Crime SuspenStories #19

(October-November 1953)

The Killer (Table of Contents: 1)

Crime SuspenStories / comic story / 6 pages (report information)

Script

Harvey Kurtzman

Pencils

Reed Crandall (signed)

Inks

Reed Crandall (signed)

Colors

Marie Severin

Letters

Jim Wroten

First Line of Dialogue or Text

Jonathan sat on the crude wooden bench...

Genre

crime

Characters

Jonathan (a hangman); Elsie (Jonathan's wife); Jonathan's father (in flashback)

Synopsis

Jonathan worked hard at his work, never wanting to follow in the footsteps of his father. Then he met Elsie, whom he intended to marry after he had established himself. However, because Jonathan's father was not a member of a guild, Jonathan was denied his opportunity to make a living, and reluctantly accepted doing his father's line of work. On the side, Jonathan practiced his own trade, which kept him away from home for days at a time. One day, he returned home to find that his wife had been fooling around with another man and had killed him. Now, Jonathan must ply his own trade: on Elsie!

Reprints

• in Tales from the Crypt (Arnold Book Company, 1952 series) #2 (1954)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Russ Cochran, 1983 series) #4 (1983)
• in Iskalde Grøss (Semic, 1982 series) #4/1992 (uke 23 1992)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Gemstone, 1994 series) #19 (May 1997)
• in The Fantagraphics EC Artists' Library (Fantagraphics, 2012 series) #15 - The High Cost of Dying and Other Stories (February 2016) [Reprinted in black and white.
  ]

Indexer Notes

Script revision from Crandall to Kurtzman per The Fantagraphics EC Artists' Library #[15] - The High Cost of Dying and Other Stories.

Wined-Up! (Table of Contents: 2)

Crime SuspenStories / comic story / 7 pages (report information)

Script

Bill Gaines (co-plot); Al Feldstein (co-plot, script)

Pencils

George Evans (signed)

Inks

George Evans (signed)

Colors

Marie Severin

Letters

Jim Wroten

First Line of Dialogue or Text

Your name is Charles Ashland.

Genre

crime

Characters

Charles Ashland; the Petersons (neighbors of the Ashlands); Laura Ashland (villain, Charle's wife)

Synopsis

Charles, in a wheelchair since an auto accident, learns that the accident was no accident at all, and that his wife Laura wanted to kill him because she was sick and tired of living with him. She now informs him that is going to try again by wheeling him out on a pier, attaching a wire to it so that she can pull the chair into the lake as she goes swimming. But she is in for a great surprise!

Reprints

• in Tales from the Crypt (Arnold Book Company, 1952 series) #2 (1954)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Russ Cochran, 1983 series) #4 (1983)
• in Iskalde Grøss (Semic, 1982 series) #6/1994 (uke 50 1994)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Gemstone, 1994 series) #19 (May 1997)
• in The Fantagraphics EC Artists' Library (Fantagraphics, 2012 series) #11 - Aces High (December 2014) [Reprinted in black and white.]

Indexer Notes

Some of the story is told in flashback.

Rendezvous! (Table of Contents: 3)

text story / 1 page (report information)

Script

Al Feldstein

Pencils

Marie Severin

Inks

Marie Severin

Colors

Marie Severin

Letters

typeset

Genre

crime

Reprints

• in Tales from the Crypt (Arnold Book Company, 1952 series) #2 (1954)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Russ Cochran, 1983 series) #4 (1983)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Gemstone, 1994 series) #19 (May 1997)

Murder May Boomerang (Table of Contents: 4)

Crime SuspenStories / comic story / 8 pages (report information)

Script

Johnny Craig

Pencils

Johnny Craig (signed)

Inks

Johnny Craig

Colors

Marie Severin

Letters

Jim Wroten

First Line of Dialogue or Text

From the very first issue of Crime SuspenStories...

Genre

crime

Reprints

• from Crime SuspenStories (EC, 1950 series) #1 (October-November 1950)
• in Tales from the Crypt (Arnold Book Company, 1952 series) #2 (1954)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Russ Cochran, 1983 series) #4 (1983)

About Phase (Table of Contents: 5)

A Horror SuspenStory / comic story / 7 pages (report information)

Script

Bill Gaines (co-plot); Al Feldstein (co-plot, script)

Pencils

George Evans (signed as G. Evans)

Inks

George Evans (signed as G. Evans)

Colors

Marie Severin

Letters

Jim Wroten

First Line of Dialogue or Text

It was on the night of November 8th, 1952...

Genre

horror-suspense

Characters

Myrtle Fenwick (Wilbur's wife); unnamed newspaper boy (cameo); Wilber Fenwick villain, newspaperman)

Synopsis

Wilbur always enjoyed recounting the gory murder details found in his column in The London News to his wife, who promptly told him to shut up in a very loud voice. But he touted to her that all the murders occurred under a full moon and that a werewolf had to be responsible. He planned to kill his wife, as he had done to three other women, then claim he was lycanthropic, a victim of the full moon. Unfortunately for him, January 29, 1953, had a full eclipse of the moon at the time of the murder, so poor Wilbur was sentenced to death for pre-meditated murder.

Reprints

• in Tales from the Crypt (Arnold Book Company, 1952 series) #2 (1954)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Russ Cochran, 1983 series) #4 (1983)
• in Iskalde Grøss (Semic, 1982 series) #6/1994 (uke 50 1994)
• in Crime Suspenstories (Gemstone, 1994 series) #19 (May 1997)
• in The Fantagraphics EC Artists' Library (Fantagraphics, 2012 series) #30 - A Slight Case of Murder and Other Stories (April 2021) [Reprinted in black and white.]

Keywords

London News

Indexer Notes

Script revision from solely Feldstein to Gaines and Feldstein by Craig Delich.

Parts of the story occur on September 8, 1952, December 5, 1952, January 2, 1953, and January 29, 1953

Part of the story is told in flashback.