Evolution of the Crime Magazine

 
     
     
     
  It's fun to track the evolution of the imagery created on the cover of mid-century Detective Magazines. which later became Crime magazines and then made a slippery slide into the shadowy world of Exploit-a-rama!! 

The following images are taken from covers of various magazines starting in the 1920's on through to 1990's.  Starting out as Detective Stories, these publications with lone wolf protagonist who much like Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade work outside the system neither criminal nor police and incorporate stories which have a substantial element of mystery in their content.  The Black Mask cover from 1920, first line left side, describe the magazine as "A Magazine of Mystery, Romance. and Adventure. By 1922 it's motto has become "A Magazine of Mystery and Detective Stories".  Evidence of the idea that mystery had a major influence on the goings on rendered in these stories.

After studying the progression of the covers it's not hard to see that the Detective Magazines later become Crime Stories which as time passes actually provide a conduit for sexual exploitation.  The need to constantly manufacture shock for readership turns the intellectual give and take of a mystery story into what could be called shock value dirt literature.

The graphic progression found in the iconography of these magazines was parroted by American film a bit later.  Take a look at the style and content differences between the films 'Phantom Lady' (1944) and 'Screaming Mimi' (1957). Now check out the magazine covers of that same period. 

 
     
             
             
       
  1920   1922   1922  
             
             
             
             
       
  1922   1923   1923  
             
             
       
  1923   1923   1923  
             
             
       
  1928   1928   1929  
             
             
       
  1930   1930   1930  
             
             
       
  1931   1932   1932  
             
             
       
  1933   1933   1933  
             
             
       
  1933   1933   1933  
             
             
       
  1934   1934   1934  
             
             
       
  1934   1935   1935  
             
             
       
  1935   1935   1935  
             
             
       
  1936   1936   1936  
             
             
       
  1937   1937   1938  
             
             
       
  1938   1939   1939  
             
             
       
  1940   1940   1940  
             
             
       
  1941   1941   1941  
             
             
       
  1941   1941   1941  
             
             
       
  1942   1942   1942  
             
             
       
  1942   1942   1942  
             
             
       
  1942   1942   1942  
             
             
       
  1943   1943   1943  
             
             
       
  1944   1945   1945  
             
             
       
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  1957   1957   1957  
             
             
       
  1958   1958   1958  
             
             
       
  1958   1959   1963  
             
             
       
  1963   1964   1965  
             
             
       
  1965   1967   1969  
             
             
       
  1970   1971   1971  
             
             
       
  1974   1975   1977  
             
             
       
  1978   1978   1979  
             
             
       
  1980   1980   1985  
             
             
       
  1985   1985   1985  
             
             
       
  1985   1985   1985  
             
             
       
  1991   1992   1993  
             
             
   
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