The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America
The story of the rise and fall of those comic books has never been fully told—until The Ten-Cent Plague. David Hajdu’s remarkable new book vividly opens up the lost world of comic books, its creativity, irreverence, and suspicion of authority.
When we picture the 1950s, we hear the sound of early rock and roll. The Ten-Cent Plague shows how—years before music—comics brought on a clash between children and their parents, between prewar and postwar standards. Created by outsiders from the tenements, garish, shameless, and often shocking, comics spoke to young people and provided the guardians of mainstream culture with a big target. Parents, teachers, and complicit kids burned comics in public bonfires. Cities passed laws to outlaw comics. Congress took action with televised hearings that nearly destroyed the careers of hundreds of artists and writers.
The Ten-Cent Plague radically revises common notions of popular culture, the generation gap, and the divide between “high” and “low” art. As he did with the lives of Billy Strayhorn and Duke Ellington (in Lush Life) and Bob Dylan and his circle (in Positively 4th Street), Hajdu brings a place, a time, and a milieu unforgettably back to life.
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Amazon Significant Seven, March 2008: I may be alone here, but when I read Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, a whole strata of American artists came to life for me. Ever since then I've been waiting for a book like David Hajdu's The Ten-Cent Plague to come along and show me the contours of this world. Anyone who remembers Positively 4th Street will recognize in this new book Hajdu's peerless ability to weave first-person recollections with an acute perspective of America at a pivotal moment in its cultural timeline. The rise of comics as a mode of expression, an outlet for entertainment, and, rather tragi-comically, as a target for censorship, couldn't be more compelling in anyone else's hands. In deft narrative strokes Hajdu creates a colorful, character-driven story of our first real--and lasting--counterculture (if the burgeoning popularity of graphic novels is any indication) and shows why we embrace it still.--Anne Bartholomew
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. After writing about the folk scene of the early 1960s in Positively 4th Street, Hajdu goes back a decade to examine the censorship debate over comic books, casting the controversy as a prelude to the cultural battle over rock music. Fredric Wertham's Seduction of the Innocent, the centerpiece of the movement, has been reduced in public memory to a joke—particularly the attack on Batman for its homoeroticism—but Hajdu brings a more nuanced telling of Wertham's background and shows how his arguments were preceded by others. Yet he comes down hard on the unsound research techniques and sweeping generalizations that led Wertham to conclude that nearly all comic books would inspire antisocial behavior in young readers. There are no real heroes here, only villains and victims; Hajdu turns to the writers and artists whose careers were ruined when censorship and other legal restrictions gutted the comics industry, and young kids who were coerced into participating in book burnings by overzealous parents and teachers. With such a meticulous setup, the history builds slowly but the main attraction—EC Comics publisher Bill Gaines's attempt to explain in a Senate committee hearing how an illustration of a man holding a severed head could be in good taste—holds all the dramatic power it has acquired as it's been told among fans over the past half-century. (Mar.)
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Review
"This book tells an amazing story, with thrills and chills more extreme than the workings of a comic book's imagination." -- Janet Maslin, The New York Times, March 10, 2008
Customer Reviews
Covers the bases on this particular subject
The author does a good job in explaining the message behind the title of the book. The "ten-cent plague" was a time between World War II and the mid-1950s where there was concern by those in authority that comic books with particular themes were filling the minds of teenage adolsecents with thoughts of violence and sex. Various steps were taken to put down the publication of these comics which died out around 1955.
This type of comic book changed America by putting into colorful pictures thoughts and actions that heretofore were relegated to the written book. Today, events such as Comic-Con are evidence that while these ancestors of the graphic novel were banned, their influences are felt today. With that said, we must ask ourselves the question not addressed in this book of whether we should just drop the age restrictions on reading material and let children read all things to their enjoyment. We would find that if we ask the author, he would desire some restictions on such activity. A good read nevertheless and I would recommend it to one who wants to delve into the crazy world of early 1950s comics.
The Rise and Fall of Comic Books
David Hajdu is a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York City. The research for this book began when he was at the University of Chicago, and he finished writing this book while teaching at the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. The `Acknowledgments' thank the many who helped in various ways. In the mid-1940s the comic book was the most popular form of entertainment in America (p.5). Over 640 titles were produced each month, written primarily for kids. [My recollections is that young adults or highschool graduates also read them (p.70).] In the late 1940s they began to feature stories of "crime, vice, lust, and horror". [What, no crime for Superman and other heroes (p.6)?] Some comic books were a simplified form of the true crime stories found on TV today. There was no Official Censorship of these small businesses.
Were comic books "a leading cause of juvenile delinquency"? No, the economic system caused JD. In earlier times most kids went to work at age 14 (after grammar school) and had more parental supervision. The loss of small businesses led to more idleness and there was less parental supervision when both parents had to work (p.276). Chapter 1 notes the low esteem for comincs since the 1890s, and their popularity. Hans and Fritz, the Katzenjammer Kids, were popular for decades in spite of their pranks. Newspapers carried stories of crime and lust (p.15), just like today's tabloids. Around 1930 comic strips copied the styles of pulp magazines (p.17). Funny books were first given away with merchandise (p.21). Comic books were produced by an assembly line (pp.26-27). "Superman", the Champion of the Oppressed, was the first highly successful comic book (p.30). Commercial rivalry was one reason to slam comic books (pp.40-41).
Chapter 4 tells of the first reactions against comic books. Laws censoring publications go back to the 1880s. In 1948 the US Supreme Court ruled these laws unconstitutional because of their vagueness (p.90). This would not prevent future laws that were specific (p.97). Fredric Wertham said comic books corrupted the youth of America (p.100); his statistics proved it (p.101). Crimes were committed by children who read comic books (p.109). [The sole influence in their lives? No mention of the radio programs of that era.] Students began to collect and burn comic books like Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, The Spirit, Captain Marvel, Archie (p.119). [What about TV programs?] That treatment for Gaines on page 273 overlooks the topic of who owns the company that distributes magazines. The censorship of comics resulted in a loss of sales (p.314). The small businesses were destroyed (p.315). Bill Gaines stayed in business by publishing `Mad' magazine which parodied society (p.324), [Hajdu doesn't mention the legal trouble for this magazine in 1965 which ended its independent publication.]
The other person looking at that piano concerto looks like Harry Truman (p.325). That "snarling and sweating" person looks like Joe McCarthy with Roy Cohn behind him. Marlon Brando as "Terry Malloy" from "On the Waterfront". The Smith Brothers use cough drops. Jackie Gleason as "The Poor Soul". Julius LaRosa with the detonator. Jack Webb as "Joe Friday", left hand at his shoulder holster. Groucho Marx with the duck holding the secret word. Did Jack Cole die because he owed a lot to the people who financed `Playboy' (p.328)? [There was no mention of "Sad Sack" or "Wonder Warthog" comics.] This book tells how the small business of comic book publishing was destroyed to benefit Big Corporations like television and their increased audiences. Hajdu didn't relate horror comics to the cycle of horror films in the 1930s-1940s. If you want horror, just read some of the original uncensored Grimm's Fairy Tales. The `Bibliography' lists about 100 books. Are any comic books on microfilm? They seem to be lost publications (p.296). The cartoon cover of this book is a turn-off to this serious subject.
An object lesson in fear-mongering, politics and censorship.
This book centers around comic books, but it doesn't have to. It could just as easily be about witchcraft, or Huckleberry Finn, or Communism, or any other group or topic that has found itself in the crosshairs of American politics at one time or another. Ultimately, this is a book about small groups in American society deciding what others should read, how they should behave, and what ideas they should have, and cunning politicians using the cause for their own advancement.
Here, Hadju does a wonderful job laying out the history and development of the comic book industry in early 20th century America. He then shows how, in the right (wrong) climate, it takes only a small spark to start a popular wave of fear and animosity towards a nearly random target. In this case, the cultural and political planets align against comic books in the 1950s. Hadju really brings to life the depth and vitriol of the anti-comics movement and how flimsy a foundation upon which it rested.
Anyone who values intellectual freedom should read this book. The distance in time and culture afforded by the passing of 50 years allows the reader to stand away from the hysteria of the day and see the campaign against comic books solely for the irrational, politically-driven censorship which they were. Having that experience as a reader may allow us to recognize similar hysteria when it strikes in our own lifetime. That's invaluable.
One theme central to all calls for American censorship is the rallying cry of censors, made clear by Hadju, that, "The framers of our Constitution, when they created freedom of speech, could not have intended to protect...(insert target here)." In this case, comic book creators were presented as unprotected by the First Amendment because of their status as corruptors of youth. But we must always remember that the only speech in need of legal protection is that speech which will be found objectionable or hateful to the majority of the population. No other speech will need the protection of law.
A well-written history and a great lesson in how easily our freedoms can be eroded. Highly recommended.
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