The Spirit #20

Will Eisner's cover for this April 1950 Quality Comics issue crackles with tension: the blue-suited, masked Spirit wrestles a gun away from a glamorous woman in a white gown and red cape — jewels and scattered cash spilling around them — while a hunched, sinister figure lurks in the shadows nearby. A stack of character portraits along the left edge hints at the cast of "The Vortex: A Story of Terror," one of three complete Spirit adventures packed inside alongside backup features Flatfoot Burns and Jonesy. For a dime, readers in 1950 were getting a remarkably generous helping of pulpy, stylish storytelling straight from the pages of leading newspapers nationwide.