vintage and modern pulp fiction; noir, schlock and exploitation films; scandals, swindles and news
Like a comfortable sweater the Jan Hudson pseudonym was used by many, but in this case she was George H. Smith. That name, in turn, belonged to two other actual authors published during the 1960s, including one who wrote swamp sleaze novels. The Smith of Hell’s Highway also wrote as M. J. Deer, Jerry Jason, Dusty North, and so forth. It all gets pretty confusing. What we know for sure, though, is that this effort is copyright 1962, with an unknown cover artist, and cool graphics on the rear.
Don Bellmore, whose Hot Pants Heiress you see above, was one of many prolific smut authors during the 1960s. He wrote Shame Agent, Sin Dealer, Prey for Rape, The Dyke Department, The Twins’ Initiation, and many more. It all sounds pretty low rent, but you’d be surprised how robust the market is for vintage sleaze. We saw The Twins’ Initiation going for $49.95 on one site. Pretty good for an author that wasn’t even real. Bellmore was one of those names shared by a number of writers, including George H. White, who also wrote as both Jan Hudson and J.X. Williams, though the J.X. pseudonym was also used by John Jakes among others. White/Bellmore also may have filled in as Alan Marshall when Donald E. Westlake wasn’t inhabiting the role. It all gets pretty confusing. But what isn’t confusing is this humorous cover art, featuring a bottomless vixen doing the upside down bicycle exercise and her friend with a shoe fetish. We have some more Bellmore covers below. Enjoy.
The Soviet Union launches the satellite Sputnik I, which becomes the first artificial object to orbit the Earth. It orbits for two months and provides valuable information about the density of the upper atmosphere. It also panics the United States into a space race that eventually culminates in the U.S. moon landing.
American blues singer Janis Joplin is found dead on the floor of her motel room in Los Angeles. The cause of death is determined to be an overdose of heroin, possibly combined with the effects of alcohol.
The newspaper Pravda is founded by Leon Trotsky, Adolph Joffe, Matvey Skobelev and other Russian exiles living in Vienna. The name means “truth” and the paper serves as an official organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party between 1912 and 1991.
An obscenity trial brought against Lawrence Ferlinghetti, owner of the counterculture City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco, reaches its conclusion when Judge Clayton Horn rules that Allen Ginsberg’s poetry collection Howl is not obscene.
After a long trial watched by millions of people worldwide, former football star O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman. Simpson subsequently loses a civil suit and is ordered to pay millions in damages.
U.S. President Woodrow Wilson suffers a massive stroke, leaving him partially paralyzed. He is confined to bed for weeks, but eventually resumes his duties, though his participation is little more than perfunctory. Wilson remains disabled throughout the remainder of his term in office, and the rest of his life.
Ten days before the opening of the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, a peaceful student demonstration ends in the Tlatelolco Massacre. 200 to 300 students are gunned down, and to this day there is no consensus about how or why the shooting began.
