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Tuesday, February 16, 2016
1952 Comics Controversy Newspaper Series by Gertrude E. Flyte
From March of 1952, here is a series of newspaper articles written by Gertrude E. Flyte on the comic book controversy. These were published in Mitchell, South Dakota's DAILY REPUBLIC. Click to make bigger.
I just finished reading the series of articles regarding comics and comic books (it was hard for these old eyes, even enlarging it, but I managed). Remember the furor over comic books, Wertham's polemical book occurred contemporaneously with the Red Scare, and Hollywood Blacklist which cost many in the film industry their careers. It was all of one cloth. I even drew an extra-credit political-type cartoon for 8th grade US History about the Army/McCarthy Hearings, then. No kid I ever knew would have recognized himself as anything like Wertham described from reading comic books. When I was in university about ten years later I did read Wertham's "Seduction", and marveled at how my earlier self had been so unaware of the poison I had been reading. Or maybe it was just the doctor's overreaction.
I just finished reading the series of articles regarding comics and comic books (it was hard for these old eyes, even enlarging it, but I managed). Remember the furor over comic books, Wertham's polemical book occurred contemporaneously with the Red Scare, and Hollywood Blacklist which cost many in the film industry their careers. It was all of one cloth. I even drew an extra-credit political-type cartoon for 8th grade US History about the Army/McCarthy Hearings, then. No kid I ever knew would have recognized himself as anything like Wertham described from reading comic books. When I was in university about ten years later I did read Wertham's "Seduction", and marveled at how my earlier self had been so unaware of the poison I had been reading. Or maybe it was just the doctor's overreaction.
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