#tarpé mills

[gootie]

Women in Comics were the focus for drink 'n draw. I drew June Tarpé Mills' Ms. Fury, based on her sexy drawing of the character. Ms. Fury ran from 1941 to 1952 and predates Wonder Woman by 8 months. If you're not familiar withTarpé Mills, I recommend you check out some of the pricey Ms. Fury collections if you can find them, and Trina Robbins' great A Century Of Women Cartoonists

[pulp2pixel]

Miss Fury - A Tribute to June Tarpé Mills

Since there are so many prompt lists out there each October I like to pick and choose from each sometimes combining prompts from multiple lists/days.

For this years activities I am kicking it off with the @cartoonist.kayfabe prompt for #kayfabetober #goldenage

To represent the Golden Age of comics I am doing a tribute to one of these few female cartoonists of the Golden Age, June Tarpé Mills. While she had created characters such as the Purple Zombie, Daredevil Barry Finn, and Mann of India by far her most famous character was Miss Fury. Miss Fury (originally titled Black Fury) ran as a syndicated newspaper comic strip for April 1941 to December 1951. The strip was full of action, adventure, and romance. The strip would introduce elements of contemporary fashion design to the work as well as more progressive ideas about the roles of wine in society. Particularly, Marla Drake would adopt a young boy being a single unwed mother. A fact that got a few newspapers to drop the trip.

Personally, I love her art work. I first came across it about two years ago and was blown away. Her inclusion of fashion and her rendering of the female form easily puts her in the ranks of the good girl artists of the era. Her inclusion of fashion in her work is also very clear and beautiful.

Learn more about her and her work at https://www.tarpemills.com/

#pulp2pixel #fanart #digitalart #goldenagecomics #tarpémills #tarpemills #comicart #comictrips #comicbooks #missfury #comics

[lasaraconor]

[justforbooks]

Trina Robbins

American cartoonist and author whose pioneering work in comics included being the first female artist to draw Wonder Woman

The American illustrator and writer Trina Robbins, who has died aged 85, began her career in comics in her native New York in the 1960s as a contributor to the counterculture newspaper East Village Other. She also drew and wrote strips for Gothic Blimp Works, an underground comic.

Then came comic strips, covers and spot illustrations for the underground publications Berkeley Tribe and It Ain’t Me, Babe, often described as the first feminist newspaper, before before she put together an all-women comic, It Ain’t Me, Babe Comix (1970), followed by the anthology All Girl Thrills (1971) and the solo comic Girl Fight Comics (1972).

Her black heroine, Fox, was serialised in Good Times (1971) and another of her characters, Panthea, who first appeared in Gothic Blimp Works (1969), was a regular in Comix Book (1974-76).

She also became one of the 10 founders of Wimmen’s Comix, an all-female underground comics anthology published from 1972 to 1992, and in the late 70s was a contributor to High Times, Heavy Metal, National Lampoon and Playboy.

Later she adapted the 1919 novel Dope, by Sax Rohmer, for Eclipse Comics (1981-83) and wrote and drew Meet Misty (1985-86) for Marvel. She was also the first woman to draw Wonder Woman, in The Legend of Wonder Woman (1986).

Robbins’ wider interest in the history of girls’ comics led her to co-write a book about the genre, Women and the Comics (1986), with Catherine Yronwode, and later A Century of Women Cartoonists (1993), followed by a number of biographies of female comic pioneers, including Nell Brinkley, Lily Renée, Gladys Parker and Tarpé Mills.

Born in Brooklyn, she grew up in Queens, where her mother, Bessie (nee Roseman) was a teacher. Her father, Max Perlson, was a tailor who later wrote for Yiddish-language newspapers and published a collection of stories, A Minyen Yidn (1938), that was turned by Trina into a comic anthology in 2017.

At the age of 10 she graduated from reading wholesome animal comics to Millie the Model, Patsy Walker and others with female protagonists. The Katy Keene comic was especially influential, as it encouraged Robbins to make paper dolls and design clothing for them. She was also a huge fan of the jungle adventuress Sheena.

Having discovered science fiction at 14, Robbins began attending conventions, and at one such gathering she met the short story writer Harlan Ellison. At 21 he was five years her senior, but they dated briefly and he later wrote her into his film The Oscar (1966) as Trina Yale, played by Edie Adams.

Trina attended Queens College before studying drawing at Cooper Union, although she dropped out after a year. In 1957 she married the cartoonist Art Castillo; they moved to the Bay area of Los Angeles until he disappeared to Mexico and the relationship ended.

Working for a time as a model for men’s magazines, she was a cinema usherette when she met Paul Robbins, whom she married in 1962 following Castillo’s death. Her new husband wrote for the LA Free Press, which gave her access to the Byrds, Bob Dylan and other musicians, and she began making clothing to sell to musician friends, including Mama Cass.

Returning alone to New York in 1966 (she and Robbins eventually divorced, in 1972), she opened a boutique called Broccoli on East 4th Street, making clothes for exotic customers and having flings with a number of them, including the Doors’ singer Jim Morrison and the activist Abbie Hoffman; she also had longer relationships with Paul Williams, editor of Crawdaddy magazine, and the cartoonist Kim Deitch, with whom she set up a cartoon art museum on East 9th Street.

Her clothes-making got her into a song by Joni Mitchell, who wrote in Ladies of the Canyon that “Trina wears her wampum beads / She fills her drawing book with line / Sewing lace on widows’ weeds / And filigree on leaf and vine”.

After she had sold her boutique in 1969 and began to make her living in comics, there was no looking back.

Apart from her writing and illustrating activities over the years, in 1994 she became one of the founders of Friends of Lulu, a US-based charity that promotes the reading of comic books by women and the participation of women in the comic book industry.

Her later work on the history of women in comics produced three further books, From Girls to Grrrlz (1996), The Great Women Cartoonists (2001) and Pretty in Ink (2013).

She also wrote a number of books for children, starting with Catswalk: The Growing of Girl (1990), and including the Chicagoland Detective Agency series (2010-14) of bizarre high school mystery adventures.

For adults she wrote The Great Women Superheroes (1996), Eternally Bad: Goddesses With Attitude (2001), Tender Murderers: Women Who Kill (2003) and Wild Irish Roses: Tales of Brigits, Kathleens and Warrior Queens (2004).

Her most recent comic was Won’t Back Down (2024), a pro-choice anthology.

She is survived by her partner, Steve Leialoha, a daughter, Casey, from her relationship with Dietch, and her sister Harriet.

🔔 Trina Robbins, writer and illustrator, born 17 August 1938; died 10 April 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[gay-ben-shapiro]

Miss Fury by Tarpé Mills, June 22, 1941

[zotcomics]

Tarpé Mills

I WON’T CRY!

[rptv-drawings]

Mermay Drawing 09-MAY-2021

Prompt: Superhero

I chose to draw Miss Fury as a mermaid for today’s challenge.  She was a comic book heroine from the 1940s created/drawn by Tarpé Mills

Pencil, black pen, and markers on white paper

[comicwaren]

From Fearless #004, “Golden Girls” & “Two Gals Eating Ice Cream”

Art by Marguerite Sauvage

Written by Trina Robbins

[sallymolay]

Pioneer Woman Comics Artist

Tarpé Mills (1918-1988) was one of the first major US female comics artists. She is best known for her action comic strip, 'Miss Fury', the first female comic hero (image above).

Her full name was June Tarpé Mills, but she published her art without her first name in order to hide her gender, as female cmic artist were unheard of. She had tremendous talent and s known for a style of action, glamour and fashion, and sexiness that was unheard of until Miss Fury.

[atomic-flash]

Miss Fury - Created by Tarpé Mills, aka June Mills: Miss Fury was the first female action hero created by a woman, beating Wonder Woman into print by over six months (April 1941).  (via loitering with intent)

[baddreamland]

June Tarpé Mills

[girlsattack]

Miss Fury #7 par Tarpé Mills, 1945.

[rocket-prose]

Original Tarpé Mills art for the 11-14-43 Miss Fury Sunday strip (Bell Syndicate, 1943).

[orlissa]

Women in the Golden Age of Comics (1938-1956)

I promised @mercurygray a little overview some time ago, so here we go:

The first thing that we would consider a comic book today was published in 1934 (Famous Funnies #1); the early comics only featured reprinted materials from newspaper strips, but soon new comics were commissioned especially for comic books

The first superhero comic was published in 1938 (Adventure Comics #1, it featured Superman on the cover, and the first Superman story inside, which was only 13 pages long. The creators, high school buddies Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel, who had been working on different versions of the character since 1932/3, were paid $130 for it)

Most comics during these days were anthologies, featuring several shorter stories in several, very different genres (superhero, western, talking animals, etc.) usually on 64 pages; most of them featured at least one story with a female lead to, presumably, attract female audiences.

Everyone was reading comics. “[A]n average of two to three comics per week were read by over 90 percent of six- to eleven-year-olds, 84 percent of twelve- to seventeen-year-olds, and 35 percent of those eighteen and older. In each age group, the numbers of males and females reading comics were roughly equal.”

But working on comics was uncool. If you wanted to be taken seriously as a writer/illustrator, you didn’t really want it to be known that you have worked on comics (e.g Stan Lee’s real name was Stanley Lieber; he started working at Marvel—then known as Timely Comics at 17, and, wanting to be a serious writer one day, he decided not to use his real name for his comics). Academically this is a problem, since many, many comics from this era are uncredited.

Also, many of the early comic book creators were Jewish (often second generation immigrants), so comics were pretty quick on condemning Hitler/WWII. The cover of the first issue of Captain America featured him punching Hitler a year before the USA entered the war.

Okay, so, female characters in this era! There were many of them, but most of them never got their own book, were only featured in a few anthology issues, and were soon forgotten. Mike Madrid puts them into four categories: the Debutantes, the Partners, the Victory Girls, and the Glamour Girls

Debutantes: usually bored heiresses who practice vigilantism for the thrill of it, and to find personal freedom through it.

Phantom Lady (1941): society girl Sandra Knight, who fights spies and criminal using “a blinding black light that renders her foes helpless,” while wearing what’s essentially a yellow swimsuit. She never wears a mask, and yet her senator father and her fiancé, Don, never recognize her.

Spider Widow, Grandmother of Terror (1942): another society girl, Dianne Grayton, who wears a hideous witch mask, long black dress, and a floppy hat, to literally scare her foes into submission

Miss Fury (1941): SUPER IMPORTANT! The first superheroine to be written by a woman (June Tarpé Mills), and one of the first to get her own series. Marla Drake is also a reluctant hero: when preparing for a masquerade ball she learns that another girl is about to wear the same dress as her, she puts on a leopard skin attire that her uncle got her from an African witch doctor—which then gives her powers. She gets attacked on her way to the party, defends herself, and then gets into a whole bunch of misunderstandings that gets her fighting Nazis and spies, not really because she wants to, but because she needs to protect her reputation.

Lady Luck (1940): Brenda Banks, a “modern lady Robin Hood,” who uses her jiu-jitsu and marksmanship skills to fight crime while wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a veil to cover her face.

Partners: lesser appendages of already established male heroes

Shiera/Hawkgirl (1941)—Hawkman’s girlfriend, there is not much to say

Doris Lee—Starman’s sweetheart; Owl Girl—The Owl Rocketgirl—Rocket Man; Doll Girl—Doll Man; always girls, never women.

Mary Marvel—the exception. Captain Marvel’s sister (okay, this is where it gets confusing: this Captain Marvel is who we know today as Shazam. He was published by Fawcett, who then were sued by DC because they said Captain Marvel was too similar to Superman, then Fawcett eventually went under, DC bought to rights for the character, but by then Marvel had their own Captain Marvel—Mar-Vell, in whose story Carol Danvers was a supporting character in the late 60s, who then would go on to star in her own title Ms. Marvel in 1977, and then would become Captain Marvel in 2012, while the Ms. Marvel title was taken up by Kamala Khan in 2014. I know.). You know, the kid who yells Shazam!, and turns into an adult superhero. He shared his powers with his friends, who then became characters like Captain Marvel Jr. and Lieutenant Marvel. But when he shared his power with his twin sister Mary, she 1, turned into a slightly older version of herself instead of an adult and 2, was simply named Mary Marvel. But she was cute and popular and got her own series.

The Victory Girls—women from all walks of life who usually take a double role in the war effort; some regular job during the day, and superheroing during the night

I mean, there were a bunch of patriotic superheroes already: Captain America, Captain Victory, Yankee Eagle, Fighting Yank, Captain Flag, Minute Man, Flag Man, The Shield, etc.

Joan Dale—ordinary reported granted powers by the Statue of Liberty to become Miss America

Joan Wayne—DC stenographermoonlighting as “dreaded bundle of female dynamite” Miss Victory

Linda Turner—Black Cat, Hollywood starlet destroying nazi spy rings to defeat boredom

Pat Parker—War Nurse; nurse during the day, masked hero during the night

Sylvia Manners—Black Angel, masquerading as a frail girl living with her aunt in the English countryside, she is actually a ruthless aviatrix, shooting Nazi planes off the sky

Glamour Girls: since these are post-WWII, I don’t really wanna get into the details. Basically: noir-inspired, darker and grittier, with more emphasis on sex appeal. Basically more for the male gaze at this point.

Not categorized, but Madrid also mentions them:

The Woman in Red—thought to be the first female crime fighter in comics, who wore a sweeping scarlet cloak with a matching mask and skullcap

Fantomah—“a beautiful blonde protectress of the jungle,” who would turn into a terryfing skull-faced goddess in trouble

Madam Fatal—actually a guy, retired stage actor Richard Stanton dressed as an old lady

Red Tornado—Ma Hunkel, a burly working class mother with a cooking pot over her head

And of course Wonder Woman, created by William Moulton Marston in 1941. Marston’s WW is a whole another can of worms I do not want to open now (I can literally fill a 90 minute lecture with Marston)

Some creators—well, there wasn’t many, especially not in the superhero business (just to get a taste: in 1972, Marvel wanted to publish three series aimed at women, written by women, but they had no women on stuff, so they gave the job to the wives of three staff members.

Marjorie Henderson Buell (1904-1993), credited as Marge, creator of the strip Little Lulu (1935-1944)

Edwina Dumm (1893-1990), cartoonist suffragist, the first full-time female editorial cartoonist, creator of the comic strip Cap Stubbs and Tippie (1918-1966)

Dalia “Dale” Messick (1905-2005), comic strip artist, creator of Brenda Starr Reporter (1940-1980), a reflection of herself

June Tarpé Mills (1912-1988), creator of Miss Fury, one of the first female comic book artists, who had a background in fashion. She both wrote and drew Miss Fury, and, fun fact, in 1943 she once draw Miss Fury in such a tiny bikini made of leaves that 37 newspapers cancelled the strip at once (most sources say it was because the outfit was too revealing, but given that she has an apple in one hand and snake around the other, I’d say the reason was blasphemy.

EDIT: I totally forgot: after WWII superheroes went out of fashion, and only a few characters remained in publication. Instead there were horror and true crime comics (which were mostly read by returning GIs, and which would lead to a moral panic over comic in a couple of years) and romance comics for the women. The first romance comic, Young Romance #1 (1947) was created by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby, the creators of Captain America. Even Wonder Woman took on a romance-approach under Robert Kanigher, who took over writing the character in 1947, after the death of Marston.

Bibliography/Recommended reading:

Cocca, Carolyn: Superwomen: Gender, Power, and Representation Gomez, Betsy (ed.): She Changed Comics: The Untold Story of the Women Who Changed Free Expression in Comics Howe, Sean: Marvel Comics: The Untold Story Madrid, Mike: Divas, Dames, & Daredevils: Lost Heroines of the Golden Age of Comics Madrid, Mike: The Supergirls: Fashion, Feminism, Fantasy, and the History of Comic Book Heroines