Dorothy Carr was a blind orphan and worked as a street musician for two heartless women, Aunt Eliza and Aunt Martha, who specialised in taking in crippled orphans and forcing them to beg. Dorothy regained her sight after a fall, but kept it secret so she could help the other kids.
Next door neighbours Val Price and Jenny Brown had fallen out. Then Val got a pony, Snowflake and Jenny got a pony on loan, Frosty, and they discovered that the ponies were twins. Problems ensued when the horses wanted to stay together!
When Julie Weston’s cat was killed by a mob of tearaways calling themselves the Link Street Gang, Julie set about taking revenge on them.
Lady Anne Bannerman meets Anne Brown on the train to her new boarding school. The two hit it off so when Brown suggests that for a laugh they could switch places for a little bit as they have similar names Bannerman agrees. Soon Bannerman isn’t happy when she hears Brown getting people to call her Lady Anne. She confronts Brown telling her its time to reveal the truth but Brown is not going to switch back as she knows Bannerman’s secret. Anne’s brother was fired on accusations of being a thief and her family paid off employees to keep it hidden. So Bannerman is blackmailed into keeping quiet.
Not only does Brown use the Lady title to her benefit, she also makes Bannermans life difficult, she makes her give her all her money, copies her work and she doesn’t want her having any friends. She isn’t happy when Bannerman becomes friendly with scholarship girl Eileen. She forces Bannerman to blow her off. Of course all the girls think Bannerman is a snob trying to stay close with a “Lady”. Other than two girls Lucille and Myrna, everyone is fed up of “Lady Anne’s” boasting
Other than dealing with Brown’s nastiness, Bannerman has to figure out how to stop people finding out the truth when problems arise. Such as when her Great-Aunt decides to visit, she has to meet her outside the school, or when Anne Brown’s parents visit and she has to hide in the bushes until Brown comes back. Another close encounter is on a school trip when Bannerman runs into old classmates. She introduces them to Anne Brown so when classmates see Brown waving them off as well as Bannerman they just think Bannerman is sucking up except for Eileen who is suspicious. She is not ready to give up on Bannerman as she finds her quite the different person on the hockey field and thinks there is something up with Brown and Bannermans friendship. Brown decides Eileen is getting too close and frames her for stealing a bracelet so she gets suspended.
Even when Bannerman gets a chance to go home she doesn’t get a break as Brown forces her to invite her along. Although her parents aren’t fooled by Brown’s compliments and wonder why their Anne is friends with her. Things get worse for Bannerman as she is sent to coventry . Meanwhile Brown isn’t happy when during a charity run Lucille and Myrna tells a photographer from the local newspaper that Brown is a lady. Bannerman tells her not to worry nobody will know her locally. It seems she’s wrong as a friend of Jamie, her brother sees the paper and sends a clipping to him. Jamie arrives in time to overhear Brown trying to blackmail his sister into stealing things. They’ve attracted a crowd from the school so Brown spitefully tells them that Jamie is a thief, but he corrects her as he was cleared of all charges that morning. Brown is expelled and Anne is able to tell the head about Eileen being set up and let’s Lucille and Myrna she isn’t interested and having people like them as friends.
A common trope of a girl being blackmailed in order to protect their family, The Honourable S.J., Sandra’s Sad Secret, Be Nice to Nancy and others follow this theme. There are a few differences in this story though. Anne Brown is similar to S.J. in personality but she is not a wealthy person using her influential powers to get her on way and take advantage of those with less than her. Instead it is the person with money, Anne Bannerman that is trying to protect her family. Another difference is that they’ve switched identities so not only does Bannerman have to do what Brown says she can’t even be herself. Being tricked into being someone else has appeared elsewhere often more in a historical context such as The Imposter. Still a combination of things make this story work well even if it’s not doing a lot of new things.
Obviously Brown hasn’t thought of a long term plan or problems that arise from being someone else. In one instance a teacher finds their work is copied off each other, Brown tells Bannerman she can take the blame, but she points out that will go on Brown’s report card. So Bannerman is able to come on up on top in that instance. Bannerman does try to look out for other pupils such as when flowers are going to be presented to a duchess, she lies to Brown saying she knows her and that Brown will have to hide while a young pupil gets to give the flowers to her instead.
Bannerman’s parents seem like nice people so it’s surprising that Anne didn’t confide in them but considering how they handled Jamie’s accusations maybe they wouldn’t have been the best! I can understand they felt they were helping covering up for Jamie and didn’t want to risk the family reputation but it made him look guilty and like they didn’t trust him.
It’s quite lengthy at 15 episodes, and can be formulaic in that a situation comes up where the girl’s true identity may be discovered, Bannerman is reminded of her family problems and Brown gets money/work from Bannerman. But it’s nicely done, the art is good, everyone having distinct looks and it is well paced.
Just a quick post on some changes to the site. Most obviously I have updated the look, although I think I favored the old header as it gave a clearer image of Ken Houghton’s artwork, from the story “The Time Machine” (which seemed appropriate for this site!) but I prefer the new layout overall. I will keep having long posts on stories on stories and other comic related articles which will be listed under blog posts.
I had set up a separate site to be more of an index of the comics but I have now decided to merge the two sites. I had a lot of the stories indexed with the help of Mistyfan, those posts provide short overviews on the stories, as well as creator and issue details when known. Those shorter posts will continue here, as well as that under Annuals, there are posts listing the content of the book, with some looking at Annuals in more details. Another plan is to add a creator index, this is one of the tougher projects as the comics were not credited, but I’ll try and add what I do know.
Of course all this fits in around my job and other commitments, but I do want to keep posting regularly. Any feedback, questions and suggestions are welcome!
On Jo Dentry’s first day working at a store, Gladstone and Peebles, she found an old Victorian telephone. When she lifted the ear piece the ghost of Jeannie May materialized. Jeannie a cheeky cockney had worked in the store when it first opened 1837 and she promised to help Jo all she could.
A popular format for stories were the small digest picture story libraries. These could tell a variety of stories and were a light easy read and complete, so no need to track down the rest of the story. I’ve already looked at some of the DC Thomson picture story library for girls that were published under the names of 4 of their popular titles; Bunty, Mandy, Judy and Debbie. IPC also had their equivalent picture library which is discussed on the Jinty blog here
DC Thomson published other types of digests to capture different audiences such as the
lighthearted Beano and Dandy comic libraries, Commando war stories in pictures and romance based Star- Love Stories in Pictures. Another romance based digest was Blue Jeans photo novel but it used black and white photos and was aimed at teens. Although I never read the Star digests when they were originally published, it is nice to see some familiar artists and interesting stories available digitally.
DC Thomson has only a small collection of digital content on comixology (more details here) including Beano and Dandy Annuals, Best of Bunty, Commando and Star, but the collection is growing and hopefully will continue to expand. The Star-Love Stories were first published in the 1960s and lasted until the 1990s with over a thousand issues printed. The Star digests had something in common with the Commandos as they both had the same editor for a time Chick Checkley. Unfortunately like other DCT publications details of the creators involved are still hard to come by, some familiar artists do pop up though. This looks to be Julian Vivas work.
Also some familiar themes appear such as jealous rivals, career driven protagonists, historical stories, mysteries to be investigated, cruel guardians, family feuds and misunderstandings. One of my favourite’s in this collection is “Mistress of Jarmyle” digital issue #9 (originally printed in 1989 as #1195). A historical story set in Somerset in 1815, Caroline Bennet returns from America, to claim back her family home, Jarmyle, and seek revenge on Lord Grantley, the man responsible for taking over Jarmyle and killing her father in a duel. She keeps her identity hidden in order to get close to the nephew of Lord Grantley intending he will pay for his late uncle’s crimes. The art is very pretty and the digital upgrade makes it very clean and crisp. The plot is somewhat predictable but there are still some surprises and it’s a good read. The art on the covers of these books are nothing like the inside art, but they are very vibrant and striking.
Another story “Journey to Love” has orphan Jo Gibbs, a young woman who is taken advantage by her guardian who expects her to do all the housework and give her the money she earns (a familiar setting!). Jo decides enough is enough and pursues her goal of becoming a nurse which leads her to taking a job at a residential home. This in turn leads to her to be taken on the pensioner’s trip to Spain, where this potential romance and some shady business going on. Other stories include “Treacherous Heart” where an aspiring model, Alison, has to deal with a jealous rival who isn’t happy with her getting top jobs and envies her photographer boyfriend. She plans to sabotage Alison. In “Two Hearts” sisters Liz and Corrie move to the Scottish highlands to help with their father get his hotel up and running. The sisters are very different Liz more willing to muck in, while Corrie is more snobbish. They both find love interests but it seems that Corrie has her eye on Liz’s potential partner. I found the ending a bit rushed in this story but the story kept me interested as I didn’t know who was going to end up with who.
In the original format a small pin up of popular band or star would be inside the front cover. This is not included in the digital format but it may have been fun to include this in for nostalgia. Still for just 69p each, there is plenty of nostalgia to be captured in the stories. So far there are 12 digital issues available. They are fun reads and I’m looking forward to future releases.
Beth Rogan lives in a caravan with her grandmother Old Meg. When Wilbur Wilson’s circus comes to the town he rents the field where Old Meg’s caravan has stood for years, so when she is evicted from the field, she vows revenge on the circus. She instructs Beth to sell bewitched ballet shoes to the high wire ballerina. Beth is scared of old Meg so she goes to the circus but decides not to give them to the ballerina. Unluckily she bumps into the ballerina, Sheena, who sees the shoes are her size and insists on trying them. She dances beautifully but seems to dance longer than intended. Beth asks Sheena for a job and ballet lessons as payment. She tries to keep an eye on Sheena but on the first night Sheena falls from the high wire, luckily the safety net means she isn’t injured. Old Meg is still scheming and Beth is too afraid to defy her outright, when Meg gives her a potion to make the animals sleepy, she takes it, but empties it out later.
Beth tries to burn the shoes but sparks fly at her and onto one of the tents setting it on fire. Together with the circus people, they manage to put out the fire but she is surprised to find the ballet shoes aren’t even singed. More bad luck falls on the circus when the lions turn on Lex the lion tamer. Lex rallies some other circus folk against Beth saying she’s a witch and they have had nothing but bad luck since she joined. Sheena steps in to stop them. More accidents happen as a trapeze artist falls and Sheena is shocked when her laces untie and wrap around the wire and she has to be saved by acrobats. Beth tries to hide the shoes and while she is doing this she sees someone stealing circus money. But she can’t explain why she was in the owner, Mr Wilson’s, caravan. Beth catches Lex the lion tamer trying to hide the money. So Beth is given another chance, but her relief is short lived as Meg confronts Beth for turning her back on her and gives her one more chance to help or she will be destroyed.
Old Meg’s next step is to kidnap Billy, the owner’s son. When Beth tries to stop her Meg attempts to run her over. Luckily Beth manages to jump on the caravan and gets to the boy. The caravan is chased by Mr Wilson and Meg takes a corner to sharp hitting the pavement, she is flung from the caravan and is killed. Beth believes with Meg dead the shoes will no longer be bewitched and their worries are over but it seems the circus still has obstacles to overcome. That night on the high wire Sheena finds herself unable to move, all that has happened has made her lose her nerve. Beth decides to leave the circus taking the shoes in the hope the circus will be safe. She is startled to run into what looks like Meg’s ghost but turns out to be Meg’s sister Mairi. After telling her all that has happened, Mairi puts a powerful spell on the shoes, so Beth can use them on the high wire. Beth convinces Mr Wilson put on another show and thanks to the shoes Beth’s performance is amazing. Soon Sheena returns recovered from her experience, she tells Beth to keep the shoes and they become a popular double act.
A very early story from Judy, it is quite short at only 7 issues. There is not a lot of room for development but there is still a lot fitted into the few issues. There is the cursed shoes as well as Meg’s sabotage, the thief sub-plot and Beth also discovering a love of dancing. It would have been nice to have developed some of the circus people some more, Sheena’s first appearance give hints that she might be a bit of a diva, one of the clowns refer to her as “temperamental” and she shoves Beth aside on their first meeting but soon she is just nice, defending Beth and has the misfortune to have cursed shoes. It could have been interesting to see Sheena change her ways because of the curse but maybe the writer didn’t want to make her too unsympathetic or didn’t have time to develop it more.
Lex is set up as an antagonist to Beth, he is suspicious of her since he caught her pouring out the sleeping potion near the animals. Although he has reasons to suspect her knowing about the sabotage, it turns out he is not so innocent himself as he has outed as a thief, which is convenient for Beth. Another convenience is Mairi turning up with the excuse of not being around before because she didn’t agree with her sister’s dark curses. It is strange that we never know who cursed the shoes originally, it would make sense if Meg had done it, but apparently they were given to Meg by an old gypsy. I wonder had they been used before on someone and what other cursed items had Meg in her possession?
It is an enjoyable read despite some flaws. I do like the art and the red tones bring a nice splash of colour. I also like that the ending isn’t rushed, even though it’s a short story, Meg getting killed isn’t the end of things. It takes one more installment to wrap things up, even if Mairi has a quite random appearance, it is good to take the time overcome one more hurdle.
The Radcliffe Mill Brass Band had a secret benefactor—Trudy Tomkins. their cornet player and grand-daughter of the conductor, Will Bailey. Trudy earned the money by singing, under the name of Antonia Doe,with the Spud Bashers, a local pop group. She had had to miss a band practice in order to record the group’s first disc…
Series of short stories about people with famous names, that have similar but new adventures as their namesake. Such as –
Bobbie Crusoe and the Pink Planet
In the year 2085, Bobbie Crusoe and her dad spaceship crash on planet. They are saved by David who brings them to a settlement on the planet. Bobbie hopes David will come back to Earth with her but he declines, he doesn’t let her know he is actually an android and he thinks robots aren’t meant to have feelings.
