Forgotten Femme Fatales: Cleve F. Adams' VIOLET McDADE in "The Voice" (Read it Here!)

Circus fat-lady turned private detective Violet McDade is not your typical femme fatale, but she's a definitely a femme, and there are few more fatal. With her partner (and narrator), the slim, trim Nevada Alvarado, she starred in at least a dozen novelettes in Clues Detective Stories. Violet packs a pair of .45s at all times, and welcomes any excuse to start slinging lead. In one tale, after gunning down a lady murderer, she deliberately steps on her rather than walk around.

"The Voice," from the Sept. 1936 issue, actually delivers three femme fatales for the price of one. Along with Violet, we get Nevada and her high-society pal Kay, a suspected dope smuggler. Cleve Adams obviously had a lot of fun writing this story, and I had fun reading it. I think you will too.

Your FFB Femme Fatale Headquarters is pattinase. 

Pulp Gallery: THE PHANTOM DETECTIVE

1936

1947

1950

I Am a Fugitive from the FBI

Got this OFFICIAL NOTICE via email yesterday. Yikes! Since I've apparently already been found guilty, I'm taking it on the lam. I'll do my best to continuing posting here - from an undisclosed location in a country without an extradition treaty. Cash contributions to my escape fund may be sent in care of Davy Crockett, General Delivery, Abuja, Nigeria.

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Field Intelligence Groups J. Edgar Hoover Building

935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, D.C.

Attention: Beneficiary,

I am Special Agent Erick Bolt from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Field Intelligence Groups (FIGs). We intercepted two consignment boxes at JFK Airport, New York. The boxes were scanned but found out that it contained large sum of money ($4.1 million) and also some backup documents which bears your name as the Beneficiary/Receiver of the money. Investigation was carried out on the diplomat that accompanied the boxes into the United States. Said that he was to deliver the fund to your residence as overdue payment owed to you by the Federal Republic of Nigeria through the security company in United Kingdom.

We cross check all legal documents in the boxes but we found out that your consignment was lacking an important document and we cannot release the boxes to the diplomat until the document is found, we have no other option than to confiscate your consignment.

According to Internal Revenue Code (IRC) in Title 26 also contain reporting requirement on a Form 8300, Report of Cash Payment Over $10,000 Received in a Trade or Business, money laundering activity may violate 18 USC §1956, 18 USC 1957, 18 USC 1960, and provision of Title 31, and 26 USC 6050I of the United States Code (USC), this section will discuss only those money laundering and currency violation under the jurisdiction of IRS, your consignment lacks proof of ownership certificate from the joint team of IRS and IRC, therefore you need to reply back immediately for direction on how to procure this certificate to enable us relieved the charge of evading the law on you, which is a punishable offense in the United States.

You are required to reply back within 72 hours or you will be prosecuted in a court of law for money laundering, also you are instructed to desist from further contact with any bank(s) or person(s) in Nigeria or the United Kingdom or any part of the world regarding your payment because your consignment has been confiscated by the Federal Bureau here in the United States.

Yours In Service,

Agent Erick Bolt

Regional Deputy Director

Field Intelligence Groups (FIGs)

Overlooked Films: HERE'S FLASH CASEY (1937)

No Black Mask hero had more success in more forms of media than George Harmon Coxe's Flashgun Casey. His radio show ran from 1943 to 1950, he had a short-lived comic book published by Marvel, and a TV series (starring Darren McGavin) ran in 1951 and '52. Some of his pulp adventures were reprinted in digest and paperback, and he appeared in four original hardcover novels.

AND there were two Flash Casey movies. Women Are Trouble (1936) starred Stuart Erwin and was based on the Black Mask story of the same name. Here's Flash Casey (1937), with Eric Linden in the lead, was supposedly adapted from the first Casey adventure, "Return Engagement."

Well, I have not read "Return Engagement," but I'm pretty sure it doesn't start with Flash in college, or portray him a wide-eyed boy getting his first job as a new photographer. No, Eric Linden is not playing the grizzled, hardboiled character of the pulps, but he's likable and believable enough in the role he's given. There are even spurts of decent hardboiled dialogue (though not usually from Casey). Watch it yourself and see.

A couple points of interest: In one scene we visit a newsstand, and there's a close-up of an issue of Short Stories. Too bad it wasn't Mask. Later, at a society benefit, a background orchestra is playing a highbrow rendition of the Sons of the Pioneers' tune "Tumbling Tumbleweeds." And the criminal scheme involves what appears to be the 1930s equivalent of Photoshop.

Got your popcorn? Here we go:

Cap Gun Monday: NICHOLS DERRINGER

This derringer was one of very few Nichols "shell firing" guns - sort of their answer to Mattel's Shootin' Shell line. This one came with three-piece bullets (a shell, a casing, and a red "pellet" tip). The red pellet was the piece that was actually propelled out of the barrel. Though the gun has two barrels, only one is hollow and functional. These days, a single three-piece bullet is worth more than the gun itself.

The most common Nichols derringer was the Dyna-Mite, at right, which did not fire a projectile. The Derringer (capital D) is about 3 3/4", while the Dyna-Mite is just over 3".  Stick around. The Dyna-Mite will get its own pictorial sometime soon.

More cap guns HERE.

SHADOW COMICS 34, 35 & 36 (1944)

Our growing Shadow Comics cover gallery is HERE.