When publisher Harry Donenfeld and managing editor Frank Armer launched Spicy Detective Stories in early 1934, they knew great cover art would sell their magazine.
Fred Craft painted the cover for the first issue of Spicy Detective Stories, debuting with its April 1934 number. H. L. Parkhurst did the next four. However, with the sixth issue of the pulp, they had found their man.
Hugh Joseph Ward was perfectly satisfied freelancing for Ace-High Magazine and other pulps. But those days ended once he had a “Spicy” cover under his belt.
The October 1934 cover for Spicy Detective Stories was soon followed by the cover for the first newsstand issue of Culture Publications’ Spicy-Adventure Stories and another for Spicy Detective. Before he knew it, Ward was the regular cover artist for all of Culture’s “Spicy” pulps, with a “girlie” pulp like Tattle Tales or Bedtime Stories thrown in for good measure.
Parkhurst was still around, but he was increasingly used to “fill the gaps” between Ward’s superb output. Later came Allen Anderson and, still later, Joseph Szokoli and others.
We hope you’ll join PulpFest 2024 on Thursday, August 1, at 9:25 pm as we welcome pulp art historian David Saunders for a peek at “The Spicy Artists,” both inside and outside of the magazines. In addition to the line’s great cover artists, he’ll discuss the interior artists and the comic strip artists who drew such features as Sally the Sleuth, Polly of the Plains, Diana Daw, and The Girl with the X-Ray Eyes.
David Saunders is, quite probably, the foremost scholar of American pulp artists. His free public website, Field Guide to Wild American Pulp Artists, has over 300 biographical profiles of these creators of popular culture. Additionally, he has written biographical profiles of artists for Illustration Magazine and several coffee-table art books on pulp artists.
An award-winning artist himself, David is the son of one of the most prolific pulp cover artists, Norman Saunders, who painted 867 pulp covers for almost every title and publisher. David is the winner of PulpFest’s 2016 Lamont Award, named in tribute to the long-running Pulpcon.
PulpFest 2024 begins on August 1 and runs through August 4 at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Pittsburgh – Cranberry in Mars, Pennsylvania. We’ll be celebrating “Spice, Spies, Shaw, and More” at this year’s convention.
The general public is welcome to attend our evening programming events free of charge. To learn more about our programming, please click the Schedule button at the top of this page.
For those who also want to enjoy our dealers’ room, you can join PulpFest by clicking the registration button at the top of this page. And don’t forget to book a room at the DoubleTree. They’re going fast!
If you want to sell at this year’s PulpFest, our wall tables are sold out. Island tables are still available, but they won’t last long. Register soon!
Our featured image is excerpted from H. J. Ward’s cover for the February 1936 issue of Spicy Mystery Stories, illustrating Victor Rousseau Emanuel’s story, “Bat Man.” It’s probably the most iconic of Ward’s covers for Culture Publications’ line of “Spicy” pulps.
PulpFest advertising director William Lampkin adapted our lead image from H. L. Parkhurst’s cover for the December 1934 issue of Spicy-Adventure Stories.
Written by Robert Maxwell and drawn by Max Plaisted, the Diana Daw comic strip ran in Spicy-Adventure Stories from its first newsstand issue, dated November 1934, through its July 1943 issue as Speed Adventure Stories. According to graphic designer Tara Odorizzi, “Whether it’s the sands of Arabia, the unexplored depths of Africa, a concentration camp in Siberia, or a temperate region of Mercury, you name it, Diana’s been there. . . . She’s something of a Depression-era Lara Croft, only with less clothing and money.”
Our final image is Allen Anderson’s cover for the February 1941 issue of Spicy Detective Stories, the artist’s first cover for the “Spicy” pulps. Like H. J. Ward, Anderson quickly became one of Culture’s “go-to” artists, contributing cover paintings to Spicy Detective, Spicy Mystery, Spicy-Adventure Stories, and Spicy Western Stories. He also painted covers for Private Detective Stories and Super-Detective.
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