SEX REARS ITS LOVELY HEAD edited by Jerome Beatty, Jr.

Some great gag cartoons from a very well-worn copy of SEX REARS ITS LOVELY HEAD, "a rib-splitting collection of cartoons about the biological urge assembled from the best of America's foremost family magazines," edited by Jerome Beatty, Jr. and copyright 1956 by Bantam Books, Inc.

This is a collection of cartoons that originally appeared in all of the A-list publications of the day: Collier's, Look, The Saturday Evening Post, This Week, Cosmopolitan, Ladies' Home Journal and The American. And these are some of the major cartoonists of the day. Burr Shafer provides the cover.

Part two is here.

Part three is here.

Part four is here.

Part five is here.

Wenzel could draw pretty girls and made a career doing just that.

Bill Harrison's cartoon (below) is a great one.

I had to look at Clyde Lamb's cartoon a couple of times before I got it:

Dana Fradon:

Mischa Richter:

I like how Greg D'Alessio gives us a complete sense of place and fashion.

Below: Bob Barnes gives this gag a nice twist:

Below: Syd Hoff with a bit of racy advice from mother!

Ted Key's body language depiction is spot-on!

Gardner Rea echoes Bill Harrison's cartoon. Putting the knife in the bride's hand is a wonderful touch.

The two lovers in the balloons is one of my favorites. I have no idea who drew it, though.

Below: I like the slap dash style, but see no signature. My guess: Reamer Keller.

Below: a Gardner Rea cartoon that would not be published today:

Virgil VIP Partch has a certain view of the world that is loopy and odd and very lovely to see:

And here's another one from VIP:







Part two is here.

Part three is here.

Part four is here.

Part five is here.

My thanks to Ed Tucciarone for passing along this book to me. Thank you, Ed!

-- This has been a bloggy rerun from December 21, 2011.