Romantic Secrets #50

Charlton's Romantic Secrets #50 captures the tangled heartache of 1964 romance on a cover by Dick Giordano — a red-haired young woman in a yellow sweater stands close to a dark-jacketed young man against a brick wall, while in the background a blonde woman in red and a dark-haired man in a brown jacket walk together, oblivious. The thought bubble and cover copy — "Why do I feel this way? Could it be that I had destroyed a loyal and lasting love?" — spell out the emotional stakes with the kind of earnest urgency that made romance comics irresistible. Inside, Joe Gill's script and Sal Gentile's art bring "The Ladder of Love" to life, with inks by Dick Giordano tying the whole package together.