Chicago Spanking Review

True Brides Experiences #16

From True Brides Experiences #16 (February 1956). © Harvey. Enhanced by Spiritworks Studio. Posted by the Web-Ed on 06/24/2010.

The last of "The Seven Spankings" (comic-book spankings which were known to a small group of us back in the 70's) is probably also the least - the Harvey romance comic True Brides Experiences #16 (February 1956). (Note: we're temporarily skipping The Saint #5 since we can't find our copy). Even now, little is known about the creative personnel involved with this issue, and the spanking itself is rather ho-hum compared with the other six. The positioning is somewhat awkward, and the bride's parents are critical of the husband instead of cheering him on as they should.

Here is the issue's cover. As with Campus Loves #5, this was the last issue. They should have had more spankings early in the run - preferably every issue! That might have sold enough copies to keep these titles going.

Notice that this is the only one of the Seven to have the Comics Code Seal of Approval on the cover (upper right-hand corner) since it is the only one published after the Code's inception in 1954. We can only conclude that because spanking was both commonly practiced and generally accepted during the 50's, the Code's administrator did not see it as sexually deviant the way Wertham did. For more about this, see the discussion in Frontier Romances #1.

09/24/2010 update: Here's a little more from this comic, which we think is also due to Spiritworks. As you can see, the emotional tone is all wrong, leaving us somewhat dissatisfied. The wife is resentful and at least in the panels we have, does not come around to a different point of view. Of course, we don't have the entire story, so perhaps she did learn her lesson after all. If we find any more, we'll add it here.

The spanking panel from the reprinted version in True Brides Experiences #16.

01/17/2014 Update: more information came to light since this page was last updated in Sept. 2010. Ripley discovered something that we didn't suspect back in the 70's: True Brides Experiences #16 was actually a reprint of Teen-Age Brides #1 (August 1953). Although we haven't been able to get a copy of either book because they're very hard to find, we do have some new scans courtesy of SpankingPanels, beginning with the spanking panel itself. Also, it is now believed the art was by Al Avison, who did a lot of work for various Harvey titles and had also drawn Captain America and The Whizzer (which he co-created) for Marvel.

Avison does a decent job with the art here, particularly the clothing folds, although he was not a "good girl" artist like Matt Baker and his presentation is not particularly erotic.

The splash page from the original version in Teen-age Brides #1.

Now let's take a look at some pages from the original version in Teen-age Brides #1. First we have the splash page, which as you can see foreshadows the spanking panel that comes later in the story. This is good for a couple of reasons: first, the composition is better and larger here, and the spanking more enjoyable (for us, not the teen-age bride!); second, it is our theory that having the spanking on the splash page made it impossible to change for the reprinted version in True Brides Experiences #16, which was subject to the Comics Code Authority. (The Code Administrator demanded other changes be made - see The Effects of the Comics Code on Spanking Part 2 for the entire story). Had the Code Administrator managed to get the spanking deleted, one of "The Seven Spankings" would have remained unknown to us spanko comic fans back in the 70's, and probably undiscovered until Ripley acquired Teen-age Brides #1.

An interior page from the original version in Teen-age Brides #1.

Next we see what caused the trouble and led up to the spanking: in her husband's view, the bride was still too attached to her parents. From what little we can see here, she isn't really all that out of line - her husband is working in his in-laws' store, and it doesn't seem to be going very well. This is a situation to be avoided if possible, because it can put a strain on a marriage, but in any case the writer doesn't seem to handle it too well.

The spanking sequence from the original version in Teen-age Brides #1.

Finally, here's the spanking sequence. The writer really drops the ball here, with the wife hating the spanking and the husband with tears in his eyes and asking for forgiveness - ugh! At least the wife recognizes that she's being spanked out of love. Far from the best of "The Seven Spankings" but at least we now have a clearer idea of what was going on.

The full splash page from the reprinted version in True Brides Experiences #16. Posted by the Web-Ed on 02/19/2016.

02/19/2016 Update: About the only thing we haven't seen from either version is a complete splash page. Here is the one from the reprint, True Brides Experiences #16, that we found not long ago. Seeing the beginning of the ho-hum story right after the spanking in panel 1 doesn't really do much for us, but it is interesting that the writer chose to highlight the spanking this way.