I developed a love for comic books ever since my dad bought me my first comic book back in 1979 - an issue of Super Friends based on the Saturday morning cartoon. For years after that, I can remember going to the nearby convenience store (Magik Mart, if I recall correctly), as well as the Walgreen's located in the local mall, to comb through all the comics on the spinner rack and pick out which ones I wanted to read next. Needless to say, it was those colorful superhero titles that caught my eye and quickly filled up my ever-growing collection. Never in a million years would I have considered buying, let alone even picking up and paging through, a romance comic. Yuck! Those were for girls! So, flash-forward more than four decades, and suddenly I have discovered the beauty of the stories and art that fill the pages of many romance comics from the '50s, '60s, and into the '70s. With today's comics becoming more focused on splash pages and "pretty art," and less about the story, I find myself gravitating back to the yester-years of comic books, where each issue was filled with tons of story, making each comic book well worth the price paid. In recent years, I've developed an interest in and appreciation for romance comics, which, often times, were written and drawn by talented creators who later went on to make a name for themselves in the industry - people like Dick Giordano, Jack Kirby, Gene Colan, Kurt Schaffenberg, Gil Kane, and countless others. So, this book offered me a chance to go beyond the stories themselves and find out more about the behind-the-scenes drama that went on with America's romance comics.
Love on the Racks is the first in-depth study of romance comics in America, looking at the entry of romance stories into comics in the late 1940s all the way through to the demise of romance comics in the late 1970s. The author, Michelle Nolan, was a newspaper and magazine writer who has also spent time as a comic and pop culture historian. With this book, Nolan offers fans of romance comics an opportunity to read a chronological history of the comics, learn about the driving force behind the expansion and collapse of the genre during the 1950s, see what affect the Comics Code Authority had on the books and their publishers, and consider the reasons why romance comics finally left the market entirely by the end of the 1970s. The book also contains numerous examples of romance covers, as well as some interior pages, with eight color pages showcasing some of the important covers throughout the thirty-year period.
Nevertheless, with Chapter Three, Nolan begins to study of romance comics with the publication of Young Romance #1 in 1947 from Crestwood Publications by two creators who eventually hit it big in the comics industry: Joe Simon and Jack Kirby! From this one comic spawned three-decade boom of romance comics that flooded the market (and perhaps over-saturated the market) and took the publishers, retailers, and fans by surprise. Nolan goes into each of the first four issues of this comic, providing details of the stories contained within those issues. Then she moves on to the second romance title, My Romance, which was published by Marvel Comics in 1948, who was hoping to cash in on the success it saw in Young Romance. An odd romance comic also came out from Marvel that year called Venus, which starred the goddess of love herself; however, only certain issues actually fit into the romance genre. Nolan indicates the title underwent numerous changes during its 19-issue run, from science-fiction to fantasy to others. This was followed by Fawcett Comics, who published Sweethearts in late '48, oddly enough starting it with issue 68 (see below for a discussion on the whole numbering of romance comics during their heyday). Sweethearts, it seems, was the first romance comic to be published monthly - its precursors were bi-monthly or quarterly. This, according to Nolan, was a big chance to take, since the romance genre was still so new to comics.
Each chapter thereafter looks at the succeeding years and how the realm of romance comics grew exponentially, then contracted, and then expanded once again, gaining considerable popularity to the point where there were periods when nearly 1 in every 5 comic published was a romance title! I have to say, Nolan educated me on quite a bit regarding the history of romance comics - I never realized just how many comic publishers existed at the time, and how many non-DC/Marvel publishers were out there, pushing out books each month. It was surprising to learn that some smaller companies only published a few titles a month, and one company only published one book! Yet, from 1947 to 1977, just about every company out there that published comics joined the bandwagon and pushed out title after title of romance books. If one failed, they would throw another one out there. Titles ranged from Secret Loves to Girls' Romances to Thrilling Romances to Love Diary to Sweet Love and so many others. Of all the companies, though, it was Charlton comics, who entered the game late, that published the most romance comics of any company - more than 1,400 individual issues in all! The only company who got anywhere close to that many was DC Comics, who came in at only 931 individual issues over the three decades.
Thankfully, Nolan has a "Catalogue of Romance Comics" that she, along with other romance aficionados Dan Stevenson and Jim Vadeboncoeur, Jr., compiled, listing virtually every known romance comic to have ever been published. The list is sorted by publisher, and it lists the titles, the number of issues published in each title, and the total number of individual issues published by each company. This is an excellent guide, because as mentioned above, a number of companies did not start their series with issue 1; rather, if another series they published was cancelled, they would simply pick up the numbering with a new and different title, even if it was a completely different genre (for example, some companies switched science fiction or super hero titles to romance titles, continuing the number, but renaming the book and changing the content!). According to Nolan, this happened many times because the publisher wanted to avoid having to set up new books with the postal mailing requirements; if they simply changed the title, but kept the numbering, they could try and slide it in under the old application with the post office and not have to pay any new fees for a new title! I had always wondered why companies back in the day would do that. This results in a number of romance titles that never saw an issue 1! Charlton was really bad about this - Career Girl Romances began with issue 24; Romantic Secrets began with issued 5; Hollywood Romances began with issue 46; Summer Love began with issue 46; and so on. Today, with the internet, it's easy to find out exactly what issue a particular series started and ended with; but back when these comics were first published in the '50s, '60s, and '70s, I'm sure a lot of fans were frustrated when they could not find any "early issues" of these series!
I particularly enjoyed reading about how the implementation of the Comics Code Authority affected the stories and covers to the romance comics. Nolan cites to a number of examples of how covers were changed, with woman no longer allowed to show cleavage, and how the "drama" depicted changed from physical altercations or sexual insinuations to the more generic girl crying as she sees her man being tempted by another woman (no sex indicated, of course!). Nolan also provides an example of a story from First Love #27 (April 1953) titled "Sinful Surrender" was altered when it was reprinted just three years later in First Love #61 (February 1956) to "Foolish Dream," with certain suggestive dialogue removed to avoid any sexual context,. And yes, as the romance period went on, it seems more and more comics began to reprint older stories in order to fill out content for the considerable numbers of books that were being published. Gradually, though, the Code began to loosen its grip, as many of DC Comics' later titles in the '70s began to feature stories with what might be considered somewhat "risque" at the time, including the free-love of the hippie years, interracial romances, and even some darker teen angst.
Sadly, by 1977, the romance genre had reached its ever-lovin' end, and DC Comics' Young Love #126 (July 1977) was the last romance comic to hit the stands. Oddly enough, this book was one of the books DC purchased from Crestwood when that company went out of business, along with Simon and Kirby's Young Romance (the book that started it all!). Young Love made its debut in 1949, and was a sister title to Young Romance. It was created by Simon and Kirby as well, so I suppose it is only fitting that this tremendous team that created the first romance comic would have one of their original series also serve as a closing book end to the era.
Nolan does an outstanding job of detailing the history of romance comics, and while there is a bit of repetition here and there throughout the book, as she mentions some of the same titles and publishers over and over, it does not get monotonous nor annoying - in fact, the repeated statistics and information serves as a great reminder as the reader is trudging through this thirty-year period of just how much these comics played an important part of comics history - even if they are nearly forgotten by today's fans! And for a fan like me, who only recently came into the genre, this is a spectacular resource that will provide invaluable aid in my search for issues to complete various series. This book is a definite must-have for any fan of romance comics!
RATING: 9 romantic photo covers out of 10 for providing unbelievable details about the nearly forgotten and sordid history of romance comics and the impact it had on the comics industry!
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