1957—U.S. National Guard Used Against Students

The governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus, mobilizes the National Guard to prevent nine African-American students known as the Little Rock Nine from enrolling in high school in Little Rock, Arkansas.

1941—Auschwitz Begins Gassing Prisoners

Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest of Nazi Germany’s concentration camps, becomes an extermination camp when it begins using poison gas to kill prisoners en masse. The camp commandant, Rudolf Höss, later testifies at the Nuremberg Trials that he believes perhaps 3 million people died at Auschwitz, but the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum revises the figure to about 1 million.

This awesome cover art is by Tommy Shoemaker, a new talent to us, but not to more experienced paperback illustration aficionados.
Ten covers from the popular French thriller series Les aventures de Zodiaque.
Sam Peffer cover art for Jonathan Latimer's Solomon's Vineyard, originally published in 1941.

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