LIP SYNCING

Kiss me and I'll kiss you back.

Below, another collection of covers featuring characters expressing a little affection, a continuation of the lip locks we put together way back in 2013, and an adjunct to our collection of Harry Barton neck kisses from 2017. 

Bonus action: see more kisses here, herehere, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Shhh... poor baby. Don't think of them as my ex-lovers. Think of them as practice sessions for all the fun we have.

We like this pretty cover for Loose Ladies, a “Love Novel” written by Wright Williams, aka Watkins E. Wright, for Knickerbocker Books. Williams also wrote Bar-Fly Wives, Borrowed Ecstasy, Carnival Girl, Cheaters at Love, and a bunch of other books of this ilk. Loose Ladies was number forty-eight in Knickerbocker’s Love Novels series and appeared in 1946. You’ll often see these referred to online as sleaze, but they’re chaste by today’s standards, though this one actually touches on the idea of test tube babies, weirdly. The uncredited cover painting is in a style seen on true pulp novels of the 1930s and 1940s, before good girl art took over. Maybe we’ll put together a Knickerbocker collection later. Keep an eye out. 

If someone knocks, don't answer.

It’s a good thing the real world isn’t like the worlds of pulp and mid-century crime fiction. In those realms, when a woman receives an unexpected visitor the result is often disastrous. Bad cops, evil crooks, ruthless blackmailers, lecherous uncles, and all sorts of nasty characters usually await on the other side of the door. Above and below you see a collection of mid-century paperback fronts showing those fraught moments just after a woman opens her door to trouble, or trouble takes matters into its own hands and busts its way in. Our recommendation: in the event of an unexpected knock just go out the window.

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

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.

1901—William McKinley's Assassin Executed

Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of U.S. President William McKinley, is executed at Auburn State Prison in Auburn, New York by means of the electric chair. Czolgosz had shot McKinley twice with a cheap revolver and the President had lingered for several days before dying. After Czolgosz is executed, he is buried on prison grounds and sulfuric acid is thrown into his coffin to disfigure his body and result in its quick decomposition.

1982—Lindy Chamberlain Convicted of Murder

In Australia, Lindy Chamberlain is found guilty of the murder of her nine-week-old daughter. The baby was killed during a camping trip in the Australian interior. Chamberlain claimed a dingo had taken the baby, but a jury decided Chamberlain cut the infant’s throat and buried her. The body was never found, but forensic experts played a large role in the conviction. Four years after the trial the baby’s jacket is found inside a dingo lair, backing up Chamberlain’s claim, and she is released from prison.

T’as triché marquise by George Maxwell, published in 1953 with art by Jacques Thibésart, also known as Nik.

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