Mister Crime and the Horror of Crime Does Not Pay #24, Up for Public sale

Posted in: Comics, Classic Paper | Tagged: Bob Wooden, Charles Biro, lev gleason

Crime Does Not Pay is maybe probably the most infamous title in American comedian e-book historical past, and subject #24 is one in every of its most infamous points.

Based on one comics trade legend as associated in Blab! #6 (amongst different locations) it was Charles Biro who was the originator and driving power behind the Crime Does Not Pay idea, laying out the thought for his Lev Gleason co-editor Bob Wooden in a Broadway bar.  If that is true, the title was a very long time within the making.  Wooden and Biro had identified one another since 1937 when each labored for the Harry Chesler studio, and Wooden first prominently used the phrase “Crime Does Not Pay” in print within the debut of the character the Goal in 1940’s Goal Comics #10, because the hero’s warning to criminals that subject.  Wooden would seemingly foreshadow each his and Biro’s future just a few points later in early 1941’s Goal Comics v2 #4, which facilities round a scheme whereby the tales in a syndicated newspaper caricature would supply instructions for particular crimes to a prison gang.  Biro’s identify was used within the story for a personality who was in on the scheme.  After all, Biro and Wooden’s Crime Does Not Pay could be accused of inspiring and offering strategies for crimes numerous instances after the title’s 1942 debut.

If Wooden and Gleason have been ready for the prospect to launch their dreamed-of crime comedian e-book, that probability got here by the use of Leslie Charteris and the Saint.  By his personal account in an editorial, writer Lev Gleason went to nice expense to convey the Saint to Gleason’s flagship Silver Streak title with subject #18, written by Charteris himself.  Gleason’s costly gamble did not repay.  Three points later (and one subject after Gleason had boasted about how a lot he was paying Charteris to get the Saint in comics) the title was lifeless with subject #21.  It was changed by Crime Does Not Pay which picked up its numbering with subject #22.

The Crime Does Not Pay title phrase was usually impressed by the MGM movie quick serial of that identify, which had been working since 1935.  The movie sequence supplied sober warnings in opposition to a lifetime of crime as a direct results of the then recently-instituted Hays Code, which had been instituted partially after Hollywood got here beneath hearth for glamorizing gangsters.  Sarcastically sufficient, the comedian e-book sequence it impressed would do a lot to assist convey in regards to the Comics Code some 20 years later.  Notoriously, Bob Wooden would himself serve time in jail for manslaughter within the first diploma for the 1958 homicide of his girlfriend.

The comedian e-book sequence shortly hit its stride with Crime Does Not Pay #24, which introduces Mister Crime, a spectral story narrator of the kind who would later turn into widespread in horror comics.  The ghostly determine additionally encourages characters to offer in to their worst instincts all through the tales.  In each that conduct and his look, Mister Crime is fairly clearly impressed by the promoting character Mr. Espresso Nerves, who was created by Milton Caniff and Noel Sickles in 1936.  Concern #24 additionally options one of the crucial infamous covers of the sequence by Biro, and that’s saying one thing.  One of the sought-after crime comics in American comedian e-book historical past, there is a CGC FN 6.0 copy of Crime Does Not Pay #24 (Lev Gleason, 1942) up for public sale within the 2024 October 24 – 25 Pre-Code Horror & Crime Comics Showcase Public sale #40272 at Heritage Auctions.

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