Tammy 19 February 1983

Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)

E.T. Estate (artist Guy Peeters, writer Jake Adams)

Bella (artist John Armstrong, writer Primrose Cumming)

The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Alison Christie)

Into the Fourth at Trebizon (artist Diane Gabbot(t), writer Anne Digby) – text adaptation

Just Like a Child… – complete story, repeated from Strange Stories

Heart to Heart Hints (Mari L’Anson) – Valentine feature

The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins) 

Happy Valentine’s Day (writer Maureen Spurgeon) – quiz 

Nanny Young (artist Phil Gascoine, writer Maureen Spurgeon)

Cuckoo in the Nest (artist Tony Coleman, writer Ian Mennell)

Goodies – Valentine’s Day cookery feature

For Valentine’s Day, here is the Valentine issue from Tammy 1983, an issue that is now 40 years old this year. Happy 40th!

Inside, we have plenty of Valentine features, including a Valentine’s Day story from “The Crazyees”. You would think The Button Box would have joined Valentine’s Day with a love story from the button box, but instead it’s a button story about Elizabeth II’s coronation.

Setting the Valentine theme off is a most beautiful Valentine’s Day cover, one of my favourites, with Tammy’s resident features: Bella, Pam of Pond Hill and The Button Box. It also features what must be the most extraordinary story ever in girls’ comics: “Cuckoo in the Nest”. There are loads of Cinderella stories, slave stories, animal stories, sports stories and SF stories, but you surely won’t find another serial like this in girls’ comics. Love it or hate it, you can never forget it. Why? It has a boy, Leslie Dodds, as the main protagonist, no less. Also, he is masquerading as a girl at a boarding school, would you believe? The reason for it is bit complicated to explain here, but maybe there’ll be an entry on this one at some point. So we have a boy who has to learn hard and fast about the girls’ world to keep up his masquerade, and the girl readership gets a taste of the boys’ world into the bargain. No doubt the closet male readership enjoyed this story too, along with the footy that’s in it. The story is now on its penultimate episode, which ends on the note that the game is now well and truly up for Leslie, and there’s no place to hide.

Still on the subject of masquerades, aliens are taking over “E.T. Estate” (and then Earth, of course) by switching all the people with themselves as doubles. They try to do this with Jenny Holmes, the only girl who knows what they’re up to. However, this time a weakness comes into play, which causes it to fail. But then Jenny discovers her parents have been switched. How? These aliens may be able to duplicate the human beings they replace, but boy, are they lousy actors! Their impostures would make the “Cuckoo in the Nest” look professional by comparison. Another weakness exposed. 

Bella’s current job is gymnastics instructor. There’s nothing new about that, but this time she’s doing it in an Islamic country where teaching oppressed Muslim girls gymnastics gets her caught right up in a modernism versus fundamentalism clash, with an usurper taking advantage to overthrow the Shah Bella works for. Shades of Iran! Right now, Bella’s retelling her pupils the story of how she taught gymnastics in Australia. However, the flashback doesn’t quite square with the original 1978 print. Either there’s something wrong with Bella’s memory or there’s some cavalier editing here. 

In Pam of Pond Hill, Tess Bradshaw has gone crazy over synchro swimming. However, an unfair ban (now lifted) on Pond Hill pupils using the public swimming baths at any time and now a clash of instructors have been causing problems. But that is nothing compared with Tess’s biggest problem: her nonstop yakking and bragging about synchro, which constantly annoys everyone if it doesn’t put them off her.

“Just Like a Child…” (reprinted from Strange Stories, with text boxes replacing the Storyteller) is a cautionary tale not to be too quick to dispose of your old childhood treasures, just because you think you’re past them. You never know, as Andrea Owen finds out when she is a little too zealous to switch from toys to teen stuff, only to find that one toy won’t be got rid of that easily. 

In Nanny Young, there’s a fake ghost called Sir Roger when the residents of rundown Manor Towers play ‘ghost’ to get publicity to save the manor (which backfires). It might be coincidence, but could this be a reference to Sir Roger from “Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost”? 

Tammy 17 September 1983

Namby Pamby (artist Eduardo Feito, writer Ian Mennell)

Bella (artist John Armstrong, writer Primrose Cumming)

Donkey’s Years (artist John Richardson, writer Ian Mennell) – Pony Tale

Take Your Place! (artist Joe Collins, writer Maureen Spurgeon) – Quiz 

Annie’s Cuttings (artist Phil Townsend, writer Jake Adams)

The Crazyees (artist Joe Collins)

Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)

Room for Rosie (artist Santiago Hernandez, writer Alison Christie)

Lonely Ballerina (artist Maria Barrera, writer Jay Over)

Back in Form! (Mari L’Anson) – Feature

We continue our September theme with this “back to school” issue from Tammy. Tammy steps in to cheer up Tammy readers who are trudging back to school after the summer holidays, and brings them a school quiz and (yay!) the return of Pam of Pond Hill.

A new pupil, Megan Morris, joins Pam’s class. Traditionally, new pupils in Pam’s class lead to trouble for her until the resolution of the plot thread. So far this doesn’t seem to be the case with Megan, who helps out when Pam’s gran takes a fall downstairs. However, the accident clinches Pam’s parents’ decision to move to the countryside, which leaves Pam shocked at the thought of being uprooted and leaving Pond Hill.

In “Namby Pamby”, Pam Beeton’s upbringing has been so over-protective that she is dubbed “namby pamby” at school. She is resorting to the old trick of going behind her mother’s back to get some freedom, which has gotten her in trouble. There’s trouble again when the class sneak off to a fair and Pam unwittingly lets it slip to a prefect. Now Pam’s class are out for her blood for sneaking. In the last panel we can see Pam has reached breaking point. Next week’s blurb says Pam’s going to run away (wow, her over-protective mum will probably have a heart attack at that!), which means only one thing: the end of the story is close.

“Lonely Ballerina” has discovered that the woman running the shambolic ballet school is not the ballet teacher but her sister. The teacher has been missing for months and the layabout pupils don’t care; they just take advantage to enjoy themselves. The lonely ballerina is the first to ask serious questions about what’s going on.

“The Button Box” is absent this week, but we get an emotional complete story, “Annie’s Cuttings”, about a ragged old woman named Annie Holmes living in a rundown house. She does nothing but collect old newspapers and has nobody in the world to love her except her cat Moonlight. Next door, Mum is rather intolerant of Annie, but her daughter Tina is more sympathetic and finds a way to help Annie once she discovers her problem: poor Annie was jilted at the altar and the trauma turned her into what she is. 

Bella enters a talent contest to raise funds for her gymnastics club. At her friend Jenny’s suggestion, they pair up to make it a burlesque gymnastics performance. The audience loves it, but is it enough to win? They didn’t bring a single supporter with them.

In the Pony Tale “Donkey’s Years”, Felicity Hewitson thinks the donkey man is mistreating his donkey Ned and steps in. However, it turns out she misconstrued what she saw. The man was being grouchy with Ned but not intentionally cruel, and he really does care for Ned. Incidentally, why is the story labelled a Pony Tale when a donkey is not a pony?

Pauline Wheeler gets an offer for Rosie. But instead of it falling through as usual, she actually turns it down once she realises the potential buyer wants Rosie as part of his antique collection when gran always used her as a workhorse. Rosie has to go to a home where she will make herself useful.

Tammy 8 October 1983

• Lucky by Name… (artist Juliana Buch, writer Malcolm Shaw) – first episode
• The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Alison Christie)
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• Run, Rabbit, Run! (artist Edmond Ripoll, writer Roy Preston)
• Glenda’s Glossy Pages (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Pat Mills) – first episode
• Bella (artist John Armstrong, writer Primrose Cumming)
• Room for Rosie (artist Santiago Hernandez, writer Alison Christie)
• Lonely Ballerina (artist Maria Barrera, writer Jay Over)
• The Crayzees (artist and writer Joe Collins)

Two stories start this issue: “Lucky by Name” (the second Tammy horse story with that title) and a repeat of “Glenda’s Glossy Pages” from 1975, with no announcement that it is a repeat. This is rather strange. When Tammy brings a story back by popular demand she says it was brought back by popular demand, but there’s nothing. So was it popular demand that brought Glenda back, or did they just bring it back as a filler or something?

In the former, a foal is born into a wild pony forest reserve. But there seems to be something strange about it, both in its appearance and in the way weird things seem to happen in its presence. In the latter, nice things are beyond Glenda Slade because of her mother’s low income. Then things begin to change when she receives a mail order catalogue. But maybe Glenda should remember the old saying: if it’s too good to be true, it usually is…

The Button Box story (below) is one of my favourites: the barrel button story. Bev tells the story as a lesson not to discount old barrels. Personally, though, I read the moral of the story as knowing a few basics about self defence and how to free yourself from bonds (check out the Internet) in the event of a home invasion/robbery.

(click thru)

In Pam of Pond Hill, Dad’s business is in trouble. A new supermarket is stealing his customers by undercutting his fruit & veg prices. Counter-measures to win back customers get outmanoeuvred every time and Pam suspects a leak. Tracy keeps insisting the spy is Pam’s new friend Meg, but Pam doesn’t believe it. Then, at the very end of the episode, Meg acts very strangely – she can’t get inside fast enough when Pam discovers where she lives. Hmm, does Meg have something to hide?

In the complete story, “Run, Rabbit, Run!”, Rae Betts is dubbed “rabbit” and gets bullied at school. The ringleader isn’t all that nice to her own rabbit either. Matters come to a head when the terrified rabbit runs away – right into a burning field. Strangely, a Misty story had the same title and a similar theme. The Tammy version was was written by Roy Preston, who was credited with writing plenty of spooky stories for Tammy. Did Preston write the Misty version too?

Bella has taken over as club coach because the two quarrelsome coaches have quit. They realise their mistake and come back, as it is the eve of a serious competition, but Bella is put out when the girls say no thanks because they’ve had enough of their arguing. Next week is the final episode, so we will see how this resolves.

In “Lonely Ballerina”, the ballet school has gone to pot because the principal, Mary Devine, has been missing for months. At last she is found – in the attic. Tanya Lane, who thought Mary’s sister Betty was holding her prisoner, is surprised to find Betty crying over her instead. All the same, Betty has some serious explaining to do.

Rosie’s in the school panto, serving as Sleeping Beauty’s cot. She becomes a panto star and takes curtain calls with the rest of the cast. Sadly, no home comes out of it for her.

In “The Crazyees”, the cat’s pining because Snoopa hasn’t appeared for ages. Miss T and Edie investigate and discover the lovesick cat is driving Snoopa to distraction, so he’s hiding from her. Miss T’s solution: make Snoopa human size.

 

 

Tammy 21 January 1984

Cover artist: John Armstrong

• Foul Play (artist John Armstrong, writer Ian Mennell)
• Julie’s Jinx (artist Julian Vivas, writer Nick Allen)
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins)
• First Term at Trebizon (artist Phil Gascoine, writer Anne Digby)
• The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Alison Christie, sub-writer Linda Stephenson)
• Fashion Flashback – feature (Ray Mutimer)
• My Terrible Twin (artist Juliana Buch)
• Fun Time – feature
• Swansea Jack (artist Douglas Perry, writer Linda Stephenson)
• Queen Rider (artist Eduardo Feito, writer A. D. Langholm aka Alan Davidson)
• Warm as Toast! Feature (Mari L’Anson)

The issue for 21 January 1984 has been chosen for 1984 in the conclusion to Tammy round robin.

Foul Play is unusual for being a non-Bella story drawn by John Armstrong. Katie Johnson received a serious hand injury during a hockey match. Her friends and family are convinced one of her own team mates deliberately caused it because they had always resented her. Katie doesn’t believe a word of it, but now someone is doing nasty things against the team. This week one gets her room vandalised and another gets her heart broken over a hoax call that her father was going to visit. Katie takes on the job of unravelling the mystery, and it must begin with the heartbreaking task of investigating her own friends and family as suspects.

My Terrible Twin is being reprinted by popular demand. The episode this week has already been discussed here, so we will move on.

In Pam of Pond Hill, a flu strain is causing chaos in town. It only seems to target the adults, which is giving the kids a bit of a free rein at home and school. But it’s not all fun for Pam. Cherry Laurence, the big-headed bully bossyboots who was unwisely appointed as a prefect, has now been put in charge of her form!

Tammy had always been running TV and book adaptations but now she is running two at once: The First Term at Trebizon and Queen Rider. Both the authors are former writers for IPC girls’ titles.

This week’s Button Box tale is a rags-to-riches story that centres on the Mexican art of dressing fleas. Swansea Jack, probably the last story Douglas Perry drew for Tammy, gives us the story of Swansea Jack, the dog who gave his name to a tavern by saving the lives of children at the docks of Swansea.

Julie Lee (who keeps her Romany background secret) gives her friend Gloria a Romany charm, but her horse has been acting strangely ever since. A nasty girl is spreading a rumour it is a bad luck charm. Julie is trying to find a way to deal with the problem quietly while not knowing what to make of it herself. Is the gift really “Julie’s Jinx”?

Tammy & Jinty 27 March 1982

• Bella (artist John Armstrong)
• Danger Dog (artist Julio Bosch)
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins)
• Dance of Death – the Strange Story (artist Hugo D’Adderio)
• Little Sisters (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Nanny Young (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Bessie Bunter – Old Friends
• The Human Zoo (artist Guy Peeters, writer Malcolm Shaw)
• Sandy – A Fresh Start… (artist Juliana Buch)

 

Bella is in the finals for the Superkid Contest, and will receive advanced coaching if she wins. But she has problems with the press sniffing around her and then being asked to sign a form endorsing Superkid products. The trouble is, she has never used them and can’t in honesty sign the form.

This issue has one of my favourite Pond Hill episodes: the episode that concludes the St Dorrit’s storyline, and it appears below. Pam’s form has been temporarily housed at St Dorrit’s, a super-snob school, when Pond Hill’s foundations collapse. But from beginning to end, the snob school has made the Pond Hill pupils unwelcome and their lives a misery. In the conclusion, Pond Hill reopens and Pam & Co get their long-awaited revenge on St Dorrit’s. Mind you, I still can’t figure out how the snobs fell for the trick Fred and Terry pulled on them. Maybe the snobs can’t either.

(Click thru)

 

When Misty merged with Tammy, Strange Stories changed to “Strange Stories from the Mists” with the Storyteller alternating with Misty in narrating them. After the Jinty merger it went back to Strange Stories, with the Storyteller alternating with Gypsy Rose. It was a total delight to see that the Gypsy Rose stories during this run were 100% new material; no tired reprints from Jinty or recycled Strange Stories. This one, “Dance of Death” (or should that be “Dance with Death”?) is so creepy and atmospheric that I can’t help wondering if it was originally scripted for Misty. Anyway, the story is worth reproducing here for the Hugo D’Adderio artwork.

(Click thru)

 

It is part two of “The Human Zoo” reprint, brought about by popular demand. Presumably this included “Pam’s Poll” way back in 1980. Shona and Jenny Lewis, plus other captured people, find out what it is like to be Mary Celeste when they fall into the clutches of the aliens who are hinted to be responsible for Mary Celeste. The aliens think humans are just animals – and they treat animals like animals too. They take them away from Earth to the cattle market on their home planet. For Shona and Jenny it is extra anguish as they get sold to different owners, and are forcibly separated. Now it’s not just survival and escape but also finding each other again.

In Nanny Young, Nanny is not deemed suitable for turning Cockney girl Charity Ogden into a refined young lady. Though Nanny still has her job, the task of refining Charity has been given to a Miss Hooper, who is a real bully. But that’s only the start; Charity overhears a conversation that warns her Miss Hooper is some sort of criminal, but she can’t even convince Nanny of this.

In “Little Sisters”, gran complains that she’s hard up. Inspired by the loss of her own tooth, dear little Samantha comes up with an idea that might help: give gran’s false teeth to the Tooth Fairy in exchange for money. The trouble is, she does not advise anyone first, and gran’s in a flap when her teeth go missing. But that’s nothing on big sister Carol, who is assigned the role of Tooth Fairy to Samantha. She gets the false teeth on her arm and screams the house down!

Bessie Bunter is not keen on a cross country run until she hears that there is a feast waiting at the other end. All of a sudden she’s off at breakneck speed. Of course there are difficulties along the way, including Bessie getting stuck in an oak tree and mist arising, but she ends up saving a driver from a nasty accident. This makes the feast even more of a reward for her.

Crunch time for Beth, who is trying to keep her dog Sammy hidden from the authorities, who suspect he is contaminated from a laboratory experiment. Beth didn’t believe it, but now she finally realises it is true: Sammy causes all sorts of weird effects in humans who get too close to him for too long. He is a danger dog after all.

In the Sandy Rawlings stories, Dad has a long history of causing complications for Sandy by shoving her towards boys he thinks are suitable for her instead of giving her freedom to try things out for herself. To make things worse, his choice of ‘suitable’ boyfriends are directed by his snobbishness and business contacts, not compatibility or what Sandy wants. In this episode, it leads to such a horrible tangle of complications (no going into details) that Sandy is not only in deep trouble with Dad but with the whole school as well. Sandy, who has only just got out of being the school outcast (also because of Dad), is now the school outcast again.

Tammy 5 November 1983

• Lucky By Name… (artist Juliana Buch, writer Malcolm Shaw)
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• Glenda’s Glossy Pages (artist Tony Highmore, writer Pat Mills)
• Room for Rosie (artist Santiago Hernandez, writer Alison Christie)
• Remember November… (artist Len Flux, writer Maureen Spurgeon)
• The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Alison Christie, sub-writer Ian Mennell)
• The Dawn Horse – a Pony Tale (artist Hugo D’Adderio, writer Chris Harris)
• Spell of Fog (artist Tony Coleman, writer Jake Adams)
• The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins)

This was the last Guy Fawkes issue Tammy ever published, and it is bang on 5 November. Tammy dropped Bessie and Wee Sue in 1982, so they are no longer able to provide any special stories for Guy Fawkes. We have a Guy Fawkes feature, “Remember November…” and in “The Crayzees” we learn Miss T does not like fireworks because they are so noisy. So what is in that mystery parcel she has ordered for 5 November? Joe Collins was always one for incorporating the Fireworks Code into his Tammy cartoons and this one is no exception. It is written all around the border of the full-page cartoon. We also have a recipe for a Bonfire cake in “Tammy’s Tasties”.

Room for Rosie had her Guy Fawkes story in the Halloween issue, but there is some carryover this week. Rosie has taken damage from the bonfire party, so her chances of a home have been reduced. Can Pauline find a way to restore her?

A new Pam of Pond Hill starts. It would have been nice if Jay Over had written a Pam of Pond Hill Guy Fawkes story, which is something Pam never had. Instead, Pam and her friends find themselves being roped into a cookery contest by Jenny Bates, who is using the excursion to see her favourite pop group, the Phonees. Moreover, Jenny has chosen them more for their good nature than their talent for cooking. They decide to go along with it because they are under the impression Jenny’s days are numbered and it’s her dying wish. Actually, it looks suspiciously like Jenny’s playing on their sympathy. Anyway, Jenny’s reason for entering them all in the contest is selfish and not giving any thought to winning for the school – which they don’t have much chance of.

In “Lucky By Name” everyone is now thinking Lucky the foal has some strange power over animals. Snobby Amanda and her father demand the foal be examined by a research institute but Lucky’s owners refuse because the institute has an unsavoury reputation for animal experimentation. Now someone is stealing Lucky, and we strongly suspect Amanda and her father are behind it. Lucky, if you really do have a power over animals, now might be a good time to use it…

This week’s episode of “Glenda’s Glossy Pages” was drawn by Tony Highmore instead of Mario Capaldi. Capaldi must have been unavailable for some reason, but he returns in the next episode. In the story, the power of the glossy pages drives off the police who think Glenda stole the items she mysteriously got from the catalogue, but they warn she hasn’t heard the last of them. Next, it looks like the catalogue is helping Glenda by giving her the confidence to swim against her arch-enemy Hillary. But when Hillary suddenly develops cramp, Glenda finds herself just swimming off instead of helping. What the hell has come over her? Well, it’s not hard to guess, especially as Glenda is at a loss to explain it herself but just can’t help it. We rather suspect the same thing is behind Hillary’s cramp too.

The Button Box gives us more Jackson family history this week. This time it’s a World War II story on how gran’s sister met her husband – all through one of the buttons in the box, of course.

This week’s pony tale is a sad one and based on fact. It discusses the last of the Tarpan horse breed in the Ukraine. Sonja and her father travel to the Ukraine in search of the Tarpan breed – only to find the Tarpans are on the brink of extinction and two parent Tarpans being shot by farmers pushes them over the edge.

In “Spell of Fog” Sally is convinced the mysterious rising mist is Alice Compton’s angry response to the sensationalised, historically inaccurate filming of her persecution for witchcraft. But the filming continues, so the mist intensifies. It’s got everyone scared and has even shattered a window.

Beforehand, we are introduced to Alice’s sad-looking self-portrait, the only one of her pictures to survive her burning at the stake. It seems her “extremely modern, natural style” was too far ahead of its time; people called it “the Devil’s likeness” and it sounds like this is one of the reasons why she was branded a witch. The self-portrait is clearly a plot thread to be followed up, but will it be in a way that tells us anything about the mist?

Tammy 29 October 1983

• Lucky by Name… (artist Juliana Buch, writer Malcolm Shaw)
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins)
• Glenda’s Glossy Pages (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Pat Mills)
• The Nightingale’s Song – complete story (artist Douglas Perry, writer Roy Preston)
• The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi, sub-writer Linda Stephenson)
• Spell of Fog – first episode (artist Tony Coleman, writer Jake Adams)
• Room for Rosie (artist Santiago Hernandez, writer Alison Christie)
• Lonely Ballerina – final episode (artist Maria Barrera, writer Jay Over)
• Make a Mask for Halloween! – feature (writer Chris Lloyd)

Halloween is coming up. So I am bringing out the last Halloween issue Tammy ever published. The cover is very nice, and the girls look like Trick-or-Treaters or organising their Halloween party. Inside, we have instructions for making a Halloween mask and the Crayzees go to a Halloween fancy dress ball. Miss T and Edie are rather chagrined when the human-sized Snoopa wins first prize for dressing up as Miss T!

In last week’s issue, Tammy had a blurb about a spooky story starting this issue in commemoration of Halloween. It is “Spell of Fog”. A film crew arrives at the village of Wolfen to make a film about Alice Compton, a girl who was burned at the stake for witchcraft and rumoured to haunt the spot where her ashes were scattered.  So when the film producer announces his plans to do a historically inaccurate, sensationalised film where Alice is truly evil and an agent of the Devil instead of one of the hapless victims of witch hunts, it really is asking for trouble. Sure enough, a mist is soon arising on the spot where Alice is said to haunt, and it’s clearly blowing in the opposite direction of the wind…

Surprisingly, “Room for Rosie” is celebrating Guy Fawkes one week early and passing over Halloween altogether. Pauline Wheeler is trying to honour her dying gran’s last request to find a good home for her beloved pram, “Rosie”, but so far no luck. Meantime, Rosie is being put to more of the 101 uses that she was so famous for with Gran. This week it’s carrying the Guy for the penny-for-the-routine. Rosie does not do much to sort out the problem of the week, which is where to have the bonfire after the kids lose their regular lot for it.

You’d think there would be a Halloween story in the Button Box. Instead, it’s a story to reassure you that a representative will always be on hand to sort out any problems you may have when you are on holiday abroad.

The complete story is about a promising singer, Suzy Nightingale, who loses her power of speech and singing from the shock of her mother’s death. She nurses her namesake back to health when it is injured, and notices that the nightingale has remained silent all the while, just like her. But all of a sudden the nightingale regains its power of song, which prompts Suzy to regain hers.

“Lonely Ballerina” reunites the creative team from ballet story Slave of the Clock. This was the last ballet story Tammy ever published (not counting “I’m Her – She’s Me!”, although it does have ballet in it). Tanya Lane arrives at Mary Devine’s ballet school, only to find it’s nothing but a mess, she’s the only serious pupil there, and there is a mystery to unravel. The reveal (not very credible and does not make the story one of Tammy’s best) is that Mary’s sister Betty has been struggling to keep the ballet school going after an accident rendered Mary catatonic. This was a foolish thing to do, as Betty knows nothing about ballet. Even more unwisely, she tried to conceal Mary’s condition instead of explaining the situation, getting help, and keeping the school closed until her sister recovered. Mary did not do so until the final episode. In the meantime, the school fell apart, efforts to hide the secret from the governors have now failed, the story is all over the newspapers, and the school faces closure. But of course, being a girls’ story, things end happily.

“Lucky by Name” is a foal named Lucky who seems to have powers over other animals. Unfortunately more and more people are beginning to notice. Now Lucky has made two rich and powerful enemies over it, and they look like they are threatening serious trouble.

Glenda gets a really freaky sign that her “glossy pages” have supernatural powers that could be dangerous. Mum lights a fire where Glenda hid her glossy pages and elsewhere, the bike she got from them catches fire! Yet there’s not a trace of damage on the bike or glossy pages. Then there’s even more trouble when the police come around and demand to know where Glenda got that nice stuff that is way beyond her means, and are not going to believe it came from those glossy pages. What can Glenda do? Or, more to the point, what are those glossy pages going to do?

The latest Pam of Pond Hill story ends this week. Dad has been facing down a supermarket rival whose cut-price fruit & veg have been threatening his greengrocer business. But just when that problem looks all sorted out, the supermarket gets vandalised and Pam is suspect because of the recent bad blood between the two businesses and an item, which was given to her, was found at the scene of the crime.

Tammy 2 April 1983

Cover artist: Santiago Hernandez

• The Secret of Angel Smith (artist Juliana Buch, writer Jay Over)
• It’s a Dog’s Life (artist Phil Townsend, writer Alison Christie)
• Bella (artist John Armstrong, writer Primrose Cumming)
• The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi, writer Alison Christie)
• Strawberry Delight! Competition
• Nanny Young (artist Phil Gascoine, writer Tom Newland)
• The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins)
• Thief by Night (artist Eduardo Feito) – complete story
• Easter Bonnets – feature
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• ET Estate (artist Guy Peeters, writer Jake Adams)

The cover of this Tammy Easter issue has always had me craving for a yummy Easter egg.

But anyway, Wee Sue, Bessie Bunter and even the Storyteller have been dropped by this stage, so how does the issue commemorate Easter? There is a feature on how to make an Easter bonnet, Easter jokes, and Easter hijinks with the Crayzees. Miss T tries a spell to enlarge Easter eggs and thinks she’s succeeded, but finds that what she has really done is shrink herself and Edie so the Easter eggs just look big to them. And when she tries to reverse a spell, she ends up turning herself and Edie into giants, so now the eggs look like mini eggs to them.

You’d think there would be an Easter tale somewhere in “The Button Box”. Instead, it’s shades of “Stefa’s Heart of Stone” with the tale of “ ‘Tough Nut’ Tara”. New girl Tara is a hard case who snubs all offers of friendship. But when it’s her birthday she gives in. She admits to Bev that, like Stefa, she reacted badly to grief and tried to harden her heart so she would not be hurt that way again, but now she realises her mistake. Thank goodness tough nut Tara was not as hard to crack as Stefa!

The complete story slot could have been used for an Easter story. Instead, it’s a reprint of a Strange Story. By this time Tammy was running reprints of Strange Stories, but the Storyteller has been replaced with text boxes.

In the serials, Abby Fox can’t help but be jealous of Angel Smith, the girl who wants to enter the family’s trapeze act while Abby is excluded because Dad does not want to lose her the way he lost her mother. Now Abby suspects “The Secret of Angel Smith”, whatever that is, and Stalky the clown could help her there. But Stalky has oddly clammed up and Abby thinks it’s because the circus boss has been at him over it.

In “It’s a Dog’s Life”, Rowan Small is bullied in the children’s home, and the bullying she gets shares some parallels with the ill-treatment Riley the dog gets next door. Both Riley and Rowan have been making progress in striking back at their abusers, but this week the bullies bring in reinforcements, which trebles the bullying for both of them. Rowan decides it’s time to run away – with Riley in tow, of course.

Bella is so badly out of training that she has to go through the basic tests to get back into gymnastics. It’s a bit of a come-down for an ex-champion like her, but at least she gets through. But Bella should have known better than to believe her devious Uncle Jed would have genuinely been hiring the private gym he found for her. And in the final panel it looks like she is about to find out the hard way…

Nanny Young is in charge of a baby this time, and there are suspicious signs that his older sister Barbara is jealous of him. Nanny tries to reach out to Barbara while looking for the solution, but so far it’s evasive.

The current Pam of Pond Hill story concludes this week. Fortune-seekers have been out to steal Goofy’s inheritance from his great-aunt, which they believe is hidden in the doll’s house that was bequeathed to him. They tear the doll’s house to pieces to find it and leave in haste when they turn up empty. It turns out they didn’t look hard enough.

In “ET Estate”, the alien invaders finally catch up with Jenny and Dora. They hold them prisoner while explaining the next stage of their plan – which will make all life (humans included) on Earth extinct, just to keep them fed!

 

Tammy 31 March 1984

• Dear Diary – I Hate You! (artist Maria Barrera) – final episode
• Cassie’s Coach (artist Tony Coleman, writer Alison Christie)
• Pearls of Wisdom (artist Hugo D’Adderio) – complete story
• The Crayzees (artist Joe Collins) – final episode
• Angela Angel-Face (artist Rodrigo Comos) – final episode
• On Your Feet! (feature)
• The Flying Horse (artist Hugo D’Adderio) – pony tale
• The Button Box (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• Pretty Trimmings (feature)

 

In the previous entry we profiled how the final issue of Princess prepared for the merger with Tammy on 7 April 1984. Now we profile how the Tammy issue for that week did the same.

The page advertising the merger is similar to Princess, except there are no characters or information telling us what to expect in the merger issue, apart from Rusty the Fox. Later in the issue we are informed “Stefa’s Heart of Stone” will be here next week. It replaces “Angela Angel-Face”, which is a repeat of the same Angela Angel-Face reprint that appeared in Jinty in late 1980. Angela is finished off with a two-part spread.

“Dear Diary – I Hate You!” is another story that has been cleared out quickly to make room for the merger. For the past few weeks it had been running on six-page spreads before the usual three for the final episode. In the story, Tammy takes one of her rare forays into the blackmail story. It is the type of blackmail serial where the protagonist is forced to be ‘nice’ to an odious, unpopular girl, which makes her unpopular with her classmates and her life a nightmare. This scenario appeared frequently at DCT, with stories like Judy’s “Be Nice to Nancy!” However, it was far less common at IPC for some reason, and this is one of the few examples I have seen of it at IPC. In this case the blackmailer is expelled without the blackmail itself coming out. That is a bit odd for this type of story, but it has to be this way because of the tricky situation that caused the blackmail.

Pam’s current story has been a two-part filler. It had the potential to be spun out for several more episodes, but instead was told in two episodes. A new girl is being made a prisoner by her parents in her own home. They go as far as to escort her to school and back and even try to have the headmaster Mr Gold keep her away from her classmates at break times. Hurrah for Mr Gold for telling them he has no right to do that. It turns out they were reacting too harshly and rigidly to a violation of trust and their daughter getting into serious trouble and bad company. They themselves eventually realise they went about it the wrong way, and there is a happy ending with help from Pam of Pond Hill.

Sadie-in-Waiting from Princess takes over as the Joe Collins cartoon next week, so this week is the final episode of “The Crayzees” (below). No goodbyes from them; it’s a regular episode.

This week’s Button Box story is a story about rights for left-handed people. Alison thinks she can’t sew because she is left handed. So the button story Bev spins is one about a left-handed 1920s girl who was brilliant at sewing, but her sewing suffered at school because her sewing teacher kept forcing her to sew right handed. The teacher was silenced in the end. Alison emerges not only with a whole new confidence for sewing but also reminded as to how lucky she is not to be living in the bad old days when schools forced left-handed kids to use their right hands.

“Cassie’s Coach” is the only Tammy serial that carries on into the merger. The reason Tom has gone missing is that he has gone to sweep chimneys, and Cassie and her sister are worried sick. Of course Tom’s employer, Mr Scrimmet, is a cruel (and ugly) one, and won’t tell them where he is. So it’s a search to find Tom as soon as possible. When they do track Tom down they have to come up with a cunning plan to rescue him, because Scrimmet is not letting him go.

Not surprisingly, there are complete stories, which act as fillers. Both of them are period stories drawn by Hugo D’Adderio. One, set in the 15^th century, is of a nobleman, Lord Belmont, being held to ransom in France while his brother Ambrose uses the ransom money (wrung out of the unfortunate peasants) to usurp Lord Belmont’s estate and keep himself in luxury. Ambrose even goes as far as to make Lord Belmont’s mother and daughter Meg servants in their own home. Once Meg finds out what Ambrose is really doing with the ransom money she devises a “desperate gamble” to get rid of him, which does come across as rather contrived and unbelievable, though of course it works.

The other D’Adderio story is a pony tale set in 1820, where Lucille Beringer works in her Uncle Marius’ hippodrome. Things go smoothly until Marius starts forcing Lucille and her horse Sultan into a stunt that is increasingly dangerous for the horses. Eventually Lucille decides to make a run for it with Sultan, but Marius is in hot pursuit and ready to horsewhip them into an even more dangerous stunt. This spurs them into the final effort they need to escape. Their panel on the cover is of the work they find in a more savoury horse show afterwards.

 

Crazyzee Christmas (1982)

Christmas is coming. So for some Christmas fun I am putting up “Crazyee Christmas” from Tammy 25 1982 to show how Miss T, Edie and Snoopa shared the Christmas spirit just over a year after they all came together in the Tammy and Jinty merger as “The Crayzees”.

Christmas with The Crayzees. From Tammy 25 December 1982.