Daring men can be fun, but sometimes she wonders if she should have stayed with that accountant from Wichita.
The cover of Adam magazine from this month in 1962 is simpler than normal but very effective too. Instead of the usual three figures, you get the lone woman with an explosion in the background. It pairs with Jay Edmond’s short story “The Deadly Angel,” about a test pilot’s wife whose husband dies in the fictional X-20 jet (modeled after jets like the Bell X-1 flown by Chuck Yeager). After her husband goes down in flames Lorrie Chambers takes up with another pilot, who also dies during a test flight. Then she takes up with another who dies, and another. Protagonist Len Jacobs meets her in a bar the night before his own X-20 test flight. Is Lorrie a jinx, or is she suffering a run of otherworldly bad luck? He’s advised not to go near her, but he can’t stay away because she’s beautiful—of course—and he can’t back out of the test. So the story concludes with his flight into the stratosphere. Does he survive? The cover tells you. We’ll just say the story was an interesting change from the tiger hunts and treacherous fatales you usually get in Adam.
In terms of art and photography there’s less than in later issues, especially those from the mid-seventies and onward. You get a mere five model pages. The inside back cover features one with slicked back hair in a pool. Whoever photographed her may have been in love with Grace Kelly. He posed his blonde exactly the way Howell Conant famously posed Kelly in Jamaica in 1955 for a cover of Collier’s magazine. We’ve added an inset of that shot.
Why are you people always so pushy? No! I don't accept Jesus as my personal lord and savior!
Straight outta Sydney we have an October 1969 issue of Adam for you today. The cover illustrates Lester Way’s story “Day of Reckoning,” in which a man learns that his wife is a liar and cheater, but only after the cops tear apart her story of a rapist home invader. It’s a good little tale, but you can’t help noting the cops’ immediate disbelief. Way unwittingly reflects policing culture around sexual crimes at that time (and often this time too). Or at least, we assume it was unwitting. Maybe he’s a cleverer writer than we think. But since the attack never happened, the cover art represents the wife’s fabrication to the police and her husband.
As a side note, the reason the art put us in mind of pushy door-to-door solicitors is because we have our own unwanted (sort of) salesman. While we have numerous stores in the pueblo, we get our eggs from a man we call “The Egg Guy.” He brings farm fresh eggs to people’s doors, which is fine, but the problem is he tries to sell us dozens a week. We tell him over and over we can’t eat that many eggs, but he doesn’t get it. So while we do buy from him (the eggs are excellent), we also spend a lot of time turning him away. We admire the hustle, though.
As we paged through this Adam we found numerous fascinating features, such as the factual stories “Witchcraft Love Cult,” about a man captured by Panamanian Indians, and “Be Murdered or Sold,” about a woman trafficked into sexual bondage in Yemen. There’s also fiction from veteran Adam contributor John P. Gilders called “The White Man’s Burden.” That term, for those who don’t know, refers to the idea that white men were morally obligated to “civilize” inhabitants of the lands they colonized. The story completes an unusually interesting set of literary contributions in a magazine that never fails to entertain.
In addition, on the inside of the front cover is U.S. model, actress, and photographer Salli Sachse, who appeared in such films as The Million Eyes of Sumuru and The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini. She died just last month. Several other beautiful models grace the interior pages, none of whom we can currently identify. Maybe we’ll get a bit of reader help on them.
And of course there’s art. Jack Waugh, as always, makes his presence felt, and Earl Norem makes a surprise appearance. We thought his work appeared only in U.S. men’s adventure magazines, so our first thought was: Good on him for making it Down Under—hope he got well paid. Then we had a closer look. His art for the story “Escape Ring” looks far less crisp than the other illustrations. His signature is fuzzy. We think Adam borrowed the art from another magazine. Don’t quote on us that. Dirty Aussie thieves! Don’t quote us on that either. Forty-plus art panels below.
They say that if you have to resort to aggression you've lost the argument, but it doesn't look like she cares.
The two photos above show obscure Australian actress Denise Coward—with a change of wardrobe between—and were made for her 1985 actioner Sudden Death. She thus becomes one of our rare modern femmes fatales, but these shots were so good we had to share them. As for the movie, yeah, we watched it. Why not? It’s basically Death Wish with Coward in the good-citizen-pushed-too-far role, big hair on all the actors, and a synthpop soundtrack, including a recurrent version of New Order’s tune “Confusion.” The movie is topical, but there’s no need to watch it—the promo photos are the best part of it.
Perfect! Now show them your front again! If you keep distracting them we might just win this fight!
Above are scans from an issue of Adam magazine published this month in 1976. The cover art pairs with Richard Lindsay’s story “Seaward from Samarinda,” about a river captain with the awesome name Salvador Cain who finds himself upriver deep in Borneo trying the save a princess from assassins sent by her brother the prince. He gets her aboard a riverboat in a town called Samarinda and that’s when the real action begins. It’s good work from Lindsay, with a pitched gun battle, multiple sticks of thrown dynamite, and more. This issue of Adam goes a bit heavier than usual on the glam models, which suits us fine because among them is Swedish export Annika Salmonsson, better known as Anita Hemmings, in the photo feature “The Awakening.” You can see more of her starting here. Adam will return.
I can't make it all out, sir, but it's something about how it's their land, we're invaders, yadda yadda yadda— You know how they are.
Australian author Morris L. West’s novel Kundu has been reprinted many times, which is often (though not always) an indicator of quality. We’ve seen editions from HarperCollins, Panther, Bantam, Ulverscroft, Allen & Unwin, Granada, White Lion, and Mayflower, and those are just the English editions. But he first published it in 1956 as the Dell paperback you see here with nice Victor Kalin art.
Between the covers West tells the story of a diverse group of colonials in the highlands of New Guinea, amongst them a priest, a district police officer, a “witch doctor,” a German farmer named Kurt Sonderfeld, and his wife Gerda. There are many unusual undercurrents among these people, not least the hate-hate relationship between the Sonderfelds, who openly cheat and can barely stand each other’s company.
That relationship comes into focus once West reveals that Sonderfeld is really escaped Sturmbannführer Gottfried Reinach, who operated a Polish concentration camp where he plucked beautiful Gerda from the masses headed for the crematoria, made her his mistress, and brought her along when, under a false identity, he escaped the collapsing Reich and eventually settled in New Guinea. Because she knows the truth, Gerda can never be free, and Nazi hunters aren’t kind to mistresses anyway.
Gerda is Sonderfeld’s only danger. Otherwise his fake identity is ironclad. He even had a concentration camp number tattooed onto his arm. But safety breeds hubris. He harbors dreams of power and domination over the vast valley in which he resides. In order to achieve that he must control the tribal medicine men, and that’s where the book generates its intrigue. West blends interpersonal strife, tribal magic (i.e. the belief therein), and subterfuge into an unlikely colonialist potboiler. The book was reportedly written in a flash, but there’s occasional eloquence to the prose, such as in this passage about a supporting character lost early in the narrative:
They marked the grave with a big square stone and left him there—lonely in death as he had been in life—loveless, barren of achievement, crowned with dust, naked in the naked earth of the oldest island on the planet.
As in all colonialist novels, locals do not fare well with white characters, but there are degrees. Sonderfeld, being a Nazi, has some harsh ideas about New Guineans, while the priest is more paternal. They’re opposite in makeup. Sonderfeld is smart and loves to show it, but he’s also impulsive. The priest is unassuming and always thinking of the long term. Sonderfeld is an atheist; the priest has deep religious conviction. He emerges as Sonderfeld’s main resister, and main protector of the tribes.
We don’t feel Sonderfeld’s contemptuous atheism is a natural fit for that character—after all, the Nazis were predominantly, vastly, overwhelmingly Christian, so the more interesting opposition with the priest would have been not atheist against believer, but a loving Christianity against a violent one. It’s a split that existed in Germany then, and exists in the U.S. today. But other than that, and one or two other facile confabulations, we have to call Kundu a good book.
First I'll let her wake up and see that I struck it rich. Then I'll tell her I'm divorcing her.
The above issue of Adam magazine was published this month in 1961, with a cover illustrating Arne Paule’s story “Dead on Time,” about a gangster who hires out the killing of his mistress, which of course doesn’t happen once the killer gets a look at the target. As usual there’s art signed by Jack Waugh inside, while another illustration—the one split into panels five and six—is signed by Yaroslav Horak. Sometimes known as Larry Horak, he was a Czech-Russian born in China who emigrated to Australia in childhood, began working for Adam‘s parent company K.G. Murray Publishing in 1957, and put together a career that made him one of the most prolific cartoonists in Australia.
Elsewhere in Adam the editors devote several pages to international boxing, and specifically the idea that referees need to be tough. We’ll agree with that—we’ve seen a couple get slugged in the face. The article gives numerous examples of problematic situations for refs, and mentions that in the U.S. the Ku Klux Klan had a part in fixing fights so white boxers would win. In addition, in panel eleven you saw a typical theme in mid-century cartoons—two men in a dungeon. We put together a collection of those a while back which you can see here. We still have issues of Adam coming in on occasion, so right now we have more than thirty to post. Look for more soon.
The good folks at Horwitz adopt another Hollywood actress.
Valerie Allen was an obscure U.S. actress who started her career in cinema before quickly migrating to television, appearing in shows such as 77 Sunset Strip, Gunsmoke, and Sea Hunt. Probably her most interesting movie for our purposes is 1958’s I Married a Monster from Outer Space, which we watched last year. Her earliest roles were in 1956, but when Sydney, Australia-based Horwitz Publications used her image in 1957 for this cover of Set-Up for a Sinner she had not yet scored a credited screen role. This once again confirms our theory that Horwitz habitually used unlicensed handout photos for its cover art. There was nothing to be gained by using a completely unknown American actress over an Aussie model except not having to pay a modeling fee, so they used whatever film promos came into their publishing offices, and didn’t pay for them. Well, Allen may have been obscure, but this bright cover is the opposite. We think it’s one of Horwitz’s best.
Let's face it—once the wine tasting and the luau were over there was no reason to finish the cruise anyway.
Above is the cover of the August 1976 issue of the Australian men’s adventure magazine Adam, a publication we’ve featured a few times* in the past. The front illustration is an unusually colorful and evocative piece for a magazine that specialized in them. It pairs with a story by stalwart Adam contributor Mike Rader titled “The Eye of the Dragon,” which is about a magazine writer in Malaysia, the beautiful spy he encounters, and a legendary gem coveted by all and sundry. As always, Rader does pretty good work.
This issue of Adam is one in which erotica and pulp style literature coexist to nice effect, with beautiful interior illustrations by Jack Waugh and others interspersed with photos of cinema sex symbols Andrea Lau and Karin Schubert, a snippet on xxx star Marilyn Chambers, and semi-nude photos of unknown models. When people ask why we have vintage nude photos on our website this is exactly why—it’s relevant to what was produced by post-pulp publishers throughout the late ’60s and the entirety of the 1970s.
*This is the ninety-third issue we’ve shared. Click the keyword “Adam” below if you want to lose a substantial amount of your valuable time.
Maybe your talent isn't in legitimate medicine. I hear there's a good living these days in being a quack.
An angst tinged cover fronts Karen Miller’s 1962 medical drama-romance Hospital Crisis. This is from Horwitz Publications, the Australian imprint we like to focus on because of their celebrity covers. No celeb here, but the work is nice, if uncredited. Miller wrote other medical books such as Flying Doctor, UrgentDiagnosis, Call for the Flying Doctor, and Doctor Off-Track. She was a pseudonym, though there’s confusion over whose. Some say she was in reality Richard Wilkes-Hunter, while others say Ray Slattery. The facts will emerge in time, we’re sure.
Forget the whip! Scratch him behind the ears! I think cats really like that!
This issue of Adam magazine was published in June 1959 with nicely colorful art of a cat trainer stuck in a cage with an angry panther. Adam covers were always derived from one of the interior stories. This time it’s “Circus of Death,” credited to D. Mills, and it’s about a lion trainer, a panther trainer, and a high wire walker who all lust for the same woman. The panther trainer plots with the high wire walker to use a cat named Juju to kill the lion trainer. It’s a pretty good story despite the woman’s completely ornamental role—she doesn’t even have a line of dialogue. Also inside is “Pagoda Well” by Berkeley Mather, who wrote the ambitious if flawed 1960 Central Asian adventure The Pass Beyond Kashmir, which we talked about here. He runs over familiar ground, weaving the story of an arrogant character named Sefton who signs on to a diamond mining expedition to Burma only to find he’s taken on more than he can handle. Of special note in this issue is a feature on blues singers. You get rare photos of Bessie Smith, Lena Horne, and others. These older Adams have less photography and art than the awesome ’70s issues, but the covers are always beautiful. More from this publication to come.
German theoretical physicist Albert Einstein is awarded the Nobel Prize for his work with the photoelectric effect, a phenomenon in which electrons are emitted from matter as a consequence of their absorption of energy from electromagnetic radiation. In practical terms, the phenomenon makes possible such devices as electroscopes, solar cells, and night vision goggles.
1938—Kristallnacht Begins
Nazi Germany’s first large scale act of anti-Jewish violence begins after the assassination of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan. The event becomes known as Kristallnacht, and in total the violent rampage destroys more than 250 synagogues, causes the deaths of nearly a hundred Jews, and results in 25,000 to 30,000 more being arrested and sent to concentration camps.
1923—Hitler Stages Revolt
In Munich, Germany, Adolf Hitler leads the Nazis in the Beer Hall Putsch, an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the German government. Also known as the Hitlerputsch or the Hitler-Ludendorff-Putsch, the attempted coup was inspired by Benito Mussolini’s successful takeover of the Italian government.
1932—Roosevelt Unveils CWA
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt unveils the Civil Works Administration, an organization designed to create temporary winter jobs for more than 4 million of the unemployed.
1935—Parker Brothers Buys Monopoly
The board game company Parker Brothers acquires the forerunner patents for Monopoly from Elizabeth Magie, who had designed the game (originally called The Landlord’s Game) to demonstrate the economic ill effects of land monopolism and the use of land value tax as a remedy for them. Parker Brothers quickly turns Monopoly into the biggest selling board game in America.
1991—Gene Tierney Passes Away
American actress Gene Tierney, one of the great beauties in Hollywood history and star of the seminal film noir Laura, dies in Houston, Texas of emphysema. Tierney had begun smoking while young as a way to help lower her high voice, and was hooked on cigarettes the rest of her life.
