[Tudor House]

Pocket Partner (24 vintage adult digest magazines, 1969)

Baltimore, MD: Tudor House Publications, 1969. First & second editions, w/ different cover prices, stapled softcover 12mos., approx. 32 pages, bound dos-a-dos (two issue numbers per volume), sized for the shirt pocket at 4 x 7 inches. Twenty-four vintage adult digest magazines, circa 1969, produced in Baltimore & featuring "Vibracolor" printing techniques, using vibrant ink colors in high contrast, Hippie & Mod fashion, wallpaper, furniture, & hairstyles. Among the best, most progressive imprints issued by Baltimore's smut dynamo, Central Magazine Sales (later Central Sales), under their Tudor House Publications subsidiary, commonly known as T.H.P., almost always seen sporting the patented "Vibracolor" (or Vibra Color) banner. These issues, unlike other T.H.P.'s, ran no ads or order forms.  Attractive models w/ workable photography, the ink colors are the focus, as is soft-core simulated sex, both being characteristics & techniques recalling Lasse Braun's filmmaking style, "Blue" (or Danish) magazines released in Europe a decade earlier, & kingpin Reuben Sturman's appropriation of much of this material for distribution in the US. Notable issues showcase themes including bohemians, lesbians, sailors, bondage, motorcycles, transvestites, call girls, swingers, & one titled "Sexchange: 2001," a parody of Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film, "2001: A Space Odyssey." Less savory titles involve rape & pirates. Presumed complete, 32 titles, a total of 16 volumes, w/ most if not all seeing two publication releases: first at $3 per, then at $10 per, sometimes different cover photos & internal sequence. Presuming the cheaper edition was released earlier, the expensive edition re-released as T.H.P. fizzled into the Komar Company, once owned by prominent Baltimorean Samuel Boltansky, still operating in Baltimore but now primarily an Internet sex toy & wholesale shop, no longer called Komar. Boltansky founded Central Magazine/Central Sales in the early 1960s, may have had ties to organized crime, was involved in police raids (one incident in 1976 when Louis Gugliemi & he ran shipments to Texas). He is mostly remembered as a prominent philanthropic real-estate developer, regularly contributing to the Jewish Museum of Maryland, where annual conferences featured keynote speakers in his honor. Boltansky's under-the-counter operation in the fight against censorship & the empowerment of sexuality will remain a "vibrant" totem thanks to Tudor House titles like Pocket Partner. Several magazine imitators would attempt similar techniques & themes, notably Spectracolor, Excitachrome, & Golden State's Electra Color. None matched the psychedelic Day-Glo faultlessness of Tudor House, perhaps their earlier Scandinavian counterparts. Still highly collectible to date. Represented: issues 1/2 (both), 3/4 (variant), 5/6 (both), 7/8 (both), 9/10 (variant), 11/12 (both), 13/14 (variant), 15/16 (both), 17/18 (variant), 19/20 (both), 21/22 (variant), 23/24 (variant), 25/26 (variant), 27/28 (both), 29/30 (variant), 31/32 (both). Very Good Plus overall, all w/ light rubbing, toning, faint foxing, a few w/ small price stickers, a few w/ moisture wrinkling, a few w/ light scuffs. Scarce Baltimore smut for mature, consenting audiences.

[Book ID 125959]