Tammy and Misty 1 August 1981

Cover artist: John Armstrong

Bella (artist John Armstrong)

The Breaking of Faith (artist Giorgio Giorgetti)

Wee Sue (artist Mike White)

Linda’s Fox (artist and writer Ron Tiner) – final episode

Are You Set for Summer? (artist John Johnston, writer Maureen Spurgeon) – quiz

The Look of Things (artist Jaume Rumeu) – Strange Story from the Mists

Tune-in (pop and TV gossip feature)

Bessie Bunter (artist Arthur Martin)

No Love for Lindy (artist Eduardo Feito) – first episode

Stella Stirrer (artist Tony Coleman)

For the first Tammy issue for August 1981, Bella takes over the cover spot after Sandy finished last week. Oh dear, no sooner is Bella back on the cover when she’s really put her foot in it by thinking circus tricks (learned from the circus she is staying at) would impress the judges at a gymnastics competition. Now she realises it was one of her worst mistakes, never, ever to be repeated. It not only makes her lose badly but also causes terrible trouble when the audience reacts angrily to the marking. Still, anyone who’s read Bella for long enough will know that when a competition goes badly for her, it means she’s about to undergo a new course in plot direction. Sure enough, somebody comes to the circus wanting to speak to her. Whether for good or bad, it’s definitely the upcoming plot change. 

Bessie’s appearances have grown more intermittent since the Misty merger, but she appears this week. Stackers has the pupils making calendars for a sale of work, but soon finds out Bessie is about as good at making calendars as she is at classwork. 

Tammy’s August issues always had a focus on getting us primed for summer and holidays. Sure enough, her first August issue for 1981 has a summer quiz. The Strange Story from the Mists has a holiday theme, with the Carstairs family on holiday in Malaysia. Unfortunately, daughter Geraldine is spoiling things with her rudeness towards anything or anyone she does not consider attractive. She even throws a stone at a tortoise, calling it “such an ugly-looking brute”. Geraldine’s parents don’t look like they are doing much to crack down on her conduct, but punishment comes, of course. Geraldine is cursed to see nothing but the face of a mysterious old lady she didn’t find attractive. The curse lifts by the time Geraldine returns home, but it would surely have been otherwise if the story had appeared in the original Misty. August is also time for shopping. Wee Sue goes Christmas shopping in August while she has the money, but eventually she uses her Christmas shopping to help some hard-up kids who want to celebrate a birthday, and they hold an August Christmas birthday party. Now, that’s the Christmas spirit! And Tammy is offering holiday coupons.

The new story, “No Love for Lindy”, looks like it could be following similar lines to Sandy Rawlings; perhaps it is the same writer. As with Sandy, the protagonist (Lindy Allen) tells her own story and there’s a boyfriend figure. He’s the only thing making staying at the Westons (who turned out to be no better than the countless failed foster families Lindy’s had already) worthwhile. 

“Linda’s Fox”, written and drawn by Ron Tiner, finishes this week. It sounds like writing a girls’ story was a new experience for Tiner, but he did very well on it, and it must have been a popular story. It was one of my favourites, anyway. The ending is well crafted and thought out in how it handles the clearing of Linda’s father, what happens once he’s out, and keeping Linda’s friendship with Ross the fox intertwined. Tiner ought to be proud of it. Its replacement next week is a repeat of a popular 1976 Giorgio Giorgetti story, “Tag Along Tania”.

Speaking of Giorgetti, his current story, “The Breaking of Faith”, is now on its penultimate episode. Faith discovers the truth about her friend Claire after (finally) checking things out at the home Claire was staying at. Now she has to decide what to do. Her decision will certainly involve what to do about Claire running away, terrified of her finding out the truth.

“Stella Stirrer” saves her friend Katie from drowning in the school swimming pool although she can’t swim. Later, she’s back to stirring things up for snobby Harriet when she discovers Harriet has stolen the credit for the rescue!

Tammy and Misty 6 June 1981

Cover artist: Juliana Buch

Sandy – A Girl Like You (artist Juliana Buch)

Olympia Jones (artist Eduardo Feito, writer Anne Digby)

Bella (artist John Armstrong, writer Primrose Cumming)

Wee Sue (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)

Perfect Pets – feature

The Breaking of Faith (artist Giorgio Giorgetti) – first episode

Tune-In (feature)

Bride of the Devil (artist Hugo D’Adderio) – Strange Story from the Mists

Stella Stirrer (artist Tony Coleman)

Edie and Miss T (artist Joe Collins) – cartoon

Bessie Bunter (artist Arthur Martin)

Linda’s Fox (artist and writer Ron Tiner)

Now we come to 1981 in our Tammy June month round. The Cover Girls have disappeared and we are in the era of the splash panel story covers. Most often, Bella had the spot on this cover, but Sandy has it at the moment. When the cover changed, a new look Tammy logo was introduced (above).

The Misty logo has shrunk on the cover, a clear sign the Misty merger was on its way out in Tammy. Misty was still co-presenter of Strange Stories from the Mists, and this week she tells the legend of Evelyn Carew of Potter Heigham (below), rendered with gorgeous Hugo D’Adderio artwork. The same legend was profiled in the original Misty, on her page of British folklore and legends. Many readers sent in contributions for prize money. 

The team-up of Miss T and Edie was the most durable of the Misty merger. The pair became a trio when Snoopa came over from Jinty to form “The Crayzees”, and it lasted until Princess II merged with Tammy in 1984.

Adding extra delight to Tammy is the “Tune-In” feature, which gives us funny and informative stories and gossip about TV and pop stars. 

Bessie Bunter was relegated from regular appearances to fill-in ones when Misty joined, but this week she does make an appearance. Molly is on break, which gives more room for serials. Hugh Thornton-Jones is doing Wee Sue this week, the strip where his artwork appeared the most often in Tammy. Olympia Jones, the smash-hit story from 1976, is back by popular demand and enjoying an equally popular repeat. “Linda’s Fox” is one of the girls’ serials we know to be both written and drawn by the same person. In this case it is Ron Tiner. This was the only serial Tiner drew for Tammy, along with a couple of Strange Stories.  

Sandy, another popular Tammy character, is on her second story in Tammy (a third followed in 1982). In her original story, Sandy was the first Tammy story about boyfriends and dating, which was a novel thing for Tammy to do at the time. The days when boyfriend serials were commonplace in girls’ serials were still many years ahead, up at DCT. Sandy’s second story still features boyfriends, but it is not a story arc like the original. It is a series of scrapes and troubles of one sort or other. Some of them are new problems, but others stem from Sandy’s still-persisting problems from her first story, particularly her interfering father, and not having found a suitable boyfriend since she lost the one from her first story.  

In her latest story, Bella has run away from the cruel Barlows and fallen in with a circus. She finds circus is not for her, nor is it the best way to keep up her gymnastics. However, she’s stuck with it for the time being, as the circus badly needs her while it is under threat from an enemy. 

Giorgio Giorgetti’s new story is “The Breaking of Faith”. He had been a regular Tammy artist for several years, but he passed over later in 1981, so this was his final year in Tammy. His last Tammy story was “Jump, Jump, Julia”.

“Stella Stirrer” is a revenge on the bullies story, where a new kitchen maid at a posh boarding school uses the kitchen to hit back at the snobs who pick on her. But in revenge stories, things have a nasty habit of getting out of hand. So far this has not happened, but the story is still in its early episodes. The later episodes will tell.

“Bride of the Devil”, Tammy 6 June 1981. Art by Hugo D’Adderio.

“Bride of the Devil”, Tammy 6 June 1981. Art by Hugo D’Adderio.

“Bride of the Devil”, Tammy 6 June 1981. Art by Hugo D’Adderio.

Tammy & Misty 13 June 1981

• Sandy – A Girl Like You (artist Juliana Buch)
• Olympia Jones (artist Eduardo Feito, writer Anne Digby)
• Bella (artist John Armstrong)
• Wee Sue (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Tune-In (feature)
• The Breaking of Faith (artist Giorgio Giorgetti)
• Water under the Bridge – Strange Story from the Mists (artist John Richardson)
• Stella Stirrer (artist Tony Coleman)
• Edie and Miss T – cartoon (artist Joe Collins)
• Linda’s Fox (artist and writer Ron Tiner)

For 1981 in Tammy round robin we profile 13 June 1981.

The Misty logo still appears on the cover, albeit reduced in size, and Strange Stories from the Mist are still going. In this week’s tale Misty herself hosts the tale and even appears in the tale. Fiona encounters a bridge that is haunted by the spectre of an evil tyrant. In life he enjoyed murdering peasants and throwing their bodies in the river. In death he lures live people to their deaths in the river, but when he tries it on Fiona he is outwitted when she gets rescued. The villagers downplay her experience, but there are definite signs they more about it than they let on.

A full-page splash panel of a serial now leads off the covers. Usually it is Bella, but right now it is the second Sandy Rawlings story, “Sandy – a Girl Like You”. Sandy is always having boyfriend and boyfriend-related problems. This week it is lovesick fools who develop crushes and the problems these can cause. Sandy has a lovesick boy, Timmy Harris, hanging around her like a shadow, and it’s causing a nuisance and embarrassment for Sandy. He is too young for her and classmates are sniggering, but how to get him off her back? He’s like a limpet on it. Meanwhile, classmate Jane develops a crush on the new maths teacher, which is also causing problems.

Although Bella is not on the cover, she is running in the issue. In fact, her story started with her running away from Jed and Gert’s abuse. In so doing she has ended up joining a circus. Bella soon decides circus life isn’t for her, but can’t leave them because rogue Uncle Nick is trying to ruin them with nasty tricks so he can add them to his fairground. This week he poisons the performing poodles.

This week’s episode of Olympia Jones takes a pivotal turn for her. During an emergency she accidentally discovers her horse Prince is a brilliant show jumper. All of a sudden, her dreams of an equestrian Olympic gold, which seemed to die with her parents, are reviving. The training begins, and Prince is doing so well that trainer Miss Carson (“Carsie”) decides his debut will be the County Open. Ye-ikes! Olympia has never entered a swish horse event like that and the competition will be far stiffer and grander than the gymkhanas she entered before. Will she and Prince be up for it?

In Wee Sue, the headmistress wants the pupils to have more nature studies, so Miss Bigger takes the class out for a lesson on apiarism – “the study of bees” she tells smartass Sue, not “the art of monkey impersonation”. Boy, the old tartar really is letting Sue get away with such cheek this week. Unfortunately for Miss Bigger, her lesson ends up with her diving into the duckpond to escape the swarm she found in the hive. As a result, she gets a nasty cold and can’t stand any mention of bees. So don’t tell her Sue got in the local newspaper for finding rare bee orchid.

“Linda’s Fox” is the third example we have found on this site where the artist wrote the story they illustrated. Linda Barnes takes solace in a litter of foxes next door, especially one cub she names Ross, after her policeman father is wrongly imprisoned at the hands of “Splinter” Mallory. In this episode both Ross and Linda get hard knocks – literally – and haven’t got their protectors to help them. Ross is venturing into the outside world and discovering some of the dangers, and at the same time loses his mother. Meanwhile, Splinter’s bully son and his gang attack Linda. Linda’s policeman father is not around to deal with it, and they don’t deal with it themselves by reporting it because Linda is scared it will make things worse.

Faith Adams values her new friend Claire Ellerman as she doesn’t make friends easily. However, her classmates keep telling her Claire is no good: she comes from the local home for problem children. Claire’s explanation for this seems reasonable enough and Faith accepts it – but is it true? Is she really the daughter of rich parents living abroad who’s only staying at the home because the matron is her cousin? And now a classmate has planted another seed of doubt about Claire in Faith’s mind: did she steal the fancy paintbox she brought to art class?

Stella “Stirrer” Smith has taken a kitchen job at a posh school but is the constant target of bullying at the hands of snooty girls. She is finding the kitchen the perfect way to hit back at them. So far her tricks have gone smoothly and she’s gotten away with them. But this week she runs into trouble with her first cliffhanger. She is trying to get revenge at the school hockey match but gets cornered under the table. Will she be caught or find a way to stay hidden?

Tammy & Misty 25 July 1981

• Sandy – a Girl Like You (artist Juliana Buch) – final episode
• A Royal Bonanza! – competition
• Bella (artist John Armstrong)
• Edie and Miss T (artist Joe Collins)
• The Breaking of Faith (artist Giorgio Giorgetti)
• Whimsical Weddings (cartoons)
• The Spirit from the Sea – Strange Story (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Linda’s Fox (artist and writer Ron Tiner)
• What about a Wedding? (writer Maureen Spurgeon)
• Wee Sue (artist Robert MacGillivray)
• Olympia Jones (artist Eduardo Feito, writer Anne Digby) – final episode
• Stella Stirrer (artist Tony Coleman)

We have already profiled the Jinty Royal Wedding issue for 1981. This time we look at how the Tammy issue for that week did the same.

Tammy did not have quite as much Royal Wedding content as Jinty. We have a competition to celebrate, with Royal Wedding souvenirs among the prizes. There are “Whimsical Wedding” cartoons, a quiz that tests your wedding know-how, and an Edie and Miss T cartoon where Miss T decides to gate-crash the Royal Wedding (below). But Tammy could have done more by having a Strange Story with a wedding theme and a Royal Wedding story in Wee Sue as Jinty did with Gypsy Rose and Tansy. Instead, they are regular stories. The Strange Story is about a fishing community that worships a spirit from the sea. A girl seeks the spirit’s help for her brother’s chest infection – by offering his cough medicine to the spirit as a gift! Will this odd offering to the sea spirit actually help her sick brother? Wee Sue gets entangled with Miss Bigger’s bird-watching efforts and ends up taking a photo of an extremely rare bird perched on Miss Bigger’s hair bun while she’s fast asleep, and in a most unbecoming position. Now that’s hilarious for us, and embarrassing for Miss Bigger!

The pages I used to read over and over in this issue were of the final episode of Olympia Jones. The Rotts’ frame-up of Olympia for animal cruelty and horse theft seems all sewn up, but it unravels at the last minute. This is because Linda Rott, the real animal abuser, succumbed to temptation to do it again – but she did not know Olympia’s friend Amanda was secretly taking photos of her doing so. The explosive panels where Linda finds this out, flies into a tantrum and gets restrained by policemen (ha, ha!) when the photographs are presented to the court are the ones I read the most on these pages. Pity the final episode didn’t dedicate more panels to the Olympics where Olympia wins her gold or telling us what happens to the scheming Rotts in the end. An extra page or episode would have helped.

On the letters page, Tammy uses the final episode of Olympia as a lead-in to promote Anne Digby’s newly published circus horse story, The Quicksilver Horse. When the Olympia Jones reprint began, the Tammy team said on the letters page that they hoped readers would like it and don’t forget to vote for it in the favourite story coupon if they did. Tammy bookends this with: “We’re glad that so many of you have enjoyed the serial Olympia Jones again, and you can read the final part later in this issue.”

Another frameup is beginning to unravel in the penultimate episode of “Linda’s Fox”. Linda finds Splinter Mallory trapped under the collapsed house next door and takes advantage of his  situation to make him agree to confess that his testimony against Linda’s father was perjured. Meanwhile, the collapsed house catastrophe has Linda’s beloved fox going on the run and taking refuge in a truck. Where will it take him?

It is also the final episode of “Sandy – A Girl Like You”. A holiday romance for Sandy’s friend Kim turns nasty when Sandy finds out the boy is not only a two-timer but also a cad who is pulling the “poor boy” routine to cadge money out of Kim, which he spends on his other girl. After a bid to convince Kim of what’s going on fails, Sandy hatches a plan to catch the rotten swine out in front of both girls, which succeeds. On the way home, Sandy’s train passes by her first boyfriend, Steve, and she calls out to him. But her voice is lost in the wind…

Bella enters her first gymnastics competition in a while, but she isn’t doing too well. So she draws on the tricks she has learned at the circus she is staying at to soup up her beam routine. The applause is thunderous. However, there are already warning signs it was not a wise move where the judges are concerned. Bella’s unpleasant rival calls it “just a vulgar bit of showing-off”, and we may have to give grudging agreement. We shall see when Bella’s marks come up next week, but Bella may be about to learn the hard way that circus tricks should be confined to the circus.

In “The Breaking of Faith”, Faith Adams does not make friends easily, so she depends a lot on the friendship she has struck with Claire Ellerman. The trouble is, there are constant doubts as to whether what Claire tells Faith about herself is the truth because she is staying at a home for problem children. For this reason Faith’s classmates keep telling her Claire is a bad lot and taking her for a ride. Faith doesn’t really know what to think and keeps oscillating between doubt and loyalty to Claire. However, this time it looks like Claire has finally been exposed as one big fibber.

Stella Smith uses the kitchen at the boarding school she works in to constantly strike back at the snob who is always picking on her. This week, Stella uses the kitchen to do something nice for a change – but it unwittingly leads to even more trouble and puts her friend’s life in danger.