HARLEM NOCTURNE

We ain't leaving 'til the sun comes up.

Here’s something wonderful we found on our recent U.S. trip. It’s a 1929 woodcut print promoting Harlem’s famous Cotton Club. You probably know the Cotton Club was one of America’s most prominent speakeasies, if that isn’t an oxymoron, and that it hosted some of the greatest jazz luminaries of the age, including Duke Ellington, Lena Horne, Cab Calloway, Bessie Smith, George Gershwin, and many others. The place was mob owned, specifically by England-born gangster Owney Madden. If stories about the sheer wildness of the Cotton Club are true, this print certainly captures its spirit. The artist here is E.M. Washington, who was quite well known for his woodcuts, and whose surviving original work goes for a fortune. This particular item is a reprint, which put it well within our price range.

1970s-era Police Gazette was pretty, colorful and well-designed—but nobody wanted to buy it.

Above are the cover and seven interior pages from a National Police Gazette published in March 1974, two years before the century-old magazine folded. In retrospect it’s easy to see one of the problems the Gazette was having: while the graphics, printing, photo quality and paper stock had all improved over the years, the magazine had lost its visual impact. At the time, editors must have thought they had made the magazine more attractive, but can the above cover really compare to this one, or this one, or this one? Successful competitors like National Enquirer featured little or no color, but the immediacy of their covers was hard to resist.

Part of the rationale behind the Gazette’s change may have had to do with its decades-long circulation decline, prompting them to do away with photo-illustrated covers in favor of cheaper promo shots. Or perhaps their longtime cover artisans simply aged and retired, taking their singular talents with them. Or perhaps new editors came aboard and decided to modernize—the default move of managers who have no aesthetic clue. Who knows? We just know that the results speak for themselves. But we’ll keep collecting even these late-period Gazettes because they’re useful in presenting a complete record of the publication. We’re going to go out a limb and say that we now have the largest compendium of Gazette pages on the internet. See them by clicking keywords “Police Gazette” below. 

His casa es su casa.

Above, a 1939 program for legendary Broadway showman Billy Rose’s extravaganza Aquacade, and four late-1930s programs from Casa Mañana. The Aquacade was a music, dance and swimming show that began in 1937 at the Great Lakes Exposition, later moved to New York City, and featured notables like Duke Ellington, Johnny Weissmuller and Esther Williams. Casa Mañana was a club Rose opened in Fort Worth, Texas in 1936. Built specifically to host his aquatic productions, the venue contained a revolving stage surrounded by a moat. So many landmark mid-century clubs have met the wrecking ball, but Casa Mañana still exists today, though the original stage is gone. 

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

1989—Los Angeles Herald-Examiner Folds

William Randolph Hearst’s newspaper the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, which had gained notoriety for its crime and scandal focus, including coverage of the Black Dahlia murder and Charles Manson trials, goes out of business after eighty-six years. Its departure leaves the Los Angeles Times as the sole city-wide daily newspaper in L.A.

1938—Seabiscuit Defeats War Admiral

At Pimlico Racecourse in Baltimore, Maryland, the thoroughbred stallion Seabiscuit defeats the Triple Crown champion War Admiral in a match race that had been promoted as “The match of the Century” in horse racing. The victory made Seabiscuit a symbol of triumph against the odds during the dark days of the Depression, and his story became the subject of a 1949 film, a 2001 book, and a 2003 film, Seabiscuit, which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.

1984—Indira Gandhi Assassinated

In India, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is assassinated by two of her own Sikh security guards in the garden of the Prime Minister’s Residence at No. 1, Safdarjung Road in New Delhi. Gandhi had been walking to meet British actor Peter Ustinov for an interview. Riots soon break out in New Delhi and nearly 2,000 Sikhs are killed.

1945—Robinson Signs with Dodgers

Jackie Robinson, who had been playing with the Negro League team the Kansas City Monarchs, signs a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers to become the first African-American major leaguer of the modern baseball era.

1961—Soviets Detonate Super Nuke

The Soviet Union detonates an experimental nuclear weapon called Tsar Bomba over the Arctic Circle, which, with a yield of 100 megatons of TNT, was then and remains today the most powerful weapon ever used by humanity.

Uncredited cover art for Lesbian Gym by Peggy Swenson, who was in reality Richard Geis.
T’as triché marquise by George Maxwell, published in 1953 with art by Jacques Thibésart, also known as Nik.

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