Harry Harrison… Beware! Not of Harry Harrison’s writing because that’s excellent. Beware he drew horror strips for more than just EC Comics. While he and Wally Wood produced some classic comics there, HH began selling off other strips to packagers for a fee. The authors are not know for sure but Harry wrote most of these, including the writing in the fee. Some of these free market sales ended up at Youthful’s Beware and later Trojan’s Beware when the comic changed hands.
Many of these comics borrow from classic tales of horror, which Harry Harrison must have been familiar with as a fan of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror. (Some of the artists appearing alongside HH in these comics were veterans of the Pulps Harry enjoyed, men like Vincent Napoli, Henry Kiefer and John Forte.
Youthful
“Doll of Death” Beware #10 (June 1952) had inks by Ernie Bache. Stony McLoyd, gangster, figures out his rival, Joe Gunn, is using a voodoo doll to torture him. Stony kills Joe and gets the doll. When he locks it up in his safe, he almost suffocates. Passing out, the doll is swept up and thrown in the basement furnace. Bye Bye, Stony…
“The Horror Heads” Beware #11 (August 1952) Dirk van Gort is a guide in the Himalayas. He kills his employer in a disagreement then plans to hide the fact. This includes killing his Sherpa helper, Tasni-Kya. Before he dies, he curses van Gort. Later the guide feels itching on his arm. A miniature head of the slain Sherpa appears on his arm. Van Gort wanders the mountains, cutting off the heads as they appear. He ends up in a hospital. From the bandage on his leg, a full miniature Tasni-Kya appears and kills him. HH borrowed this idea from Edward Lucas White’s classic horror tale “Lukundoo”. Harrison changes the setting from the African jungle to the Himalayas.
“The Body Snatcher” Beware #12 (October 1952) Around this time, HH was doing actual adaptations of classic pieces for Chilling Tales. He did Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” and Sir Walter Scott’s “Wandering Willie’s Tale”. This time he borrows from Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Body Snatchers”. Harry is a grave-robber. His friend gets cold feet and ends up as one of the cadavers when the doctor is in a hurry for a fresh corpse. The doctor succeeds in bringing back the dead. Harry’s dead friend kills the doctor then comes for Harry, pushing a massive gravestone unto him.
Trojan
“Rebirth” Beware #1 (January 1953) is a Lovecraftian piece by Harrison. Clarence Homes is a hen-pecked milquetoast of a man. His wife, Melissa, is cheating on him with a sharper named Larry. When Clarence inherits a fortune, the two lovers plan his death. Going to the castle, a creepy caretaker tells them that nothing alive, not even vermin, will live in the place. Clarence thinks he sees something lurking in the waters nearby. Larry throws Clarence off a tower and the lovers claim a fortune in gold and jewels. Clarence doesn’t drowned. He is saved by weird white ectoplasmic creatures that haunt the castle. They transform him into an emotionless but immortal monster. Only love remains in Clarence’s heart. Clarence goes to reclaim his wife and make her immortal too.
“The Clutching Hand” Beware #2 (March 1953) was written by Jesse Merlan. Joe is just out of prison but he is willing to kill for his girl, Margo. He robs and kills a man dressed like a magician, taking his jewels. In the process, Joe cuts off his hand. The hand comes for vengeance. It strangles Margo. Joe gets the murder wrap for killing her. While in prison, the hand comes for him, too. The guards find Joe strangled but no hand. Merlan has used an old idea made popular by Guy de Maupassant and W. F. Harvey.
“The Swamp Horror” Beware #3 (May 1953) was written by Richard Kahn. The comic looks like an adaptation of Anthony M. Rud’s “Ooze” though there were many similar stories done afterward. Some men in Calgaro Swamp witness two white amoeboid monsters fighting it out. They pour kerosene on them and burn them up. A manuscript in a bottle tells the story of Dr. Carlson and his experiment with the white monster. We learn the amoeba ate Carlson’s assistant and finally the doctor, too. The second slug was Carlson, giving the men enough time so they could burn the creatures with kerosene.
“Web of Doom” Beware #4 (July 1953) Spider comics were pretty standard Horror comic fare. Here is Harry’s rendition. A man is restrained in a hospital when he claim seven foot long giant red spiders are out to get him. He tells his story. Shipwrecked on an island, he and his mates encounter the monsters. Only he survived because he dove back into the sea. Later he is rescued and returns to civilization. The creatures sneak onto the ship and follow him. Nobody believes the man and he is sedated. Later the spiders take him away. One nurse sees the spiders…
In Harry Harrison! Harry Harrison! (2014), the author recalled:
I was saved from comics by a congressional investigation. Horror comics were getting pretty repulsive. When a Dr. Wertheim put them on television, during his investigation into the horror comics industry, they looked even worse... A new professional career was opening up for me. Since I had not been drawing very much, but had been editing comics and writing scripts for them, it was very easy for me to take a step sideways and go into editing pulp magazines. This was when science fiction saved me.
Of course, we all know how that worked out with the classic Deathworld trilogy, Make Room! Make Room! (filmed as Soylent Green), The Stainless Steel Rat, West of Eden and many other great books, I think we can be happy HH made that transition. His artistic talents would have been wasted on the watered-down comics of the Silver Age.
All of these comics are available for free at DCM.
