Intl. Notebook

June 8 2024

THE EDGE OF FOREVER

A timeless show's most timeless episode.

Was Star Trek the greatest sci-fi series ever aired? We think so, though there have been other great ones. But even if Star Trek wasn’t the best, it was the most topical and groundbreaking, with its anti-war and anti-racism allegories, diverse crew, and costumes that pushed the bounds of censorship. The two shots above are from the 1967 episode “City on the Edge of Forever,” written by Harlan Ellison and considered by many fans to be the pinnacle of the series. In the photo are Enterprise crew members looking at the Guardian of Forever, an eternal being that records all of history and acts as a gateway for those who wish to observe the past firsthand.

When Doctor McCoy suffers an accidental drug overdose that makes him psychotic he leaps through the gateway to a past Earth. At that moment the Enterprise, which is in orbit, disappears. Somehow McCoy has changed Earth’s past, and caused the ship—possibly all of humanity—to wink out of existence. The crew members have no choice but to follow McCoy into the past to try and stop him from doing whatever altered history. Spock refers to that past—the 1920s—as “a rather barbaric time.” We wonder what he would think if he came from the future to the 2020s? We have a feeling the word “barbaric” wouldn’t suffice.

Star Trek, William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, Nichelle Nichols, Harlan Ellison, television, sci-fi

Intl. Notebook

June 2 2024

TANJIBLE DIFFERENCE

A change of culture is always good. It's also a reminder of how similar we all are.

We made it to Marrakech and back. As always we kept our eyes open for pulp style material, but came up empty. The place is kind of pulp in itself, though, even without paperbacks and magazines to collect. We did see one thing—above is a restyled Casablanca poster hung in a nightspot we visited at which we saw a wild Moroccan jazz performance, with scantily clad Senegalese tribal drummers and dancers added for spice. It was insanely raucous and outrageously good.

The poster reminded us of all the vintage movies set fully or partly in Morocco. We’re talking, aside from the aforementioned, Hitchcock’s The Man Who Knew Too Much, Vincent Price’s The House of 1,000 Dolls, Morocco, Moon over Morocco, Outpost in Morocco, Road to Morocco, A Night in Casablanca, Our Man in Casablanca, Our Man in Marrakech, La môme vert de gris, Port Afrique, Tangier, The Woman from Tangier, Mission à Tanger, Billete para Tánger, (mid-century filmmakers really liked Tangier), Trapped in Tangiers, Casablanca nid d’espions, and many more.

These movies aren’t all good, and only a few were actually shot in Morocco, but they channel the unique vibe of the country just the same. Books we’ve talked about that pass through there include The Shocking Secret by Holly Roth, Seven Lies South by William P. McGivern, The Last Match by David Dodge, and—again—many more.

It was nice to return to Marrakech. Every once in a while you need to get away from Western culture. It’ll help you appreciate the amazing variety of people in the world, who, even so, are similar to you despite their different religions, dress, and interests. We feel refreshed and ready for the heat and fun of summer.

Morocco, Marrakech

Intl. Notebook

June 2 2024

SKATING BY

That's just how they roll.

Above: four Skating Vanities performers cavort on Fifth Avenue in New York City as part of a public awareness campaign during World War II. The photo was made today in 1942, and this stunt, in addition to highlighting gas conservation, publicized Skating Vanities, which had been launched earlier in the year. It had grown out of an earlier skating extravaganza called the Roller Follies. Under its new name it enjoyed a successful fourteen year run in New York City, nationally, and overseas. Some of the spectaculars employed as many as one hundred skaters at a time. This quartet is, from left to right, Ronnie Billet, Dolly Durkin, Isabel Newland, and Jo Reilly.

New York City, Ronnie Billet, Dolly Durkin, Isabel Newland, Jo Reilly

Intl. Notebook

May 26 2024

MARRAKECH IT IF YOU CAN

Pulp Intl. heads back to the scene of the crime.

It’s intermission time. Yes, we just took a break, but it was unplanned due to our move and its many associated delays. The upcoming intermission has been planned for a while. We’re going to stage a triple birthday celebration in Lisbon with some of our favorite globetrotters. The Pulp. Intl. girlfriends are coming too, but are bailing on day four. They say they want us to have boy time, but the truth is four days with this crowd is all they can endure.

Mixed into the days and nights (of sedate museum visits and early bedtimes, we swear, girls) will be serious pulp digging. We have no idea whether Portugal has such items, but we’ll only learn the answer by looking. Hopefully we’ll make it back home intact by March 16. That’s the plan, anyway. But you know what they say about plans. To tide you over until our glorious return, let us direct you to some Pulp Intl. favorites.

A small collection of paperback covers by George Gross.

Fifteen covers of the pulp magazine Short Stories.

Modern pulp art by the amazing Owen Smith.

All our issues of the French art deco style magazine Paris Plaisirs.

All our issues of the Australian men’s adventure magazine Adam.

Misty Ayers does her daily lingerie workout then cooks a meal.

The paperback cover art of Bill Edwards.

A look at historic cinemas from around world.

Beautiful covers from the Italian publishers Edizioni MA-GA.

All our write-ups on sexploitation queen Laura Gemser.

And finally, below you’ll find our inexhaustible tabloid index, which used to reside somewhere in 2018, but which we’ve moved in case anyone wants to check out all the scandal sheets we’ve written about.

Morocco, Marrakech, intermission

Intl. Notebook

May 25 2024

DOOM’S EARLY LIGHT

1-2-0-0, party over, oops out of time. So tonight we're gonna party like it's 11:59.

The Doomsday Clock is currently set at ninety seconds to midnight. That’s not good. Here in the palatial Pulp Intl. metroplex we tend not to worry too much. For one, we’re too focused on enjoying life. Second, we’ve always maintained that the only possible benefit to the ridiculous proliferation of the ultra wealthy is that none of them want to be incinerated, and they possibly have influence on countries’ policies to a greater extent than at any previous time in history. On the other hand, humans are generally pretty stupid, running geopolitics like high school bullies, and there are many people who crave obliteration because of their bronze age religious myths. Some of those people are influential too.

So, in these moments when the spinning top of human civilization threatens to careen right off the tiny table on which it’s perched, the above photo is a reminder to live your life to the fullest. It shows the nuclear test Grable, which was part of the series of tests nicknamed Operation Upshot-Knothole, and occurred at the Nevada Test Site today in 1953. They fired a 280 millimeter nuclear shell into the desert with the so-named M65 Atomic Cannon, detonating the explosive aerially, resulting in a 15 kiloton blast. And they proved… Well, we can’t be sure about that. Multiple methods of doomsday delivery, possible delusions about contained nuclear warfare, etc. Dance, everyone. Just dance.

Nevada, nukes

Intl. Notebook, Sex Files

May 21 2024

INFORMERLY KNOWN AS

The paper that never published a truthful word.

Speaking of gonzo newspapers, here’s an issue of National Informer published today in 1972, with its “truthful news of all the facts of life.” That in itself is a higher level of satire than yesterday’s competitor Rampage ever managed. This issue of Informer is all sex, with wonder pills, wonder drugs, hookers, and bedroom variations galore, including dominant women—and men whose egos can’t handle it. There’s a photo of a model captioned: “If you want your little to girl to grow up to be a big girl don’t let her start taking birth control until seventeen.” We had to read it twice. Is that some sort of incest quip? There’s nothing these tabloid editors wouldn’t print.

Informer also once more welcomes resident seer Mark Travis. We remember when he took over for the (not so) Great Criswell. Of the two, we liked Criswell better. Plus he had a better handle. Travis predicts the rise of disposable clothing, a massive outpouring of U.S. budget on artificial lakes, and a sudden trend of home rifle ranges. These seers were early versions of modern day cable pundits—they could constantly be wrong and still keep their jobs. But once we accept these papers as satire, then it’s clear that the predictions were supposed to be wrong. It’s excellent work if you can get it. Twenty-plus scans below.

National Informer, Mark Travis, nudity, tabloid

Intl. Notebook, Sex Files

May 20 2024

SLURPING BEAUTIES

They slurp, you slurp, we all slurp in Rampage.

It’s always fun to see which direction Rampage goes in each ridiculous centerspread, and in an issue published today in 1973 they highlight a mother and daughter who lick houseguests. This stuff is priceless. It’s reported by “Karl Peabody,” who visits a Los Angeles businessman who runs his home “Burmese style,” whatever that is, with a compliant wife and daughter required to entertain guests. Soon comes the licking, and we bet you can guess which part of this pseudonymous reporter gets licked. Rampage claims on its front cover that it’s America’s “top satire and humor weekly.” We’re not so sure about the humor part of the formula, but the satire is certainly there.

We often wonder why people who bought Rampage didn’t just go full porn and buy Playboy or whatever. But maybe Rampage and its ilk were displayed more openly at newsstands, and possibly as checkout line items in drugstores and the like, leading to impulse purchases. We figure the average buyer would read the paper twice—once out of curiosity, and again to make sure it was as dumb as it seemed the first time. With tens of millions of newsstand browsers every week, even a miniscule purchase rate would probably keep a tabloid afloat. Of course, we’ve bought dozens of these gonzo newspapers, so who are we to talk? Therefore we humbly submit for your perusal a selection of choice Rampage imagery.

Rampage, nudity, tabloid

Intl. Notebook

May 11 2024

ASKED BUT NOT ANSWERED

Enquiring minds want to know, but people can't always get what they want.

Tabloids are our thing. We’ve talked quite a bit about how influential they were during the 1950s. Apparently, considering the revelation that a recent presidential candidate depended upon one to catch and kill stories that could harm his campaign, they still are. This National Enquirer hit newsstands today in 1958. The cover has a rare shot of Ireland born actress Maureen O’Hara, who says she doesn’t have a lot offer but wants a man around the house. She had plenty to offer, but she’d been divorced for around five years, so the headline makes sense. We’d have bought this but some joker wanted eighty bucks for it, which made milk come out our noses, we laughed so hard. We generally get our tabloids for fifteen, and the ones we choose are usually far more colorful than this early-period Enquirer.

We wonder if the ask was so high due to the paper’s current newsworthiness. The whole situation is interesting, because unlike old top-tier tabloids like Confidential and Whisper that often uncovered inconvenient truths, the newer interations generally just make everything up, which places them closer to satire than news. Even so, tabloids remain the traditional last stop for people wanting to sell sensational stories, but who’ve been turned away by more ethical publications, which means facts occasionally land on tabloid editors’ desks. Former Enquirer head David Pecker understood that, has testified during the ongoing Donald Trump hush money/finance disclosure trial that he expected it to happen, and, as it turns out, he was correct in spades.

Politics is a dirty business, but politicians are generally pretty square. Enquirer wouldn’t have found itself in a position to help 95% of them, but for a serial cheat and swindler like Donald Trump (fact, not opinion), whose flaws have been famously described as “fractal” (i.e. inside his flaws are more flaws, ad infinitum into bottomless, kaleidoscopic eternity), Enquirer was uniquely able to weight the electoral scales. Pecker must have felt a tremendous sense of power. We would have. The politics-journalism nexus hinges upon access, and having access in D.C—basically being an insider—is like being an insider in Hollywood, but with the added heady sensation of being in the center of world-shaping events. It must really be something to have the president’s ear.

We’d give a lot to have been in some of those Enquirer interview sessions, especially the Karen McDougal ones. A year after McDougal was made Playmate of the Year, PSGP (one of your two Pulp boys) started as a temporary hire at Playboy Entertainment Group and rose to have an office and a staff, before chucking it and running away to Guatemala. So there’s a six degrees of separation aspect to it for him. It’s a shame Enquirer killed McDougal’s and Stormy Daniels’ stories. Tabloids are part of the dark underbelly of U.S. culture. They’ve always catered to prurient interests. And reveled in it. But hiding prurience? That’s low. In a rational world that would cost Enquirer the actual designation “tabloid.” We’ll talk to the National Association for Tabloid Oversight (the other NATO) about that. Oh right—it doesn’t exist. Well, it should.

Ireland, National Enquirer, Playboy, Maureen O'Hara, David Pecker, Donald Trump, Karen McDougal, Stormy Daniels, tabloid

Intl. Notebook

May 8 2024

HARD TO BEIRA

I'm sorry I hurt your feelings. Have you considered looking for a woman out of your league who's closer to your age?

Above you see one of the items we picked up in Lisbon. It’s an issue of Colecção Cinema. Basically, these and others of its ilk in multiple countries were print versions of current release films. Starring on front are Curd Jürgens and Eva Bartok from their 1956 West German movie Ohne dich wird es Nacht, which was titled in Portuguese À Beira do Pecado, meaning “on the verge of sin.” It was known in English as Without You It Is Night, the literal German title. Sounds dark, and it is. It’s about drug addiction. Though there isn’t as much art inside Colecção Cinema as you’d think considering it’s a cine-novela, we picked it up anyway for the interesting cover and the low price—a mere €1. Fifteen scans below.

Portugal, West Germany, Germany, Colecção Cinema, Ohne dich wird es Nacht, Ð€ Beira do Pecado, Without You It Is Night, Curd Jürgens, Eva Bartok, Barry Coe, cinema

Intl. Notebook

May 5 2024

FEEL THE HEAT

Frenchmen probably got warm just looking at the posters.

Raymond Brenot was one of the great illustrators of French advertising. Actually, he was great in every field, from album sleeves to paperback covers, but his advertising work stands out due to the generally lesser amount of aesthetically top-notch advertising campaigns, even in France. But there were exceptions, and these two posters for Zaegel-Held oil stoves are among them. The second poster describes them as “a source of well-being.” We’ll buy that.

France, Raymond Brenot

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

October 7

1959—Dark Side of Moon Revealed

The Soviet space probe Luna 3 transmits the first photographs of the far side of the moon. The photos generate great interest, and scientists are surprised to see mountainous terrain, very different from the near side, and only two seas, which the Soviets name Mare Moscovrae (Sea of Moscow) and Mare Desiderii (Sea of Desire).

October 6

1966—LSD Declared Illegal in U.S.

LSD, which was originally synthesized by a Swiss doctor and was later secretly used by the CIA on military personnel, prostitutes, the mentally ill, and members of the general public in a project code named MKULTRA, is designated a controlled substance in the United States.

October 5

1945—Hollywood Black Friday

A six month strike by Hollywood set decorators becomes a riot at the gates of Warner Brothers Studios when strikers and replacement workers clash. The event helps bring about the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act, which, among other things, prohibits unions from contributing to political campaigns and requires union leaders to affirm they are not supporters of the Communist Party.

October 4

1957—Sputnik Circles Earth

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.

October 4

1970—Janis Joplin Overdoses

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.