Number 1879: Suzie the chorus girl

The dumb blonde stereotype goes back quite a ways, long before Suzie was introduced in Top-Notch Laugh Comics #28 (1942), but was well established when she was awarded her own series. Suzie #50 (1945), from which this story is taken, is actually the second issue. At this time she was presented as being a young adult; later on in the series she became a teenager, right out of high school.

In this story, a broad comedy which bounces off the walls with ideas and story points not going directly to the main plot, Suzie gets a job from “Mr. Goldwater,” a talent agent. That inside joke is a reference to John Goldwater, one of the three founders of MLJ Comics, which became Archie Comics, publisher of Suzie.

Al Fagaly, a journeyman comic book man, is credited with the drawing, combining some of his faux Jimmy Hatlo (They’ll Do It Every Time newspaper comic panel) style. Later on Fagaly partnered with MLJ editor and writer Harry Shorten to do a knockoff of Hatlo’s successful panel, called There Oughta Be a Law for the McClure Newspaper Syndicate. Here is a link to examples of the Shorten/Fagaly collaboration from Hairy Green Eyeball in 2009, including one of the panels with an idea submitted by Basil Wolverton.

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