Inquiry: Jim Trombetta: COMIC BOOKS THE GOVERNMENT DIDN T WANT YOU TO READ

Between 1947 and 1955, certain comic books printed horror and crime stories that were gory, lurid and unique. These wild books were “genuinely and bravely subversive” and featured art by the likes of such luminaries as L.B. Cole, Steve Ditko, Reed Crandall, Al Feldstein and Basil Wolverton. When Dr. Frederic Wertham’s “Seduction of the Innocent” was published in 1954, comics were linked to youth violence, depravity of all sorts and juvenile delinquency. Senate hearings were held and eventually the “strange, neo-Medieval document” known as the Comics Code was enacted to save our youth from the comic book menace. Tonight on Inquiry we speak with JIM TROMBETTA, reporter, editor and scholar and his new sumptuous art book which contains numerous examples of these scorned comics,  is titled  THE HORROR! THE HORROR! COMIC BOOKS THE GOVERNMENT DIDN’T WANT YOU TO READ.