A complete issue · 32 pages · 1889
Beadle's Dime Library No. 549
A complete, restored issue of Pulp Fiction from 1889 — all 32 pages of painted-cover fiction magazines that launched science fiction, horror, and hardboiled crime, free to page through at ComicBooks.com.
A complete issue · 32 pages · 1889
"Four Horse Frank's Frolic at Bad Luck Bar" by William R. Eyster, the featured story, opens in the mining town of Blue Blazes, which has recently established a temporary government. Belshazzar Brick, a stable but obsessively single-minded man, serves as marshal and justice of the peace. Brick harbors an intense hatred for Four Horse Frank, a supposed outlaw who once attacked him with a club. When the genteel Gerald Sinclair arrives seeking protection and employment in the dangerous camp, he becomes the object of rough frontier amusement. Musicians—an aged Italian harpist, a young fiddler, a tambourine-playing girl, and a costumed monkey—arrive at the Spotted Dog Saloon. Conflict erupts when the brutal Roaring Rob Barker attempts to force a kiss from the tambourine girl; the ensuing brawl escalates into gunfire with lights extinguished.
Each page has its own page — the cartoon, who’s in it, and what the satire means.