A complete, restored issue of Pulp Fiction from 1897 — all 32 pages of painted-cover fiction magazines that launched science fiction, horror, and hardboiled crime, free to page through at ComicBooks.com.

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A complete issue · 32 pages · 1897

Beadle's Dime Library No. 954: Joe Phenix in Chicago

1897 · Free to read

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About this issue

This issue contains the opening installment of "Joe Phenix in Chicago, or The Serio-Comic Detective" by Albert W. Aiken, author of the Joe Phenix novels and other adventure tales. The mystery unfolds when English businessman Carroll Berkeley meets his old acquaintance MacKensie on a train and reveals that his brother Marshall has vanished in Chicago. Marshall cashed a forged check for five thousand dollars (allegedly for property) two days before disappearing—a signature Berkeley suspects is counterfeit. The Chicago police attribute it to bunco-men in low establishments, but the renowned detective Joe Phenix, engaged by Berkeley, theorizes the crime is the work of clever European criminals. Investigation reveals Marshall frequented the Glorious Alcazar, a beer-garden music-hall in the Fair District. Phenix accepts the case and prepares to travel to Chicago to investigate.

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Each page has its own page — the cartoon, who’s in it, and what the satire means.