Before there was Indiana Jones, there was...

June 26, 2003 1:09 PM

Doc Savage Pulp Covers, 1933-1949.
posted by crunchland (18 comments total)

Thanks crunchland, Doc Savage were my favourite novels when I was a kid.
posted by substrate at 1:13 PM on June 26, 2003

Heh. I just saw a bunch of these, in real life, at thebrooklyn museum of art. I had no idea that most of those pulp art covers were originally oil paintings. Fascinating.
posted by sodalinda at 1:14 PM on June 26, 2003

I love the abstract ones from 1947 and 1948.
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 1:18 PM on June 26, 2003

Don't forget the movie!
posted by MrMoonPie at 1:37 PM on June 26, 2003

there's a million good band names in here.
posted by sunexplodes at 2:57 PM on June 26, 2003

Perfect link. I grew up reading about the Man of Bronze. Thanks crunchland.
posted by Wulfgar! at 2:58 PM on June 26, 2003

this is the one i have
posted by clavdivs at 3:18 PM on June 26, 2003

It's a shame the stories aren't also available.

I was at a flea market a few months ago, and found a guy selling a bunch of old pulp magazines, encased in plastic. I wasn't allowed to open them, so I picked one that had a promising cover.

Unfortunately, it was unreadable. The writing was awful, and there was very little in the way of interesting graphics or charming retro advertisements.

$12 better left unspent.
posted by crunchland at 4:26 PM on June 26, 2003

On with the man of bronze!
posted by George_Spiggott at 5:18 PM on June 26, 2003

I'm 12 again - this is great, crunchland. I had most of 1960s-70s Bantam reissues, so I went looking for those and found docsavage.org, which compares the two eras side by side.
posted by mediareport at 5:52 PM on June 26, 2003

I used to love Doc Savage as a teenager.

All of the novels are available digitally and clandestinely via the usual channels, if you are interested.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:32 PM on June 26, 2003

Life is too short and there's far too much to read that is actually worth the time as it is...
posted by y2karl at 10:24 PM on June 26, 2003

crunchland: which novel was it?

mediareport: It would be interesting to look who is the owner of that domain, docsavage.info, docsavage.net , and, er, bookfilter.com.

Then again, it may not be.

stavrosthewonderchicken: All the novels? I know where the majority are located. For some reason he doesn't make a secret of it. You'd think he had an axe to grind against Conde Nast.

And as long as we're mentioning the movie: Arnuld is scheduled to play Doc in a new version. (That's why Warner Brothers holds a few of the DocSavage website domains.)

y2karl: Some, some of the Dent penned novels aren't that bad. Raymond Chandler even regarded Dent as a nifty writer. Though I wouldn't testify Chandler was speaking of the Doc novels.

In case it wasn't obvious...those docsavage and bookfilter links above are self links. I just couldn't let mediareports link pass without mention.
posted by ?! at 11:53 PM on June 26, 2003

Was this the predecessor to this?
posted by debralee at 4:48 AM on June 27, 2003

Thanks for that Blackmask link, ?! Nice.

Also, check your email.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:17 AM on June 27, 2003

which novel was it?

Oh, it wasn't Doc Savage at all. I bought a copy of Amazing Stories, November, 1947. The cover story (and as it ended up, about 99% of the contents) was called The Giants of Mogo, by Don Wilcox.
posted by crunchland at 5:40 AM on June 27, 2003

debralee: I believe it was an independent creation. In the Doc Savage stories Doc doesn't use mysticism. Though he did use a neck-pinch to render the "bad guys" helpless on occasion.
posted by ?! at 7:43 AM on June 27, 2003

These are fab - thanks crunchland.
posted by plep at 12:23 PM on June 28, 2003