vintage and modern pulp fiction; noir, schlock and exploitation films; scandals, swindles and news
Below are scans from a March 1939 issue of Click, a humor and photo monthly published out of Philadelphia. Information is scarce on this one, but it appears to have been published approximately between 1938 and 1944. We got the images off the website Darwination, at which there hasn’t been much activity of late. Hopefully they’ll get going again over there sometime soon. In the meantime enjoy the scans.
Here’s a great random shot of Alma Heflin we found in a 1940 copy of Click magazine. Heflin was a test pilot for the Piper Aircraft Corporation, and was one of the first women—if not the first—to make a living testing commercial craft. We assume she didn’t fly in pumps, so this is probably a staged publicity shot. Heflin got to be pretty famous, and even published a book in 1942 titled Adventure Was the Compass. We also found a reference to her in a book called History’s Best Test Pilots, so clearly she was tops in the field. But all of this is just background info. The reason we’re sharing this photo is simply because it perfectly captures the romance of flight during the last century. If we run across any more images like these we’ll definitely post them.
Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, two of the most prominent socialists in Germany, are tortured and murdered by the Freikorps. Freikorps was a term applied to various paramilitary organizations that sprang up around Germany as soldiers returned in defeat from World War I. Members of these groups would later become prominent members of the SS.
The Human Be-In takes place in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park with between 20,000 to 30,000 people in attendance, their purpose being to promote their ideals of personal empowerment, cultural and political decentralization, communal living, ecological preservation, and higher consciousness. The event is considered the beginning of the famed counterculture Summer of Love.
Johnny Cash performs live at Folsom State Prison in Folson, California, where he records a live album that includes a version of his 1955 hit “Folsom Prison Blues.” Cash had always been interested in performing at a prison, but was unable to until personnel changes at his record company brought in people who were amenable to the idea. The Folsom album was Cash’s biggest commercial success for years, reaching number 1 on the country music charts.
British serial killer Harold Shipman is found dead in his prison cell, after hanging himself with a bedsheet. Shipman, a former doctor who preyed on his patients, was one of the most prolific serial killers in history, with two-hundred and eighteen murders positively attributed to him, and another two-hundred of which he is suspected.
English novelist Nevil Shute, who wrote the books A Town Like Alice and The Pied Piper, dies in Melbourne, Australia at age sixty-one. Seven of his novels were adapted to film, but his most famous was the cautionary post-nuclear war classic On the Beach.
Dr. James Bedford, a University of California psychology professor, becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with intent of future resuscitation. Bedford had kidney cancer that had metastasized to his lungs and was untreatable. His body was maintained for years by his family before being moved to Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Arizona.
