Tessie the Typist

Few Golden Age characters can claim they were brought to life by Mickey Spillane — yes, that Mickey Spillane — but Tessie the Typist made her debut in Joker Comics #2 in 1942, a comedic gem from Marvel's earliest days. A humor heroine of the wartime era, Tessie earned her own title and became a fixture across Joker Comics, Tessie the Typist Comics, and Gay Comics, keeping lively company with the likes of Powerhouse Pepper and even sharing pages with Captain America and Bucky at the height of the Golden Age. The fact that her publishing footprint stretches all the way to 2019 — nearly 77 years — speaks to a lasting charm that outlived countless flashier contemporaries. With a key issue to her name and a origin story tied to one of crime fiction's most legendary writers, Tessie is a delightful and genuinely surprising corner of Marvel history that any serious collector should know.