Pulp magazines were inexpensive fiction magazines that were published from around 1896 to the 1950s. The term “pulp” derives from the cheap wood pulp on which the magazines were printed. In contrast, magazines printed on higher-quality paper were called "glossies" or "slicks".
The pulps gave rise to the term pulp fiction in reference to run-of-the-mill, low-quality literature. Pulps were the successors to the penny dreadfuls, dime novels, and short fiction magazines of the 1800s.
Although many respected writers wrote for pulps, the magazines were best known for their lurid, exploitative, and sensational subject matter. Modern superhero comic books are sometimes considered descendants of "hero pulps"- pulp magazines often featured illustrated novel-length stories of heroic characters, such as Flash Gordon, The Shadow, Doc Savage, and the Phantom Detective.
At their peak of popularity in the 1920s and 1930s, the most successful pulps could sell up to one million copies per issue. The most successful pulp magazines were Argosy, Adventure, Blue Book, and Short Stories, collectively described by some pulp historians as "The Big Four.” Among the best known other titles of this period were Amazing Stories, Black Mask, and Dime Detective, among others.
1939 Robert de Graff launched Pocket Books. It was the first American mass-market-paperback line, and it transformed the industry. But paper book covers are almost as old as print. They date back to the sixteenth century, and paper-backing has been the ordinary mode of book production in France, for a long time. The first edition of James Joyce’s “Ulysses,” published in Paris in 1922, is a paperback. In the United States, paperback publishing was tried on a major scale at least twice during the nineteenth century: first, in the eighteen-forties, with an enterprise called the American Library of Useful Knowledge, and after the Civil War, when, unfettered by international copyright agreements, American publishers brought out cheap editions of popular European novels.
Many notable authors and books were first published as pulp fiction:
Tarzan of the Apes first appeared serialised in 1912-13 editions of All-Story magazine. Dashiell Hammet’s The Maltese Falcon was originally published in Black Mask magazine in 1930, and The Thin Man in 1934 in Redbook.
This is part 1 of a 4-part series on Pulp Fiction featuring the 1910s - 1920s.
Later larger series will feature Pulp Fiction of the 1930s, and Pulp Fiction of the 1940s - 1950s.
Modest Stein (1871-1958)
Modest Aronstam (Stein) was born in Kovno, Russia in 1871. In 1888 aged 17, he emigrated to America by himself. He moved to New York City and lived on the Lower East Side in the Jewish ghetto. It’s not known where he studied art, but by 1898 his courtroom sketches were published in The New York World, The New York Herald, and The New York Sun.
Stein began to illustrate cover paintings for pulp magazines in 1901. His cover art appeared on All Story, Argosy, The Cavalier, Munsey's, and People's Magazine. During the 1920s he was a cover artist for Clues, Complete Stories, Detective Stories, Far West Illustrated, and Love Story.
During the 1930s he continued to illustrate covers for Street & Smith pulp magazines, such as Crime Busters, Complete Stories, Detective Stories, Love Story, and Unknown. He also did many covers for the Street & Smith magazine Picture Play, which featured elegant portraits of glamorous Hollywood stars. In 1939 he moved to Hollywood, California, to work as a portrait artist.
In 1943 he returned to New York City, where he continued to create covers for Street & Smith pulp magazines, such as Astounding Science Fiction, Love Story, Mystery Magazine, Romantic Range, Doc Savage, and The Shadow. In 1949 Street & Smith ceased publication of pulp magazines as the popularity of the genre declined.
During the 1950s his major creative outlet was portraiture. In1958 he was awarded the Art League of Long Island Portraiture Prize. Two days later Stein died in Booth Memorial Hospital in Flushing, Queens, at the age of eighty-seven.
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| 1915 Movie Pictorial December issue Elsie Janis |
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| 1917 All-Story Weekly July 28 issue Haunted Hands |
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| 1918 All-Story Weekly July 6 issue The Murder Ship |
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| 1919 All-Story Weekly November 8 issue Gray Dusk |
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| 1919 All-Story Weekly September 6 issue Comrades of Peril |
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| 1919 All-Story Weekly October 4 issue Where Dead Men Walk |
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| 1920 All-Story Weekly February 28 issue The House With a Bad Name |
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| 1920 All-Story Weekly May 8 issue On the Face of the Waters |
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| 1922 Argosy All-Story Weekly December 16 issue The Free Trader |
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| 1923 Argosy All-Story Weekly April 28 issue Human Beings |
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| 1923 Argosy All-Story Weekly December 15 issue Hopalong Cassidy Returns |
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| 1923 Argosy All-Story Weekly January 13 issue Jungle Test |
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| 1923 Argosy All-Story Weekly June 9 issue A Million To One Chance |
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| 1924 Argosy All-Story Weekly June 21 issue Liberation |
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| 1925 Love Story Magazine November 21 issue |
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| 1925 The Bandits of Hell's Bend by Edgar Rice Burroughs |
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| 1926 Argosy All-Story Weekly August 28 issue The Big Voice |
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| 1926 Argosy All-Story Weekly June 26 issue The Radio Planet |
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| 1926 The Popular Magazine December 20 issue The Obituary Lottery |
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| 1927 All-Story Weekly July 10 issue Moors End |
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| 1927 Picture Play November issue Greta Garbo |
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| 1927 Picture Play October issue Gertrude Olmsted |
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| 1928 Picture Play March issue Esther Ralston |
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| 1929 Picture Play July issue Lily Damita |
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| 1930 Love Story Magazine July 26 Mid-Summer Issue |
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| 1930 Picture Play June issue Greta Garbo |
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| 1931 Love Story Magazine May 2 issue A New Story of Hollywood |
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| 1931 Love Story May 23 issue 'neath Tropical Skies |
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| 1931 Picture Play October issue Lupe Velez |
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| 1931 The Shadow April issue The Shadow Knows! |
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| 1932 Love Story Magazine October 8 issue cover artwork |
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| 1933 Love Story Magazine July 15 issue Tender Melody |
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| 1934 Love Story Magazine March 10 issue |
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| 1935 Love Story Magazine November 9 issue Football Wife |
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| 1937 Detective Story Magazine February issue Burglar - Wanted |
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| 1937 Love Story Magazine August 28 issue Justice of Peace |
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| 1938 Love Story Magazine October 1 issue |
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| 1939 Clues Detective Stories June issue Death of the Seven Masks |
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| 1939 Clues Detective Stories October issue The Manchu Skull |
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| 1939 Clues Detective Stories September issue I Know Who You Are Not |
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| 1939 Love Story January 7 issue Arabian Love Song |
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| 1939 Unknown October issue The Elder Gods |
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| 1940 Detective Story November issue Matter Over Mind |
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| 1941 Detective Story Magazine December issue Corpse in Caricature |
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| 1943 Doc Savage September issue Hell Below |
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| 1943 The Shadow August issue Messenger of Death |
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| 1943 The Shadow December issue Murder by Moonlight |
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| 1943 The Shadow July issue The Golden Doom |
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| 1943 The Shadow June issue Murder Lake |
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| 1943 The Shadow May issue "The Robot Master" |
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| 1943 The Shadow November issue The Muggers |
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| 1943 The Shadow September issue House of Ghosts |
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| 1944 Doc Savage November issue Satan Black |
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| 1944 The Shadow February issue Syndicate of Death |
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| 1945 The Shadow March issue Five Keys to Crime Original artwork by Modest Stein |
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| 1945 The Shadow March issue Five Keys to Crime |
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