Crime Does Not Pay (comic)
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Crime Does Not Pay was the title of a popular American series of comic books published between 1942 and 1955 by Lev Gleason Publications, edited and mostly written by Charles Biro. It was the first "true crime" comic series and also the first comic in the Crime comics genre. One of the most popular comics of its day, at its height the comic would claim a readership of six million on its covers. The series' sensationalised retellings of the deeds of such gangsters as Baby Face Nelson or Machine Gun Kelly were illustrated by such artists as Bob Wood and George Tuska. They were often introduced and commented by a ghoulish figure in a top hat, "Mr Crime"-- a precursor to such "horror hosts" as the Crypt Keeper at E.C. comics.
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[edit] History
When Lev Gleason hired Bob Wood and Charles Biro to edit Daredevil and Silver Streak comics in 1941, he rewarded the two cartoonists with a profit-sharing program and creator credits on the covers of the comics. In addition, Gleason urged the pair to create new titles for his company under the understanding that they would share in the profits. Biro and Wood discussed the matter and eventually came up with a concept that would become Crime Does Not Pay, a comic book series chronicling the lives of murderers and gangsters based in part on real world people. Biro is reputed to have been inspired by a meeting with a kidnapper and pimp one night in a bar [1], although publisher Arthur Bernhard has stated that the entire concept was created by Gleason [2]. The title was based on a popular radio and MGM film series.
Heralded by ads in other Gleason tiles, Crime Does Not Pay took over the numbering of Silver Streak comics with issue # 22 and was dated July 1942. The first issue featured articles and comic stories about real criminals and was written by Biro and Wood. Biro designed and drew the first cover and wrote stories about mobsters Louis Buchalter and "Diamond Joe" Esposito, and gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok.
According to Gerard Jones, Crime Does Not Pay was "the first nonhumor comic to rival the superheroes in sales, the first to open the comic book market to large numbers of late adolescent and young males"[3]. Initial issues sold approximately 200,000 copies each, a healthy number for the time, but by the end of World War II the title was selling 800,000 per issue. When sales reached one million in 1948, the editors added the claim "More Than 5,000,000 Readers Monthly" to the cover, a reference to the pass-along effect of comics circulation[4].
Mostly written by Charles Biro, the stories in Crime Does Not Pay became known for their lurid detail, confessional tone, and exceptional, violent artwork. The stories often dealt frankly with adult relationships, drug use and sex, in addition to the depictions of physical violence, torture, and murder that were standard for every issue.
Issue #24 introduced the Biro-designed figure of Mr. Crime, the cartoon mascot of the series, who narrated and commented on the action depicted in the comics, addressing his readers in a joking, conspirational tone. Mr. Crime dressed in a white top hat (labeled "Crime") and white sheet. His bizarre visage resembled a gremlin, with pointed ears, nose and teeth. In many ways he was similar to the character of Mr. Coffee Nerves from a series of print ads for Postum designed by cartoonists Milt Caniff and Noel Sickles. The character of Mr. Crime pre-dated the Horror Hosts of EC Comics and other publishers, and his ghostly presence is very similar to that affected by Rod Serling on the Twilight Zone television series and of Raymond Edward Johnson on the Inner Sanctum radio program.
The series remained essentially alone in its choice of subject matter for most of the 1940s but eventually inspired a host of imitators, including Jack Kirby and Joe Simon's Headline Comics and Real Clue for Hillman Periodicals (1947), Marvel's Official True Crime Cases (1947), DC's Gang Busters (1947), and Fox's Crimes by Women (1948). In response, Gleason and Biro ran attack ads in their own comics and launched a companion title to Crime Does Not Pay, Crime and Punishment, in 1948. However, 1948 also saw more publishers enter the genre, with the result that, by one estimate "thirty different crime comics were on the stands by the end of 1948 and by 1949 roughly one in seven comics was a crime comics"[5].
Although continuously popular in terms of sales, Crime Does Not Pay and other crime comics increasingly became the targets of concerned parents, clergy, and other groups who were disturbed by the content of the comics and saw the stories as one of the root causes of a variety of societal ills, including illiteracy and juvenile delinquency. In the wake of books such as Fredric Wertham's Seduction of the Innocent and the investigations of the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency, many publishers, including Lev Gleason, censored their own comics and adopted a strict code administered by the Comics Code Authority. The sanitized Crime Does Not Pay that resulted lasted only a few issues before being canceled with #147 in 1955.
[edit] Regular features
- Officer Common Sense, begins with #41
- Chip Gardner, begins with #22
- Who Dunnit, puzzle mystery series with art by Fred Guardineer, begins with #39
[edit] Plot
[edit] Creators
[edit] Collections and Reprints
[edit] Impact
[edit] Awards
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
- Goulart, Ron (1985). Great History of Comic Books. Chicago: Contemporary Books. ISBN 0-8092-5045-4.
- Jones, Gerard (2004). Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters, and the Birth of the Comic Book. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-03656-2.
- Wright, Nicky (1998). "Seducers of the Innocent: The Bloody Legacy of Pre-Code Comics!" Comic Book Marketplace #65. pp 24-27,56-50.
