| Slot: |
Crime and Punishment 2 |
| Item: |
Crime and Punishment 2 Universal |
| Grade: |
CGC |
| Cert #: |
0186478001
|
Owner Comments
Crime and Punishment #2 is referenced in Fredric Wertham’s “Seduction of the Innocent” (SOTI) in the text on page 161. In this section of the SOTI, Wertham provides examples of comic books that teach and encourage children to commit crimes. He describes one comic as follows – “Nothing is overlooked in these crime comics, however mean. One book shows how to steal the money box from a blind man who runs the newsstand. Of course, as in the vast majority of criminal acts depicted in comic books, this particular act is successful and not punished.” The cover of Crime and Punishment #2 fits Wertham’s description nicely and is assumed to be the comic that he is referring to in the passage on page 161.
|
| Slot: |
Crime and Punishment 3 |
| Item: |
Crime and Punishment 3 |
| Grade: |
CGC |
| Cert #: |
0014538002
|
Owner Comments
Crime and Punishment #3 is referenced in Fredric Wertham’s “Seduction of the Innocent” (SOTI) in the text on page 112. Throughout the SOTI, Wertham often cites the injury-to-the-eye motif as an “outstanding example of the brutal attitude cultivated in comic books”. In the text on page 112, he references one such example from a story contained in Crime and Punishment #3: “In a run-of-the-mill crime comic a man with brass knuckles hits another man (held fast by a third man) in the eyes, one after the other. Dialogue: ‘Now his other glimmer, Pete! Only sort of twist the knuckles this time!’”The example cited by Wertham comes from the story “Joe Bologna” contained in Crime and Punishment 3. I have included a scan of the injury-to-the-eye panel (upper right) that Wertham references on page 112.
|
| Slot: |
Crime and Punishment 12 |
| Item: |
Crime and Punishment 12 Universal |
| Grade: |
CGC |
| Cert #: |
3777931005
|
Owner Comments
Crime and Punishment #12 is referenced in Fredric Wertham’s “Seduction of the Innocent” (SOTI) in the text on pages 21-22.
On pages 21-22 Wertham describes the anatomy of a crime comic as follows “A typical sample has inconspicuously above its crime title, ‘A force for good in the community!’ and underneath that in a small circle, ‘Crime does not pay,’ and then in a square, ‘TRUE criminal case histories!’ and, in smaller type, hard to read, the words ‘Dedicated to the eradication of crime!’ Average, normal boys have often told me that if they read such signs at all they know of course that they are only ‘eyewash’ intended to influence parents and teachers who have no time to read the whole comic book. The cover of this example depicts a corpse with blood on his mouth, with the killer who has just beaten him to death beside him”.
Wertham provided an expanded description of this comic in his November 1953 Ladies Home Journal article "What Parents don't know about Comic Books". The Ladies Home Journal article provided an advanced preview of content that would later be used in the SOTI and beginning on page 52 of this article Wertham described a crime comic as follows “Another typical sample has inconspicuously above its crime title: ‘A force for good in the community!’ and underneath that in a small circle: ‘Crime does not pay,’ and then in a square, ‘TRUE criminal case histories!’ and, in smaller type, hard to read, the words ‘Dedicated to the eradication of crime!’ Average, normal boys have often told me that if they read such signs at all they know of course that they are only ‘eyewash’ intended to influence parents and teachers who have no time to read the whole comic book. The cover of this example depicts a corpse with blood on his mouth, with the killer who has just beaten him to death beside him. In the doorway lounges a ‘nattily dressed’ man, gun in hand, saying: ‘I couldn’t do better myself, Teddy, but you put me in a peculiar position! I should thank you for promotin’ me to the top of his mob, but what should I do about a guy who rubes out my boss?’” The nattily dressed man quote in the Ladies Home Journal article comes from the cover of Crime and Punishment #12 positively identifying the book as the SOTI source. Wertham goes on to describe several examples of interior story components contain in Crime and Punishment #12.
|
| Slot: |
Crime and Punishment 16 |
| Item: |
Crime and Punishment 16 Universal |
| Grade: |
CGC |
| Cert #: |
2035228008
|
Owner Comments
Crime and Punishment #16 is referenced in Fredric Wertham’s “Seduction of the Innocent” (SOTI) on pages 98-99.
In this section of the SOTI, Wertham criticizes the attempts of publishers to moralize the crime deterrent aspects of crime based comic books. He references a two-page essay written by a police captain criticizing him for his views and quotes several passages from the essay “In one comic book are two pages by a police captain attacking me: ‘Don’t let reformers kid you!’ He is ‘shocked by what I read today about the people who condemn crime comics. These people are the menace.’ He goes on: ‘Children don’t like to be kicked around by reformers who want to decide what’s good for them to read.’ And he extols ‘the strong moral force’ the comics exert on children.’”
The two-page essay, entitled “Don’t Let Reformers Kid You…”, was written by police Captain Felix L. Lynch and it appears in Crime and Punishment #16. Crime Does Not Pay #76 also contains this essay and it’s likely that this was the book that Wertham was using when he quoted from the essay.
| | |