Intl. Notebook

May 18 2023

READ AND LEARN

What you learn won't be correct, but it'll at least be stimulating.

We have more tabloidy goodness for you with an issue of the venerable National Informer Reader published today in 1975. Inside is the expected sex advice and investigatory smut, but what’s interesting is that by this point Reader was growing more gender inclusive by publishing photos of nude men, particularly in its personal ads section. There are about eight pages but we’ll spare you most of them—neither the men nor women are what you’d call model types. But we’ve shared the guys from the interior stories. We even zoomed on a couple. It’s only fair, considering all the naked women this publication has provided over the years. Macho-sensitives be forewarned—swinging dicks below. Even with its forays into male nudity and lesbianism, however, Reader was still mainly a heterosexual men’s tabloid. Where else would you find a banner: “Do You Lust for Your Neighbor’s Snatch”? We have only a few more issues to share, and while we could restock, we’ll probably move on to new brands. There’s no shortage of them to choose from. Twenty scans below.

National Informer Reader, National Informer, nudity, tabloid

Sex Files

February 17 2022

LIGHT READER MATERIAL

Just a little something to help pass the time.

Above is the cover of an issue of National Informer Reader published today in 1974. Some people will tell you that the trans community is a new thing, but it isn’t, and we know because vintage tabloids have been obsessed with the subject for more than sixty years. If you don’t believe us check here, here, here, here, and here. Reader visits the topic with a story on trans entertainer Jennifer Fox. In cheap tabloids the stories were often made up, but Fox existed. She underwent gender reassignment in 1968 and became a burlesque dancer in Las Vegas. In other stories she’s noted that once knowledge of her change became widely known, interest in her exploded and she became a star attraction. The only thing is, we don’t think the photo Reader printed is Fox. Her face looks wrong, Fox was usually blonde, and not many burlesque dancers posed frontally nude after becoming famous—it would have devalued the moneymaker. Probably Reader never actually spoke to Fox. The editors simply knew a useful story when they saw it, and used a handout photo that looked good. When it comes to tabloids in this tier almost nothing is 100% accurate. Scans below.

Las Vegas, National Informer Reader, National Informer, National Informer Weekly Reader, Steve Reeves, James Coburn, Lee Marvin, tabloid, nudity, burlesque, lgbt

Sex Files

June 22 2019

READER FOR PLEASURE

There's nothing quite as stimulating as a vintage sleazy tabloid.

When the phonograph was invented, one of the things its advocates suggested was that it might be used for education, for example to listen to correspondence courses at home. Instead, in time it became a medium for selling music. When radio was invented it too was called a possible method for distance learning, and television was likewise touted as an educational device. And most of you will remember the high-minded rhetoric of what the internet would be used for. But today it’s mainly a cesspool of crass salesmanship, lowbrow entertainment, mass manipulation, and intellectual self harm. So we thought we’d add to the morass today by sharing the infinitely sleazy National Informer Reader.

This issue in all its baby blue glory appeared today in 1975 with an unidentified cover model. The magazine, you may remember from previous times we’ve featured it, was an offshoot of National Informer, and a pared down version of National Informer Weekly Reader. The “reader” aspect is close to euphemistic, as there is no actual reportage at all, and the few stories provided are just short form sleaze fiction. We’ve talked about all this before. Today, for a change, we thought it might be fun to focus on the want ads. Or maybe hope ads is a more accurate description. The term “dick pic” is a recent invention, we think, but it probably should have arisen a long time ago. Check below:

He probably should have cropped the photo down to only his left-hanging dick (his left, not yours) to have a better shot at a response. In any case, the flourishing of the mid-century tabloid industry will remind you that mass communication has always bred lowbrow gratification. Some say the internet supercharged our darkest desires, and that’s true, but we never actually needed digital technology to let our ids run free. Even pulp literature, with its murder, infidelities, and testosterone driven fantasies, is an example of the marginal blossoming into the mainstream. Well, there are few publications as marginal as National Informer Reader, as you’ll see in twenty scans below with numerous explicit personal ads. Check our tabloid index for more examples of Reader.

National Informer, National Informer Reader, National Informer Weekly Reader, nudity, tabloid

Intl. Notebook

December 19 2018

RELAXING READING

Cheapie tabloid shows the way to enriched health.

Above is the cover and below are some interior scans from National Informer Reader, an offshoot of the tabloid National Informer. It hit newsstands today in 1971. Generally the publication featured photographed models on its cover, but we’ve run across a few like this one with illustrations. There’s another one in the same vein inside the paper, and of course both are uncredited, though they look like the work of Alain Gourdon, aka Aslan. Needless to say, if these drawings are the work of the famed French illustrator, the editors of Informer Reader are unlikely to have paid for them.

The centerpiece of this issue is the spread on Swami Sarasvati, a famous yoga teacher who was born in India but moved to Australia and in 1969 became the host of a yoga television show that aired five mornings a week. Informer Reader shares her “sexercises,” but this turns out to be the editors’ salacious take on things—the Swami is merely offering relaxation and better health. It’s interesting, though, that she posed in a bikini. Clearly she wasn’t so zen a little self promotional skin was out of the question. You’ll notice her Siamese cat makes an appearance. There’s a video online of the Swami being interviewed, which you can see here, and amusingly, the cat makes an appearance there too.

Elsewhere in the issue readers get another installment of “I Predict” by seer Mark Travis. Never timid, this time around he warns that the U.S. and Soviet Union will develop lightning weapons to blast each other, that a member of the British parliament will be revealed as a modern Jack the Ripper, and that a famous Hollywood producer will be exposed as a drug kingpin. As a prognosticator you only have to be right one in ten times to impress people, but Travis isn’t even giving himself a chance with these crackpot predictions. We have more Readers to upload, so we’ll see if his anemic percentage improves. Scans below.

India, Australia, National Informer Reader, National Informer, Alain Gourdon, Aslan, Swami Sarasvati, Mark Travis, tabloid

Intl. Notebook

November 1 2018

PULPY ANNIVERSARY

One decade down, another to go.

So today is Pulp Intl.’s anniversary, and a special one, as we’ve now been around ten full years. Yeah, it’s crazy. When we began there were numerous blogs and websites that we admired and drew inspiration from, and all of them are gone or permanently idle now. A few new ones have popped up and we can only hope they last. Pulp Intl. came about because we had moved out of the U.S. and wanted something to eat up the idle hours we’d benefitted. Mostly we partied those hours away, but there were still a few left and Pulp duly sprang forth. We figured maybe ten or twenty people might drop by per week. Last we checked that number had reached more than 7,000 individual visitors per day, and in the summer it has been as many as 14,000. Per day. It’s just shocking. So we definitely want to thank every one of you for dropping by, and particularly those who visit time and again, with a special shout to those who write in with corrections and ideas.

We’ve scanned and uploaded thousands of original images, and seen them reposted tens of thousands of times on Tumblr, Twitter, and various other platforms. We have more to come. We shot photos of some items we have laying around the flat, just to give you an idea. It’s not a complete accounting. We have things we’re too lazy to pull out of storage right now. In all, scanning and sharing this stuff should take ten more years. Of course, as some wit once pointed out, plans and life are two different things—often diametrically opposed. Anything could happen, up to and including losing everything in a fire or the Pulp Intl. girlfriends—who are real people, by the way, not some concept we came up with—finally getting fed up and threatening to leave or kill us if we don’t shut down the website. But they’d never do that because they’re the best. Heh heh. Anyway, thank you everyone for these ten years. It’s been incredibly fun for us and we hope you’ve gotten a few laughs out of it, learned a few things, and had a love of vintage media instilled or just reaffirmed. And now—future here we come…

Adam Magazine, National Examiner, National Informer Reader, intermission

Intl. Notebook

June 16 2018

COCKED AND LOADED

National Informer Reader delves into the intricacies of male birth control.

By today in 1974, which is when this issue of National Informer Reader appeared, the magazine was nearing its end. It’s easy to tell. There’s less content than in pervious years, and there’s a proliferation of penny-ante ads in the front half of the layout. In the magazine world it’s understood that ads in the front are the ones most often seen by readers. The back page and inside back page are prime spots too, but otherwise it’s the front half of the book that makes publishers money because advertisers pay more for it. But readers will skip past ads if they aren’t adjacent to editorial content, so there needs to be a careful balance between the two. In this Reader that balance is gone. The entirety of pages two through seven are given over to ads and personals. You wanna know what angry is? Try the angry of an advertiser that opens a magazine and sees that his or her ad is surrounded not by readable content that keeps the reader on the page, but by other ads.

But there are still some treats even in a late stage Reader. “Older Women Are Flocking To Massage Parlors Run By Young Virile Studs” is pure gold, just for that descriptive header alone. But sometimes a header is so bizarre there’s no way to tell what the story is about. “New Vasectomy Ties Tell Women Who To Date.” Huh? What the hell kind of ties do they mean? Like the ones they use to tie your tubes? Turns out they mean it literally. A vasectomy clinic in London allegedly gave patients neckties with Vs running down the front, indicating the wearer had been snipped. And supposedly women flocked to these guys. We’ve been unable to corroborate the story, but it feels different from the second rate bull tabloid editors usually concoct—heh, we said coct—so we suspect it’s truthful. And fittingly, there’s cock in this issue, and not on slobs either—on nice looking guys, though none are swinging low, if you know what we mean. But still, something for our female readers. And male readers too. You’re welcome. Cock and bull below.

National Informer Reader, National Informer, National Informer Weekly Reader, tabloid, nudity, bdsm

Vintage Pulp

February 25 2017

MATURE READER

It may be old but it's just as feisty as ever.

Above and below we have some scans from an issue of National Informer Reader published today in 1974. During its early days the magazine was called National Informer Weekly Reader, but we guess weakly sales put a stop to its more frequent publication schedule. The content hasn’t changed in this later Reader, though. It has the usual stories of vice, including one of a sex orgy in a restaurant, complete with a photo of one of the participants, Christina Lindberg. You may remember we last saw her here.

Her presence in Reader is a classic example of the phenomenon of handout photos—i.e. publicity shots from promotional agencies sent to publications for usage in celeb write-ups. Generally, the agencies didn’t carefully check the types of publications requesting shots, which meant tabloids were able to get them pretty easily. Sometimes the parent publications would request the photos and they’d trickle down to the companies’ tabloid operations. In any case, Christina Lindberg obviously did not participate in a restaurant orgy. Though it certainly is appetizing to contemplate.

National Informer Reader, Christina Lindberg, tabloid

Vintage Pulp

October 31 2014

REMEDIAL READING

What’s scarier than National Informer Reader? Actually daring to look inside.

ReaderOn the opposite end of the tabloid spectrum from yesterday’s Top Secret, we have an issue of National Informer Reader published today in 1971. You may remember our previous entries on National Informer Weekly Reader. What you see above is simply the earlier, monthly iteration of the same rag. You wanna be scared on Halloween? Just peel back the cover on this baby.

Reader editors start by donning their anthropology hats and telling readers that by the year 2000 there will be 2.5 women on Earth for every man. You know what that means right? “In the year 2000 men will be catered to by women as in no other era in the history of mankind. Every week will be a special week dedicated in some way to the male sex. For instance, one week will be called National Sex Week, and if a man gives at the office he doesn’t have to give at home. 2000 is the start of the era when men will have the whip hand.”

Because men need more control, right? Well, if that prospect isn’t frightening enough, Reader tells us California is a breeding ground for devil-worshipping cults, drugs are destroying family life via osmosis from bad neighbors, virgin women are lamentably impossible to find anymore, and psychopathic outlaws and sex perverts have invaded America’s freewheeling outdoor music festivals. Readers also get to solve a murder mystery (which you can try below). All very scary.

Elsewhere in the issue, readers get Raquel Welch (just below) in a promo shot from Myra Breckenridge, and two photos of Malta-born British twins Mary and Madeleine Collinson, who posed together for Playboy’s

October 1970 centerfold and were the first (but not last) identical twins to do so. Both also appeared in movies, always together, because, well, twins. Their most remembered feature is Hammer’s schlock vampire classic Twins of Evil (although only one twin is a vampire in the movie). Sadly, Madeleine Collinson died last month on Malta

Lastly, Sophia Loren urges women to have sex before marriage. Loren describes women as “ridiculously moral. So they go out and marry a man without having a love affair first to find out if they are compatible.” Any potential husband, she says, might be anything from a sadist to a eunuch, and she recommends premarital sex, trial cohabitation, and state mandated probationary marriage that doesn’t legalize until three years have passed.

We have a few scans below, about fifteen issues of National Informer and National Informer Weekly Reader we’ve already shared (we’ll get you started in the archives here, here, here, and here), and we have nine more issues we hope to get through eventually. If that prospect doesn’t scare you nothing will.

Malta, Britain, Twins of Evil, National Informer Weekly Reader, National Informer Reader, National Informer, Playboy, Myra Breckenridge, Raquel Welch, Sophia Loren, Madeleine Collinson, Mary Collinson, cinema, tabloid

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

March 14

1964—Ruby Found Guilty of Murder

In the U.S. a Dallas jury finds nightclub owner and organized crime fringe-dweller Jack Ruby guilty of the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald. Ruby had shot Oswald with a handgun at Dallas Police Headquarters in full view of multiple witnesses and photographers. Allegations that he committed the crime to prevent Oswald from exposing a conspiracy in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy have never been proven.

March 13

1925—Scopes Monkey Trial Ends

In Tennessee, the case of Scopes vs. the State of Tennessee, involving the prosecution of a school teacher for instructing his students in evolution, ends with a conviction of the teacher and establishment of a new law definitively prohibiting the teaching of evolution. The opposing lawyers in the case, Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan, both earn lasting fame for their participation in what was a contentious and sensational trial.

March 12

1933—Roosevelt Addresses Nation

Franklin D. Roosevelt uses the medium of radio to address the people of the United States for the first time as President, in a tradition that would become known as his “fireside chats”. These chats were enormously successful from a participation standpoint, with multi-millions tuning in to listen. In total Roosevelt would make thirty broadcasts over the course of eleven years.

March 11

1927—Roxy Theatre Opens

In New York City, showman and impresario Samuel Roxy Rothafel opens the Roxy Theatre, a 5,920-seat cinema. Rothafel would later open Radio City Music Hall in 1932, which featured the precision dance troupe the Roxyettes, later renamed the Rockettes. Rothafel died in 1936, but his Roxy remained one of America’s greatest film palaces until it was closed and demolished in 1960.

March 11

1977—Polanski Is Charged with Statutory Rape

Polish-born film director Roman Polanski is charged with raping a 13-year-old girl at the home of Hollywood star Jack Nicholson. Polanski allegedly had sex with the girl in a hot tub after plying her with Quaaludes and champagne. Rather than risk prison Polanski fled the U.S. for Europe, but was eventually arrested in Switzerland in 2009.