Tammy 20 August 1977

Cover artist: John Richardson

Bella (artist John Armstrong)

Sharon’s Shadow (artist Hugo D’Adderio) – Strange Story serial – first episode

Melanie’s Mob (artist Edmond Ripoll)

Molly Mills – the final episode (artist Tony Thewenetti)

Bessie Bunter (artist Arthur Martin)

Maisie of Mo Town (artist Giorgio Giorgetti)

Shadow of the Fire God (artist Manuel Benet) – Strange Story

Edie the Ed’s Niece (artist Joe Collins)

Wee Sue (artist Mike White)

Daughter of the Regiment (artist Mario Capaldi)

Now we come to 1977 in our August Tammy month round. And there’s another reason to bring out this August issue – it is the issue with the final episode (below) of Molly Mills. Yes, the great Molly Mills debate has finally come to a head. On the letters page (below), ye Editor makes an open call for letters – with monetary incentives of course – on whether or not to bring her back. But really, this would have been a whole lot more fair and representative of readers’ wants if the final episode had ended with a definitive conclusion (Molly sailing off to India with the others). Indeed, if this really was to be Molly’s final bow, they should have done that. Instead, it’s a tantalising cliffhanger (Pickering’s infamous frame-up of Molly at the docks, which makes her a fugitive, on the run from the law). This would surely have skewed the response from readers in favour of Molly’s return, to see how she sorts out her predicament. Indeed, ye Editor later informs us that the response was overwhelmingly in favour of Molly’s return, and return she did, on 31 December 1977. Would the response have been the same if Molly had been given a proper send-off? Incidentally, seeing as Molly returned with a different artist (Douglas Perry), I suspect the clincher for this sudden end of Molly was not the Molly Mills debate – it was Tony Thewenetti no longer able to continue with Molly for some reason. 

Meanwhile, Bella is at a Russian gymnastics school on a scholarship, and it’s good to see she’s getting a lot out of it this time (last time she was at a Russian gymnastics school, she was wrongly expelled before she’d hardly begun). Of course the school not without problems, and boy, does her strict Russian coach have a face to remember! John Armstrong must have had a great time drawing inspiration from gargoyles or something. This week, Bella loses her memory after an accident in the gym and strays from the school. 

Tammy takes us into the world of politics with the new Strange Story serial, “Sharon’s Shadow”. Joe Brown, outraged by the rundown housing conditions in Leechester, which led to the death of his grandfather, is running for MP so he can turn things around. But his chances of election could come under threat when his sister Sharon challenges a witch’s curse at her grave and then has a strange accident there. Never, ever, challenge the supernatural, Sharon. Meanwhile, in the regular Strange Story, the horrors of human sacrifice in pre-Christian days threaten to resurface with an erupting volcano, and superstition and hysteria get the better of people.

In “Maisie in Mo Town”, it’s been a barrel of laughs (though maybe a bit un-PC today) with Maisie pretending to increasingly exasperated kidnappers that she’s a dumb wild girl from Africa who doesn’t know the first thing about civilisation and can only speak pidgin English. But now things take a very serious turn as the kidnappers make plans to smuggle her out of the country. To this end, they lock her in the attic, ready for someone to collect at midnight!

“Daughter of the Regiment” Tessa Mason has recruited a gang of mudlarks to help clear her father, who was shot for cowardice at the Charge of the Light Brigade. But one, Dick, has been bribed to help lead her into a trap! And Melanie has recruited her own gang, “Melanie’s Mob”, to train as athletes. Dad would have a fit if he knew they were the Canal Mob, and now someone has reported something to the police about it.

At a regatta, Stackers is finding a mermaid costume problematic, and it leads to hijinks. In the final panel, Bessie doesn’t think much of mermaid costumes either, as she can’t raid the grub in the one she’s forced to wear.  

Nobody in class believes Miss Bigger when she shoots a big line about how her big WAAF days in World War II helped to win the Battle of Britain. So nobody’s surprised when she comes unstuck at a Battle of Britain exhibition at a flying club: “Bigger? We had a waitress of that name in the mess. Butter-fingers Bigger we used to call her…she was always dropping the crockery.” Miss Bigger’s looking very red, and then she’s green, as she can’t take a flight in a WWII plane without feeling airsick. The real heroics belong to Sue, who scares off robbers at the club with a phoney WWII bomb.

Tammy 29 October 1977

Cover artist: John Richardson

Bella (artist John Armstrong)

Down to Earth Blairs (artist José Casanovas)

No Place for Children (artist Eduardo Feito)

Melanie’s Mob (artist Edmond Ripoll) – final episode

Bessie Bunter

The Bird of Wisdom – the Strange Story

Selena Sitting Pretty (artist Diane Gabbot(t))

Say Hallo to Hallowe’en! – feature 

Wee Sue (artist John Richardson)

Rowena and the Realms of Night (artist Peter Wilkes)

We continue our Halloween theme with the Tammy Halloween issue from 1977. One of our Cover Girls is enjoying a Halloween party while something else appears to be enjoying her Tammy as much as she does. The Cover Girls years were very enjoyable for celebrating Halloween, Easter, Guy Fawkes and other occasions in light-hearted and often amusing ways. Inside, there is also a feature on Halloween customs.  

Wee Sue and her family have a day at the races. Sue takes a punt on a horse called Autumn Springer, which prompts Miss Bigger to do the same. Then Miss Bigger unwittingly causes Autumn Springer to bolt. They have to do something fast or lose their punts and the things they want to buy with them. 

In the Strange Story, Jean Regan is a brain, and there always seems to be a bird hanging around her when she does academic wonders. But her brains make her a know-all and show-off, and she becomes unpopular. She chases the bird off and finds she is reduced to middling scholar, but now she’s more popular and happy.

It’s the final episode of the popular “Melanie’s Mob”. Its replacement next week is a Giorgio Giorgetti story, “C.L.A.R.A.”, about a computer utilised to improve the declining sporting and academic achievements of Glumthorpe Comprehensive. But is it really the answer? In girls’ comics, computers have a track record of bringing their own problems. Anyway, we begin to find out in the Guy Fawkes issue.

Bessie has to prove her strength for a bet, with a treat at the tuck shop if she wins. Bessie tries to win the bet by cheating (naughty, naughty) but in the end wins (accidentally) by using her bulk as strength.

Betsy Blair’s father is opting for “The Good Life”, living off the land and bartering, after being made redundant. Betsy is finding the change very hard and demeaning when she has been used to such a posh, comfortable life. Plus a snobby neighbour is taking the mick out of her over it and a lot of classmates are laughing. Betsy invites them over for homemade scones, but it’s another big humiliation for her when Mum puts chicken feed in the scones by mistake. At this, Betsy cracks up and screams at her parents.

Bella’s at a Russian gymnastics college, which is going much better for her than in 1975, when a jealous pupil got her expelled before she’d hardly begun. But it looks like jealousy is rearing its ugly head again at a competition: Bella’s doing her floor routine and feels something sharp and painful in her shoe. 

“No Place for Children” – no, not a place where children are banned or is not appropriate for them. It’s a place where all the children are missing. Terri Jennings keeps hearing strange whispers from the adults that it’s somehow connected with wealth they expect to receive, the old quarry that has been sealed off, and kids gossiping.  

Selena Sitting Pretty, our girl pretending to be in a wheelchair at school, has struck another problem – some toughs have thrown her wheelchair into the river and she can’t get it out. She has to continue pretending being crippled to her schoolmates while thinking of a way to retrieve the wheelchair. She succeeds both ways and is sitting pretty again after this close shave. 

In “Rowena and the Realms of Night”, the sequel to “Rowena and the Doves”, Rowena has to rescue her brother Asser, who is in the power of the Nightqueen and her daughter Princess Ygerna. He doesn’t even realise what’s happening to him, and there are only three days left to rescue him. This week Rowena and her companions get trapped in the Caverns of Endless Night. The Caverns are so dark nobody can find their way out unless they are guided by a human voice. 

Tammy 24 September 1977

Cover artist: John Richardson

• Bella (artist John Armstrong)
• Rowena of the Doves (artist Peter Wilkes)
• Melanie’s Mob (artist Edmond Ripoll)
• Selena Sitting Pretty (artist Diane Gabbot(t))
• Bessie Bunter
• Babe at St. Woods (artist John Johnston)
• Eye of the Beholder (artist Hugo D’Adderio) – Strange Story
• Edie the Ed’s Niece (artist Joe Collins)
• Wee Sue (artist Mike White)
• Daughter of the Regiment (artist Mario Capaldi) – final episode

On the cover, big sis gets one over little sis for once, who not only has to do the work but also looks narked at not being the first to read the weekly Tammy.

This week’s Tammy features one of my favourite Strange Stories, “Eye of the Beholder”, plus it has ever-popular Hugo D’Adderio artwork. The story appears below. An unsavoury Babylonian empress cares only about her garden. Like the selfish giant, she won’t share it with anyone, and woe betide anyone who so much as sniffs the flowers. But it looks like the empress may have imposed this extreme meanness on the wrong person…

Bella has set up a gym club on a collective farm. Some people are finding it hard to accept this, and at the end of the episode we get a hint that someone may have resorted to sabotage, which has put a girl’s life in danger.

Speed is the new motto at Cliff House School, and Bessie is taking it deeply to heart because it’s fun. Speed is no problem for Bessie where sneaking/eating food is concerned. But putting an aristocratic visitor on roller skates to speed things up? Unless there’s a speedy turnaround, this could mean a speedy punishment for Bessie.

Rowena reaches the last of her brothers for help in aiding her father, but all she gets is another refusal: “none of us are entirely ready, yet”. Then her brother’s companion reacts so badly against this – “you have shamed us!” – that he breaks his oath of fealty to his master. Wow, looks like help at last, at least from someone. Will it prod the brother into action as well?

“Daughter of the Regiment” concludes. Tessa Mason has been battling to prove her father was innocent of the charge that got him executed at the Charge of the Light Brigade. And what does she find? Her father wasn’t executed or charged with anything, and isn’t even dead! It was all a ruse so he could go undercover to foil a plot to assassinate Queen Victoria, and Tessa’s investigation unwittingly put it in danger. Well, they should have known that no true daughter would ever accept her father was guilty and wouldn’t rest until she had discovered the truth. They should have said he was killed in action or something.

Of late, there has been dispute as to whether Tammy artist Diane Gabbot should be spelt Gabbott. Gabbott was the original spelling and we’re not sure if “Gabbot” is a misspelling that crept in or a simplified spelling Diane adopted.

Anyway, Diane’s latest Tammy story is “Selena Sitting Pretty”, and the theme is one you see more often at DCT: a girl pretends to be disabled to take advantage. Selena Smith pretends to be wheelchair-bound because she is having difficulty handling the competition at her new school. This week she hides Lorraine’s running shoes, which forces her to run in bare feet. It blows up in Selena’s face when Lorraine wins anyway and then makes a present of the shoes to Selena, not realising she’s on the verge of discovering Selena’s secret.

A stuffy Latin teacher has problems with Babe of St Woods, who always has gangsters on the brain. When she asks for prep on one of the Caesars, Babe does hers on “Little Caesar”, the 1920s gangster. Then Babe comes to the rescue when she discovers the teacher’s prescription has been written out in the wrong dosage. Teach has failed to notice this although the prescription is in Latin. Really, teach!

Miss Bigger takes the class to the seaside on the annual school trip but makes it as stuffy as the Latin teacher while another class are permitted to have all the fun of the beach. What’s more, Sue has to find a way to get one of the girls to a beauty contest and back without Miss Bigger noticing; the girl needs the prize money for her parents’ anniversary present. In the end Sue’s class have as much fun on the beach, and the girl wins third place and enough money for a present.

Melanie Newton still has to keep her sports club comprised of local toughs a secret from her snobby father, but things are looking up for it. That is, until Dad asks her to go against the gang because he wants the gang’s sports site for development. Looks like Melanie has to rebel against her father again, something she’s been doing ever since the beginning of the story because she hates how her working-class father is now a snobby, selfish rich businessman.

Tammy 18 March 1978

Cover artist: John Richardson

• Melanie’s Mob (artist Edmond Ripoll)
• Maisie – Fashion Crazy (artist Giorgio Giorgetti)
• Goldie Alone (artist Eduardo Feito)
• Edie the Ed’s Niece (artist Joe Collins)
• Mask for Melissa (artist Angeles Felices)
• Bessie Bunter
• Molly Mills on the Run (artist Douglas Perry, writer Maureen Spurgeon)
• The Magic Lamp – the Strange Story
• Wee Sue (artist Robert MacGillivray)
• Gail at Windyridge (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Pretty Things with Poly Craft (feature)

I have brought out this Tammy in honour of St Patrick’s Day. Girls’ comics didn’t seem to bother with St Patrick’s Day much, but this issue is an exception. It’s a delightful, enchanting cover of leprechauns and fairies entertaining the Cover Girls.

Inside, Bella is on hiatus, but we’re sure some story will finish soon in order to make room for her. Meantime, several of the stories that are currently running are Tammy classics. One is “Melanie’s Mob”, Tammy’s answer to “Concrete Surfer”. Melanie Newton has formed a skateboarding club to persuade the council to provide a skateboarding rink. This week they win a special prize for their display on skateboarding safety and are encouraged to compete in serious contests. But now the only skateboarding area in town has been bulldozed.

Tammy is definitely having a jag on disguises, double lives, concealing pasts, going on the run, and assumed names. No less than seven stories have it this week in some form or other. Yes, seven.

First is “Goldie Alone”. Goldie was a mega-popular Tammy story that was still remembered years later; for example, Goldie made a cameo in the Wee Sue birthday celebrations of Tammy’s 10th issue. Goldie Gibbs is living with a foster family, the Stringers, while her mother is in hospital. The Stringers are out to stop Goldie beating their daughter Emma at an ice-skating event. Goldie is resorting to secret skating at the rink, which starts stories about a “phantom skater” haunting the rink at night. The Stringers guess the truth and go to welfare with all sorts of lies about Goldie being an out-of-control girl. Although welfare have second thoughts about Mrs Stringer’s story once they probe further, it has the police on Goldie’s tail and catching her red-handed as she tries to break into the ice rink.

Second is part two of another Tammy classic, “Mask for Melissa”. Melissa Mappin has facial scars from an accident and is so affected by it that she can’t bear to look in a mirror, and it looks like her acting hopes are dashed. This week she finds the solution: steal a beautiful mask from a shop, move to a new location, and resume acting under the assumed name of Gaye Traynor. However, we know deception and disguise are going to cause complications for Melissa. Right now though, Melissa has a more immediate problem: she can’t find a place to stay and has to resort to a hotel job to get a roof over her head.

Third is “Maisie – Fashion Crazy”. This is a sequel to an earlier Tammy story, “Maisie of Mo Town”. Maisie and Mary Malone don disguises of their own to go after shifty Marcus Adams, who’s gone off to Paris instead instead of looking after Mum’s business while she’s away. But their disguises are not exactly subtle: they look like chess boards in those checkered suits they’re wearing and one Frenchwoman is shocked already!

Fourth is “Gail at Windyridge”. Gail Peters and her father are using assumed names at the stable where he works because he was wrongly disgraced for horse-doping. But now a newspaper clip threatens to reveal their past. Added to that, more dirty work with horses is afoot: someone is trying to sabotage the Flier, the champion horse of the stables.

Fifth is Molly Mills, who is still “On the Run” after Pickering framed her for theft. Molly has made her way back to Stanton Hall, which has a new owner, and trying to hide her past. This week Molly has to resort to splashing her face with car engine oil to save herself from being recognised. This gets her lot of disapproving stares but fortunately her employer sees the funny side. Interestingly, a coloured girl has been added to the Molly cast, a black servant girl named Lucy.

Sixth is Wee Sue. Sue helps an old lady who can’t get in but finds out later she unwittingly helped a house-breaker who was disguised as the old lady. She’s got to undo the damage somehow, but the crook has shed the disguise and they don’t know what he looks like without it. But Sue realises he made one oversight, and it gets him nabbed – he forgot to remove the earrings from the old lady disguise.

Seventh is Bessie Bunter, who really is on a roll this week with a sheet of lino that keeps rolling everyone up. She foils thieves who are passing themselves off as tradesmen by dressing up in a bear suit to frighten them and then hitting them with the lino roll. Pity the thieves don’t get rolled up in it, which would have been as good as handcuffs and even more funny.

This week’s Strange Story could have reinforced the St Patrick’s Day theme on the cover with a story about leprechauns, fairies or Irish myth. Instead it’s a magic lamp story. Actually, it’s a paper lamp, made out of newspaper. But can it still work like Aladdin’s lamp and get Beryl’s brother Jimmy the cure he needs?

Tammy 10 September 1977

• Bella (artist John Armstrong)
• Rowena of the Doves (artist Peter Wilkes)
• Selena Sitting Pretty (artist Diane Gabbot) – first episode
• Sharon’s Shadow – Strange Story serial (artist Hugo D’Adderio)
• Bessie Bunter
• Melanie’s Mob (artist Edmond Ripoll)
• The Other Side of the Coin – Strange Story (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Edie the Ed’s Niece – cartoon (artist Joe Collins)
• Wee Sue (artist John Armstrong)
• Daughter of the Regiment (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Edie’s Hobbyhorse: Cycling

 

The issue for 10 September 1977 has been chosen for 1977 in the Tammy round robin. By this time Tammy is taking the shape that defines her 1970s look. “Bella at the Bar” is now just plain Bella. We now have “Reader’s Cover Idea!”, where readers send in suggestions for a Tammy cover, and the winner receives money. The regular cartoon is the Joe Collins “Edie the Ed’s Niece”, who also has a feature called “Edie’s Hobbyhorse” where Edie discusses a particular activity for a hobby or sport.

Tammy is running another Strange Story serial. This time it is about Sharon Brown, who unwisely challenged a long-dead witch (never challenge the supernatural!) and gets her shadow cursed. Anything or anyone her shadow crosses meets with disaster, and it’s upsetting her brother Joe’s campaign to win the local election. Sharon learns only love stronger than the curse can break it, but where the heck are they going to find love when the curse has made things go so badly wrong for Joe that the whole town has turned against him?

In the regular Strange Story, Gilly Bentley looks set to lose her horse, Amulet. Amulet, being a proud horse, seems to get his pride deeply hurt at that and strange things start happening, including Gilly having dreams where a centurion is riding Amulet. It climaxes in Amulet finding Roman coins, which show the same centurion riding him. All of a sudden, the question of selling Amulet is dropped.

One of the curious differences between DCT girls’ titles and IPC girls’ titles is the frequency at which they ran stories about protagonists/ antagonists pretending to be disabled. At DCT such stories appeared so often they were almost a feature. At IPC (well, in Tammy and Jinty anyway) they were sporadic. So the new story this week, “Selena Sitting Pretty”, is an exception to the rule; if she had appeared in, say, Mandy, she would be par for the course. In the story, Selena has always been top girl in class. But when her school combines with another, she comes up against serious competition for top of the class and can’t take it. Then, by fluke, they see her in a wheelchair and think she has been in a road accident. All of a sudden the big fuss is pushing out her rivals and Selena thinks she has found the way to be sitting pretty at school again.

Bella is attending a famous Russian gymnastics college (which is thankfully lasting longer for her than the one she was wrongly expelled from in 1975). The school has ordered Bella to attend a ballet because they think it will teach her some valuable lessons. But we don’t think they meant the one Bella learns the hard way: don’t lean too far out of the balcony! Fortunately Bella’s gymnastics has her landing on her feet on the stage when she falls, and it’s such a hit with the audience that she does not get expelled. And the experience does teach her some useful tips for improving her floor exercises, which is what the school wanted after all.

“Rowena of the Doves” is a medieval swords-and-sorcery sort of tale, with a protagonist who looks like a young woman and hints of alleged white magic that have many of her enemies running scared. Rowena must have brought the Tammy readers up short and it’s no wonder Rowena had a sequel. Her original story was also reprinted in Princess II. Rowena’s father, King Guthlac, has dispatched her to fetch her brothers to help him face his old enemy, the Black Earl. Rowena’s companions are her doves and her horse Silvermane. In this episode she rescues a girl who was to be sacrificed, but now the girl is seriously ill. And when Rowena finds her first brother, he refuses to help, saying he’s got problems of his own defending his stronghold. Will the other two brothers be more helpful?

Bessie is chosen to lead a paper chase. Of course her paper chase leads all the way to the kitchen, and then it starts pouring with rain. Some quick scheming has Bessie emerging on top, and she has the sneaky feeling she will not be lumbered with paper chases again.

Melanie Newton hates her new snob school and the snooty girls looking down on her former lower class origins. She turns to secretly training a gang of rough girls as an athletics team but they turn on her, much to the glee of the snooty girls. Then one of the rough girls gets stuck on the lock gates at the canal and Melanie is going to the rescue.

Another high-class girl is having better luck with street urchins in “Daughter of the Regiment”. Tessa Mason’s father has been executed for cowardice in the Charge of the Light Brigade. Tessa is out to clear his name but a Mr Cregan keeps blocking her. Tessa has found helpers in a gang of mudlarks, and this week she turns to the waxworks museum for help in getting into Windsor Castle for an audience with Queen Victoria.

Wee Sue’s Dad is not pleased to spend his day off cooking meals and doing housework because Mum is sick. Sue is not sure he can manage it either. Her mind is running riot over the horrors it must be causing and she eventually runs home in a panic to check up. At home, it looks like she was worrying over nothing and Dad has cooked a lovely dinner for the family. But then Sue opens the kitchen door…and what she finds is best not described.

Tammy 25 March 1978

Cover Artist: John Richardson

• Melanie’s Mob (artist Edmond Ripoll)
• Maisie – Fashion Crazy (artist Giorgio Giorgetti)
• Mask for Melissa – (artist Angeles Felices)
• Tuck-in with Tammy – Easter Bonnet cake
• An Easter Bonnet (artist Audrey Fawley) – Strange Story
• Greetings for Easter – Feature
• Bessie Bunter
• Molly Mills on the Run (artist Douglas Perry, writer Maureen Spurgeon)
• The Black Hunter (artist Ken Houghton) – Strange Story
• Edie the Ed’s Niece (artist Joe Collins)
• Wee Sue (artist Mike White)
• Gail at Windyridge (artist Mario Capaldi)
• Easter Gifts – Feature

This is Tammy’s Easter issue from 1978. Easter bonnets are a huge feature inside. Tammy presents a recipe for an Easter bonnet cake. Sue designs a winning Easter bonnet for Miss Bigger after accidentally squashing her original. The Storyteller even has a Strange Story about an Easter bonnet that serves as a time travel device. It sets in motion a series of events that make sure a lady’s inheritance does not go to grasping relatives. Edie starts out all eager to eat the Easter eggs she has received. Bessie Bunter and the Editor are among the donors. However, Edie keeps seeing eggs so much in one form or other that she goes off them in the end. “Greetings for Easter” discusses Easter customs. The back cover is a feature on how to make Easter gifts, including Easter cards and Easter egg gift baskets.

Surprisingly, there is no Easter theme in the Bessie Bunter story. Instead, it’s hijinks as Cliff House prepares for a concert. Rather to her chagrin, Bessie is put in cat costume for Dick Whittington (played by Miss Stackpole). Talk about a fat cat!

You may have noticed there is no Bella Barlow in the lineup. Indeed, from 1976 to 1981 Bella followed a pattern where she did not start until April at the earliest. And when she did start, she had plot threads that kept going until late in the year.

“Melanie’s Mob” can be described as the Tammy version of “Concrete Surfer”. Melanie Newton has started a skateboard club and is campaigning to get a skateboarding rink added to the local sports centre. This week things look hopeful when the council says they’ll consider it. But then other clubs pose a problem that could cancel the site the skateboarding club want. Melanie says there’s only one chance, but it means using their skateboarding skills like never before. Now what can she have in mind?

“Maisie – Fashion Crazy” is a sequel to the earlier “Maisie of Mo Town”. Maisie and Mary Malone are in Paris with Gran while Mum’s away. Maisie has a mystery she wants to unravel: why has the man Mum left in charge of business suddenly flown in to Paris as well?

Melissa has developed a real chip on her shoulder about the scars on her face. She can’t bear the sight of her own face, which she hides with a mask while trying to re-establish her performing career. This week she goes into utter hysterics while waitressing when she sees her reflection, smashes the mirror in her room, and also loses a friend with her carry-on.

Molly Mills has returned to a new employer at Stanton Hall. Her existing knowledge of the hall from her Stanton employment is proving a tremendous help to everyone. But her secret about being a fugitive (after being framed for theft) is in danger when a photo of her earlier days at Stanton Hall is uncovered.

At Windyridge, Gail Peters and her father are in similar trouble. They are staying there under false names because Dad has been wrongly branded a horse doper. Unfortunately the residents of Windyridge suspect Dad’s true identity and have called in his previous employer, Owen Winters. Meanwhile, Winters is looking increasingly suspicious himself. Gail has linked him to sabotage at Windyridge, and then she overhears a conversation that suggests Winters had a hand in that horse doping. Well, well, well!

There is also a bonus Strange Story. Now and then Tammy treated her readers to one. “The Black Hunter” is said to revive if his horn is blown three times. June Warren has already blown it twice. Will she blow it the fateful third time or will she see the danger in the nick of time?

Combining Tammy serials and regulars in Tammy’s Christmas Issue 1977

Art: John Armstrong

Art: Robert MacGillivray

Tammy 1977 Christmas celebrations

I was perusing through the Tammys and came across these features that appeared in the issue for 24 December 1977. I put them up to show how Tammy sometimes brought characters from her serials and regulars together in special features and how fascinating it was to see so many characters and features from Tammy combined together. Recent or running serials team up with the Tammy regulars for these special features in the 1977 Christmas issue. This never happened with Jinty.