Well, I've been on a business trip for the past week and was unable to find the time for retrospace. Anyway, while I was gone I spent a lot of time in airports and managed to read The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson, an excellent and hilarious chronicle of the late 1950's from the perspective of a child. While reading it, there were a couple things that I made a mental note of to research when I got back. One of which was Asbestos Lady.
Bryson talks at length about his infatuation with a certain comic book heroine called Asbestos Lady. I thought that surely Bryson couldn't be right - there was no way there was a comic book character with a name like that. I stand corrected, Asbestos Lady was real, and she had the special power of having a fire proof costume.
Bryson talks at length about his infatuation with a certain comic book heroine called Asbestos Lady. I thought that surely Bryson couldn't be right - there was no way there was a comic book character with a name like that. I stand corrected, Asbestos Lady was real, and she had the special power of having a fire proof costume.From the book: I remember feeling an unexpected but entirely agreeable hormonal warming at the first sight of Asbestos Lady, whose cannonball breasts and powerful loins were barely contained within the wisps of satin fabric with which some artistic genius portrayed her.
Bryson goes on to explain that many of his favorite comics had been "sexed up" so to speak. For example, Marvel jettisoned Captain America's sidekick Bucky in favor of "a leggy sylph named Golden Girl..."
Golden Girl, real name "Betsy Ross"(!), is featured in the picture on the left. It wouldn't be long, however, till the heroine ditched the cap and mask in favor of a costume that must surely have given Captain America a sales boost. (see below)
Unfortunately, Bryson tells us that nothing so good could last. Dr. Fredric Wertham would publish Seduction of the Innocent which argued that comics promoted violence, torture, criminality, drug-taking and rampant masturbation (though not presumably all at once). I explore this sad episode in comic censorship in detail in an earlier post.
From the book: Grimly he noted how one boy he interviewed confessed that after reading comic books he "wanted to be a sex maniac," overlooking that for most boys "sex," "mania," and "want" were words that went together very comfortably with or without comic books.
Alarmed and fearing further regulatory crackdown, the comic book industry abandoned its infatuations with curvy babes, bloody carnage, squint worthy shadows, and everything else that was thrilling. It was a savage blow.
Bryson makes mention of a certain James Hargis, considered a founder of the Christian Right and campaigner against sex and Communists. More importantly, he is the author of my favorite book title (actually a pamphlet) of all time: Is the School House the Proper Place to Teach Raw Sex?
Hargis founded the Christian Crusade Anti-Communist Youth University, but eventually came undone when it was revealed that he had had sex with several of his students, male and female alike.
For more on topics like this, the Red Scare, and the Atomic Bomb, I highly recommend Bryson's wonderful memoir of the 50's. It made my week in airports bearable.
Oh, and as for Asbestos Lady - according to the Marvel website, she contracted cancer and is believed to be dead.
