Spook is another book brought to you from Star Publications, the same
folks that put out last week's pick,
Ghostly Weird Stories. It ran for nine issues From January 1953 to October 1954.
Spook is a bit of a mixed bag. You'll get at least one supernatural/monster
type horror story but you'll also find crime, science fiction, and jungle
stories along with a couple pages of prose fiction. This is probably due to it
originally being a crime book that started in 1945 and changed names a few
times.
The first issue kicks off with a Headless Horseman story (sort of) so I had to
check it out. The stars of the story are teen Jerry and his pal Sergent Spook,
who is in fact, the ghost of a cop. I'm guessing they had other adventures in
the books leading up to this because it's just a weird place to start with no
back story. The Horseman ends up being being a projection created by some guy
that found oil and wanted to keep everyone away. Sounds like a case for the
Mystery Inc.!
One of the things that jumped out at me looking through these books is the
number of ads that seem targeted to girls. I'm not saying these comics are
"just for boys" but were a lot of girls reading this stuff back then?
All but one issues of Spook are legally
available online at Comic Book+. If you're looking to get the most horror out of your reading, I'd suggest
issue 30. Although 28 has the below story, a scifi adventure, and some jungle
girl action.
Swing over to the Countdown blog below to see the other participants!
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