RETRO HOT PICKS! | 13th Dimension, Comics, Creators, Culture

Nov05

RETRO HOT PICKS! On Sale This Week — in 1970!

Posted by Dan Greenfield on Nov 5, 2025

RETRO HOT PICKS! On Sale This Week — in 1970!

Scott and Dan hit up the comics racks from 55 years ago… This week for RETRO HOT PICKS, Scott and I are selecting comics that came out the week of Nov. 5, 1970. Last time for RETRO HOT PICKS, it was the week of Oct. 29, 1961. Click here to check it out. (Keep in mind that comics came out on multiple days, so these are the comics that went on sale between Nov. 2. and Nov. 8.) So, let’s set the scene: Pretty slow news week on a big scale, but there were still some interesting odds and ends. — It was a pretty good time for up-and-coming musical acts. On Nov. 6, a five-piece hard rock act calling itself Aerosmith played its first gig — at Nipmuc Regional High School in Mendon, Massachusetts. The band got the gig because 25-year-old guitarist Joe Perry’s mother worked at a nearby school and knew someone at Nipmuc. You can always count on Mom! — Five days earlier, a Swedish pop group named Festfolket held its first planned concert, at a restaurant in Gothenburg. The group would later change its name to ABBA. — On Nov. 3, the U.S. midterms were a mixed bag for Republican President Nixon. The Democrats lost four seats in the Senate, but still held the majority 53 seats. The Dems, however, gained 12 seats in the House, strengthening their hand in the lower chamber. Down in Georgia, 46-year-old former state Sen. Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, was elected governor. — On Nov. 7, Royal Caribbean launched its first cruise ship, the MS Song of Norway. It left Miami for a seven-day round trip with stops in the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. — The same day, but obviously completely unrelated, two schools played Ultimate Frisbee against each other for the first time. Columbia High School in Maplewood, N.J., hosted Millburn High School for a match in the parking lot. Columbia — where the sport began — walloped Millburn. — On Nov. 8, New Orleans Saints kicker Tom Dempsey blasted a last-second, record 63-yard field goal, lifting his team to a 19-17 victory over the visiting Detroit Lions. Dempsey’s heroics were amplified because was born without toes on his right foot and had to wear a custom shoe to play. The record has been surpassed many times — most...

Oct29

RETRO HOT PICKS! On Sale This Week — in 1961!

Posted by Dan Greenfield on Oct 29, 2025

RETRO HOT PICKS! On Sale This Week — in 1961!

Scott and Dan hit up the comics racks from 64 years ago… This week for RETRO HOT PICKS, Scott and I are selecting comics that came out the week of Oct. 29, 1961. Last time for RETRO HOT PICKS, it was the week of Oct. 22, 1983. Click here to check it out. (Keep in mind that comics came out on multiple days, so these are the comics that went on sale between Oct. 26 and Nov. 1.) So, let’s set the scene: The Berlin Crisis — one of the most tense standoffs between East and West during the Cold War — came close to erupting into armed conflict this week. U.S. and Soviet tanks had amassed on either side of the Berlin Wall, which had been erected just months before. On Oct. 27, less than a week after an initial confrontation, 33 Soviet tanks drove to the Brandenburg Gate to face American tanks on the other side of the border. Ten of the tanks took up a separate position. The standoff continued for 16 hours before both sides withdrew, following intense negotiations. The Soviet moved a tank back, the Americans followed, and the armored vehicles retreated one at a time. The Crisis, which began in June because of tensions over Communist objections to Western military presence in the city, as well as an exodus of East Germans fleeing to the West — culminating in the Wall’s construction — was over. In the end, Berlin would remain a divided city until November 1989 — a defining symbol of the seeming intractability of the American and Soviet geopolitical positions. All of this and more played out as the U.S. and U.S.S.R. continued frightening nuclear tests. (On Oct. 6, President Kennedy advised Americans to build fallout shelters.) On Oct. 30, the Soviet Union detonated a 50-megaton hydrogen bomb called Tsar Bomba over Novaya Zemlya — the largest such explosion ever. The weapon itself was so huge it was deemed impractical to deploy. There were, after all, other ways to fire nukes. On Nov. 1, the first Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile was put on active status. IN OTHER NEWS — General Maxwell Taylor and Deputy National Security Advisor W. W. Rostow had been sent by Kennedy to South Vietnam to assess the situation. In early November, the Taylor-Rostow Report called for improved training for South...

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