Pulp Cover Swipes of the Golden Age
The classic cover craze continues to take over the Golden Age market with record breaking prices for both super-hero and non super-hero books. Let’s take a look at some of the inspirations that helped shape the wonderful Golden Age art and stories that we all know and love. From the beginning, cover swipes were commonplace, decades before any Amazing Spider-Man 300 or Incredible Hulk 340 cover swipes occurred. The Golden Age of comics gathered a lot of inspiration, and sometimes very directly, from the pulp magazines of the 1930s and 1940s. Pulp magazines, or more commonly known as “pulps,” were cheap fiction magazines that were printed on inexpensive wood pulp paper, coining the term pulps.
The (True) Origin of Batman
One of the most infamous swipes from a pulp was not only an art swipe but also a story that was taken from a crime thriller in the November 1, 1936 issue of The Shadow. The Shadow story in question is “Partners of Peril” By Theodore Tinsley, and it was used as the story for Batman’s first appearance in Detective Comics 27 by Bob Kane in May 1939. Yes, that Batman. Furthermore, Bob Kane also may have gotten his inspiration for Batman’s arch nemesis The Joker from another 1936 Tinsley Shadow story also titled “The Grim Joker,” featuring a clown faced crime boss named The Joker.
Below are photos from Batman’s story in Detective Comics 27 and The Shadow story from 1936 so you can see for yourselves. I also attached other figure swipes Bob Kane used for different Batman poses.
Cover Swipes
Below I have compiled a variety of Golden Age science fiction, jungle and horror covers that were swiped from pulps. Sit back and enjoy some of the cover swipes and see what similarities or differences you can spot between them.
Spider June 1939 cover artist unknown vs. Mystic Comics 1 1940 by Alex Schomburg
Spicy Mystery March 1942 H. J. Ward cover vs Chilling Tales 16 1953 cover artist unknown
Spicy Mystery October 1940 vs. Captain Science 6 1951 cover artist unknown
The Ghost 1 Jan 1940 cover by Rafael DeSoto vs. Blue Ribbon Comics 18 Nov 1941 cover by Sam Cooper
Thrilling Wonder Stories July 1940 vs. Superboy 30 1954
Spicy Mystery June 1935 classic cover by H. L. Parkhurst vs. Crime Mysteries 3 1952 C.A artist unknown
Weird Tales March 1933 by Margaret Brundage vs. House of Mystery 1 by Win Mortimer and Charles Paris 1951/52
The Shadow, Street & Smith Aug 1946 vs. The Perfect Crime 14, Cross Publications July 1951
Fiction House Swipes
Many of the Fiction House comics are swiped from Fiction House pulps, as they both had the same publisher, so cover artists just borrowed directly from their existing artwork to create covers for their new comic books. You can see some examples from Fiction House below.
Planet Stories March 1943 vs. Planet Comics 40 1946 Joe Doolin cover
Wings Spring 1945 Issue vs. Rangers 26 Joe Doolin cover December 1945
Jungle Stories April 1943 vs. Fight Comics 40 1945
Wings Winter 1948 vs. Wings 93 1948 Bob Lubbers cover
Action Stories December 1942 vs. Cowgirl Romances 5 1951
Frontier Stories Winter 1942vs. Firehair Comics 2 1949
Jungle Stories Fall 1948 vs. Jungle Comics 96 1947
Jungle Stories Winter 1943 vs. Jumbo Comics 77 1945
Jungle Stories Fall 1946 vs. Ranger Comics 34 1947
Here are four Fiction House covers that all seem to be inspired by Jumbo 10 back in 1939. You can argue that Lou Fine started the throwing spear trend in 1939, so it all circles back to the Golden Age, and cover swipes went both ways between pulps and comic books.
Jumbo Comics 10 1939 vs. Jumbo Comics 40 1942 vs. Jungle Stories Winter 1945 vs. vs. Planet Comics 55 1948
Honorable Mentions
A couple more books to share – these are not Golden Age books but later covers that were also swiped from pulps.
Amazing Stories, June 1926 Frank R Paul cover vs. Creepy 18 1968
Startling Stories January 1950 vs. Vampirella 68 1978
We hope you enjoyed seeing these amazing examples of artwork from the Golden Age, and perhaps learned a bit more about the amazing world of pulp magazines and how they directly influenced the art of the Golden Age.
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