This week in 1962: GIRLS' CRYSTAL

I've rarely featured girls' comics on this blog, mainly because I naturally didn't read them as a boy so I knew very little about them. However, over the years I've learnt that most of them did contain some great artwork and they're certainly on a par with any boys' comic. Different in story tone, with an emphasis more on character and emotional tension rather than action and violence, but equally as entertaining for their intended audience. 

Let's start rectifying things a bit with a look at an issue of Girls' Crystal that was published 52 years ago this week. Running for ten years from 1953 to 1963, Girls' Crystal was published by The Amalgamated Press, which by this time had become Fleetway Publications.

Comic historian Steve Holland tells me that the cover strip of this issue Tessa - She's a Tomboy, was drawn by Cecil Orr. A very nice lighthearted style, ideal for it. Incidentally, pogo-sticks and hula-hoops were indeed very popular in the early sixties. I remember the older local kids playing with them in the street. 

The 20 page comic carried a mixture of comic strips and prose stories, plus a page spotlighting the latest schoolgirl crush (in this case, Troy Donahue). This issue also carried an ad for the latest Princess pocket libraries...

Inevitably, there was a strip about nursing, a noble profession for anyone but very much encouraged for girls at the time. I Want to be a Nurse has some good line work but I'm not sure who illustrated it. (Update thanks to David Roach: The art was by someone named Ann Simmons or G. Simmons.)

Cherry and the Children was illustrated by John Armstrong, years before he drew the popular Bella strip in Tammy of course.

Only one humour strip in the comic; Little Angel. Again, I don't know who the artist was but it's a good, crisp style.

Ghost Village has a great spooky and atmospheric feel to it. Illustrated by Tom Kerr who, as most of you will know, drew many strips for various Fleetway boys' comics.

As with boys' British comics of the time, girls' titles of 50 years ago were aimed at a slightly older reader than they are today. Tastes and society have changed and it's unlikely girls of 8 to 13 years old would be interested in anything like Girls' Crystal now. Having said that, Manga was very popular with that age group a few years ago so there's always hope. Perhaps a modern version might work, but the expense of launching such a new title is a risk that most publishers would not dare venture into. It seems it's far safer now to launch a comic on the back of a brand (such as the new Lego Friends girls' comic) and aim it at the very young.