LONG WEEKEND

No blogging for a while.  I have a dolphin watch cruise scheduled for Friday, our annual Engligh high tea in honor of Kitty's birthday on Saturday, and a delayed corned beef and cabbage feast followed by the March meeting of Erin's Family Book Club on Sunday.  Busy, busy,  busy,,,

HALLMARK PLAYHOUSE: WYATT EARP, FRONTIER MARSHAL (MARCH 24, 1949)

Today marks Wyatt Earp's 178th birthday!  A legendary lawman and entrepreneur, Earp's reputation has become murky with the passage of time and he has generally been seen as a positive force in Western  history due to his portrayal in mass media, while in truth he could rightly deserve detractors as well as admirers.

Stuart Lake's bestselling 1931 biography, Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshall, had much to do with the popularized perception of Earp as a dedicated lawman, and it is this work that forms the basis of the Hallmark Playhouse episode linked below.  That book, later to be revealed as highly fictionized and glossing over or ignoring major aspects of Earp's life, was the basis of at least three films (Frontier Marshal, 1934, Frontier Marshal, 1939, My Darling Clementine, 1946), as well as the popular television series The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp (1955-1961).

So here's Wyatt, without warts, as the fierce and courageous lawman we all want him to be.  Richard Conte stars.  Also featured were Gerald Mohr and Lurene Tuttle.  Noted author James Hilton served the host; Hilton was also the person who selected which stories would be featured on the show.

Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DE8xAefp2c

SHORT STORY WEDNESDAY: THE DEATH CRY

 "The Death Cry" by Arthur B. Reeve  (first published in Weird Tales, May, 1935; reprinted in The Television Detectives' Omnibus [also published as Great Tales of Crime and Detection], edited by Peter Haining*, 1994; and in Dead Men Tell Tales, a collection of seven Craig Kennedy stories, Black Dog Books, 2008)

Craig Kennedy, "The Scientific Detective" first appeared in "The Case of Hilda Bond" in Cosmopolitan, December 1910, the first of a long series of 81 stories for that magazine through July 1915.  At one time, Kennedy rivaled -- and perhaps out-passed -- Sherlock Holmes in popularity.  Kennedy appear in about 171 stories (an accurate count is beyond my ken) and in 30 books,  both novels and collections.  In addition, there were eight films about the character (three of which featured Harry Houdini), an unknown number of radio programs, two comic strips, and a 1951 television series.  Many of the Craig Kennedy stories bordered on science fiction with the use of scientific devices.  It is possible that a number of tales about the character were ghost-written.

The man behind this was prolific author Arthur B. Reeve (1880-1936), who also created detective characters Constance Dunlap and Guy Garrick.  Reeve was also a screenwriter, and would also adapt a number of films written by others for newspaper syndication (one of these was for the "lost" 1928 film Tarzan the Mighty; Reeves adaptation was published in book form in 2005 from ERBville Press); he also wrote a number of scenarios about fake spiritualists for millionaire-murderer Harry K. Thaw (the guy who killed Stanford White over Evelyn Nesbit, the "Girl in the Red Velvet Swing"); Thaw refused to pay and a lawsuit resulted which Thaw eventually lost.

Kennedy began as a scientist who would solve crimes using both chemistry and psychology, with his repertoire eventually widening.  Kennedy was also a man of action, carrying two pistols and not afraid to use them.  As the series progress, the character became more of a hardboiled detective and faced both racketeers and spies.  By 1930 the author became an anti-racketeering crusader, hosting a  national radio program on the subject.  During World War II Reeve would help establish a spy and crime detection laboratory in Washington, D.C.

"The Death Cry" may have been the last Craig Kennedy story the Reeve published.

Kennedy has been called to the Three Pines Hotel in the Catskills to investigate a mysterious murder.  The victim was found in a locked room, killed while in bed, blood covering his throat.  When the blood was wiped away, two small puncture holes were discovered over the jugular vein.  Previous to the body being discovered, a terrifying and inhuman cry was heard,  but no one could ay where exactly it came from.  The hotel itself had been in business for ten years; most of the guests had fled after the murder,  but eight remained in residence, including a self-proclaimed psychic, a nervous old lady, a professor claiming to be a great scientist, a smug New York broker, a young married couple with a secret (she would later try to commit suicide), and a man who appeared strangely amused by the whole affair.  Also at the hotel were the manager, the hotel clerk, and Old Peter, a queer duck of a handyman who kept disappearing.  Soon after Kennedy arrived, that mysterious, fearsome "death cry" was heard again, signaling another impossible murder.  Add to the mix a ten-year-dead hermit, a hidden cave, a missing grave marker, a British inheritance, and a strange black figure seen in the distance, and lyou hav+e all the ingredients for an atmospheric melodrama:

"A gust of dark musty air came from the yawning hole.  There was something fetid, mephitic, bestial in it.  Black as jet, the yawning cavern opened in front of Kennedy and Blount."

And:

"Then came the second scream, this time the weird, inhuman scream that started in a low wail and increased until it echoed and re-echoed in the night,  It was the scream of death -- inhuman, terrifying, unearthly."

The story is good fun, despite plot holes you could drive a truck through.  And, frankly, Reeve is not a good writer, but he is able to pull the reader along breathlessly without stopping to consider how the sausage was made.  And, really, stories like this are not meant to be examined, but are to be read uncritically and hastily.

Recommended for what it is.

The May 1935 issue of Weird Tales is available to be read online from the usual suspects.

* Haining (1940-2007) was a prolific and oft-times sloppy anthologist who should rightly be credited for bringing to light a number of forgotten and overlooked works, although his research could be very flawed, and bibliographical details can be both confusing and irritating.  The volume listed above first appeared in 1992 as Great Tales of Crime and Detection as an instant remainder, but carries a 1988 copyright notice; it appeared in 1994 as The Television Detectives' Omnibus; the book contains 32 stories about fictional detectives who have been portrayed on television (Perry Mason, Philip Marlowe, Sam Spade, Father Brown, Sherlock Holmes, Jane Marple, Hercule Poirot, Lord Peter Wimsey, as well as a number of characters less familiar to American readers), and the book's back cover and inside front cover flap both proclaim a story about Mike Hammer which does not appear and likely was wishful thinking.  the book also at one point states Antonia Fraser's detective Jemima Shore as "Jemima Shaw."  I prefer to think both of these flaws belong with the publisher rather than the anthologist. 

OVERLOOKED FILM: THE LUCK OF THE IRISH (1948)

What is St. Patrick's Day without a leprechaun and a little bit of Irish whimsey?

Here's Tyrone Power, Anne Baxter, and Cecil Kellaway -- perfectly cast as Horace, the leprechaun; Kellaway was nominated as Best supporting actor for this role.

Directed by Harry Koster (The Bishop's Wife, Harvey, My Man Godfrey), and scripted by Philip Dunne (How Green Was My Valley, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, Forever Amber), from the novel There Was a Little Man by Guy Pearce Jones and Constance Bridges Jones (who also penned Peabody's Mermaid, filmed as Mr. Peabody and the Mermaid, 1948).

Enjoy.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jyXxv5aHQg

TOMORROW? WELL, TOMORROW 'TIS A GREAT DAY FOR THE IRISH

St. Patrick's Day -- March 17th -- honors the patron saint of Ireland and is celebrated on the reputed anniversary of his death.  It takes less of a religious aspect in America where we honor St. Patrick and all things Irish with corned beef and cabbage, soda bread, the wearing of the green, parades, and green beer.  And, of course, music, both traditional and modern -- some of which was never traditionally Irish but has been coopted over the years.

I can proudly claim a smidgeon of Irish blood from my maternal grandfather, a red-headed Irisher named Bernard Francis Ford.  (The rest of my family was boringly Yankee, with a dash of French f rom my paternal grandmother, Corrine Fecteau.)  Kitty's family, however, was blazingly Irish on her father's side.  Her grandfather, John Keane (please get the pronunciation right; it's KANE, not KEENE), was one of three brothers, all of whom secretly absconded from County Cork on the same evening for reasons best not explained; one went to Canada, one went to Australia, and the third -- Kitty's grandfather -- to America.  (A  number of years ago I actually met one of the Australian cousins, a charming priest who pronounced the family name KINE (Australian-style).

Needless to say, I have been inundated with Irish music all my life, and even more so after marrying Kitty.  Some of it is rousing, some of it outrageous, some heart-breakingly poetic, some fiercely patriotic, and some just plain maudlin...and I love it all.  Note that much of Irish music is about fighting and drinking, which is probably as it should be; romance often seems to come in a distant third.  **sigh**

"When Irish Eyes Are Smiling" -- Kate Smith

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiG9cfsHQjE

"My Wild Irish Rose" -- Chauncey Olcott

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q63NgVClfkA

"Danny Boy" -- The Leprechaun Brothers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q63NgVClfkA

"The Wild Rover" -- The Dubliners

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_4KboYi40I

"Gentle Annie" -- Tommy Makem (few have combined poetry with music as well as Makem)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrIXPQ-Vspk

"Red Is the Rose" -- Liam Clancy and Tommy Makem (one of my absolute favorite songs, perhaps because it reminds me so much of Kitty)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KPfB_PRYlY

"Four New Fields" -- Tommy Makem & Liam Clancy (perhaps THE Irish patriotic song)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-d30rpdvtiA

"The Rising of the Moon"  -- Nia Casaidigh (a classic Irish rebellion song)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0zBlHlnR4Y

"Kevin Barry" -- Sean Brady (about an Irish martyr)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WN7FxDNxRXo

"The Rose of Tralee" -- John McCormack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjhVYn_Y9M

"Galway Bay" -- Bing Crosby

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gt7NdiFeYJA

"Did Your Mother Come from Ireland?" -- Gracie Fields

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtoR6D9W124

"Sweet Rosie O'Grady" -- Maude Nugent (who wrote the song in 1896)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv99NelFj7o

"Harrigan" -- George M. Cohen (who was American as can be, but never forgot his Irish roots)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmPBl-XbM-8

"McNamara's Band" -- The Irish Rovers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=101Y0sh2Lfg

"Who Threw the Overalls in M0rs. Murphy's Chowder?" -- The Maxwell Girls

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ES_Mb43WCUg

"Black Velvet Band" -- Celtic Thunder

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZqlrLTBMjg

"I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen" -- The Irish Tenors

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvC1zaxRM8o

"The Wild Colonial Boy" -- Barley Bree

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6lcdFqz-Xw

"Dirty Old Town" -- The Pogues

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s11BuatTuXk

"Off to Dublin in the Green" -- The Dubliners

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8uiHsk2asw

"When the Idle Poor Become the Idle Rich -- Ella Logan (from Finian's Rainbow)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRoA3AIm1RI&list=PLm2VYZ13BllCE6afI-8vw366_0NwCn1K3&index=11

May your thoughts be as glad as the shamrocks, may your heart be as light as a song, may each day bring you bright, happy hours, that stay with you all the year long...

HYMN TIME

The Petersens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmYCLK19wKU

PEP COMICS #1 (JANUARY 1940)

Pep Comics was the third anthology comic book published by MLJ Publications.  In issue #42 (December 1941) it introduced the character of Archie Andrews.  Archie was a major hit and by issue #57 the company changed its name to Archie Comics; Pep Comics continued under that imprint until issue #411 (March 1987)

The lead story in Pep Comics #1 featured The Shield. the first superhero to wear a costume based on the American flag -- predating Captain America by a year.  The Shield is Joe Higgins, "G-Man Extraordinary."  The only person who is aware of The Shield's true identity is the head of the F.B.I., old J. Edgar himself.  The Shield's costume is made of a secret construction which not only renders him bullet-proof and flame-proof but gives Joe "the speed of a bullet and the strength of Hercules."  The four white stars on his costume signify what Joe has dedicated his life to: Truth, Justice, Patriotism, and Courage.  In this adventure, The shield is sent to stop a Stokian spy ring (Stokians evidently come from Stokia and are not followers of  the author of Dracula).  Art  by Irv Novick, who would illustrate stories for Pep through issue #66; story by Harry Shorten, probably best known today for his syndicated cartoon There Oughta Be a Law!  The Shielkd was featured in the first 65 issues of Pep Comics.

Comic legend Jack Cole wrote and illustrated "The Coming of the Comet."  "After injecting himself with a gas fifty times lighter than hydrogen, John Dickering discovers he can now take leaps that are more like flying.  Beams now shoot from his eyes and when the rays cross whatever he is looking at disintegrates."  A pretty nifty trick for killing three associates of a typhoid racketeer before The Comet finally meets up with the villainous Dr. Archer.  The Comet was rather blase about killing his enemies.  He was the first comic book superhero to die, which happened in issue # 17 (July 1941), when he was cut down by gangster bullets; his death inspired his brother to become a similarly brutal hero, he Hangman.

Charles Biro (who created the original 1940's Daredevil) is most likely the artist behind "Sergeant Boyle/"  Hank Boyle, an American student in London, headed for home when war broke out, but his ship was torpedoed by a German U-Boat.  A non-superhero hero, he was featured in mildly comical action adventures through 1943.

Now we come to the first of three stories penned by one of my favorite authors, Manly Wade Wellman (Wellman also scripted the very first Captain Marvel story).  "The Queen of Diamonds" is a one-off story, to be followed in  the next issue with a spin-off "The Rocket and the Queen of Diamonds."  Behind impassable barriers lay the Diamond Empire, the hidden wonder of the world.  All the men her have yellow skin; the Queen (and evidently all other females) has white skin.  A villain tries to overthrow the queen but is stopped by our he-man hero who had crash-landed in the Diamond Empire.  Art by Lin Streeter.  (Evidently the Diamond empire is on an alien planet; in later issues of Pep, a winged character named Falkar of the Hawkmen is introduced to have adventures alongside the Rocket and the Queen of Diamonds.)

The next Wellman story (also illustrated by Streeter) featured Fu Chang, an American-educated Chinese living in San Francisco who uses both a set of magic chessmen and the powers of Aladdin's Lamp to solve international crime.  Here he rescues his girlfriend, Tay Ming, from the villain known as the Dragon.  Fu Chang and Tay Ming appeared in the first eleven issues of Pep Comics.

The final Wellman story features Bentley of Scotland Yard.  "In London the night was clear and calm -- and nobody was prepared for the Mayfair Monster."  The  monster happens to be a werewolf who% attacks Brenda Joyce, the wealthy ward of Sir Robert Napier.  Luckily, Bentley was on hand to stop the attack and save the girl,  but the  monster got away.  Three guesses who the monster actually is.  This one was illustrated by Maurice Gutwirth.  Bentley appeared in 41 stories between 1940 and 1945.

The Press Guardian, a.k.a. the Falcon (could he be city editor Jim Boyd? -- Nope.  See below.), appeared kin this first issue with a winged costume; beginning with the second issue, he became more sedate, wearing a  business suit, fedora, and mask. When newspaper reporter Flash Calvert goes up against Slug Wickum and his gang things go south until the Falcon shows up to rescue Flash.  Art by Jack Binder, who never met a face he could draw.  By Pep #2, the Falcon no longer exists and reporter Perry Chase takes over the role of the Press Guardian, who apparently ended his run with issue #11.

"The Midshipman" is Lee Sampson, who goes through Navy college to graduation in sixteen issues. When a small plane crashes into the river, Lee dives in to save the pilot, the lovely Mae Dennis.  Don Lewis, from a rival college and jealous of Lee talking to his "girlfriend," attacks Lee.  Mae breaks up the fight and says she will go to the dance with whoever wins the boat race that afternoon.  Both Lee and Don are the champion oarsmen for their respective schools.  As they near the finish line, neck and neck, Don smashes Lee's prow with his oar, causing Lee's boat to take on water.  With a superhuman effort, Lee manages to bring his boat over the line to win the race, but the physical strain causes him to collapse in the water.  Mother of mercy, is the end of the Midshipman?  Of course not; he goes on for another fifteen issues.  Lee is pulled out of the water just in time.  Don is pissed and later attacks Lee.  Lee defends Don in front of the brass and they become good friends, and Lee goes to the dance with Mae.  Script by Will Harr, with art by Edd Ashe.

Lastly, Eddie "Kayo" Ward is a boxer who has to fight both inside and outside of the ring as a crooked manager and his fighter try to make a "sap" out of him.  But Kayo is a clean cut powerhouse who is not easily taken.  Script by Phil Sturm; art by Bob Wood.  Kayo ;punched his way through the first 28 issues of Pep Comics.

A pretty good deal for your 1940 dime.

Enjoy.

https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=70623