Manhunt

Manhunt ran, usually in digest format, from 1953 to 1967, making it one of the longest serving detective fiction magazines of the post war period.  This particular issue, from November 1953, features a cover painting typical of the subject matter of the magazine's fifties era: an imperiled (and often at least partially undressed) woman.  While far less lurid than the covers of the earlier pulp detective magazines or contemporary men's magazines, these covers provided a reminder of Manhunt's antecedents.  Occasionally, the covers rang the changes, featuring a woman handing out the violence to a man or, even more occasionally, another woman.  While originally billed as Manhunt Detective Story Magazine, from April 1956 the title contracted to simply Manhunt, with the strap line 'World's Most Popular Crime Fiction Magazine'.  As if to back up this bold claim, the magazine boasted a number of overseas reprint versions: in the UK there were two series, the first, from 1953-54 titled as the US edition, with a second series from 1960-61 titled Bloodhound Detective Story Magazine.  Australia boasted no less than three reprint series, titled Manhunt Detective Story Magazine (1953-54), Phantom Suspense-Mystery Magazine (six undated issues in the fifties) and Verdict Detective Story Magazine in 1955.

Despite the women-in-peril covers, Manhunt was something of an 'upmarket' magazine, featuring many new stories from 'name' authors of the era.  During the fifties Mickey Spillane and Evan Hunter/Ed McBain featuring prominently.  Indeed, some of McBain's 87th Precinct stories saw their first publication in Manhunt.  James T Farrell, Frederic Brown and Richard S Prather also frequently had featured stories.  At least one of Ross McDonald's 'Lew Archer' series of novels had its debut in the pages of Manhunt.  As the sixties progressed, the covers became somewhat more abstract in style and the names of the featured authors less familiar to modern readers, but the magazine continued to have an audience. By 1964, the cover claim 'Every Story New!' had vanished, implying that, like many magazines of the era, it was increasingly relying upon reprints from its archive (many of which would have been 'new' to current readers) in order to cut costs.  Bi-monthly since 1958, 1967 saw only two editions, after which Manhunt ceased publication for good, having notched up some 114 issue in total, which was pretty impressive for any post-war genre fiction magazine.