The cover on this issue of WESTERN TRAILS is by Ray Quigley. I don't know anything about him except that he painted a dozen or so pulp covers in the late Thirties and early Forties. The lineup of authors in this issue is a good one: L.P. Holmes, Carl McK. Saunders (really Philip Ketchum), Van Cort (really Wyatt Blassingame), Clyde A. Warden (with a Bert Little story), Robert E. Mahaffey, Andor de Soos (who did about 15 stories for various Western and gang pulps in the late Thirties), and Kenneth P. Wood. I've read and enjoyed all those authors except de Soos and Wood.
Here's an odd pulp cover for you, on the first issue of DOUBLE-ACTION GANG MAGAZINE, a short-lived gangster pulp. I have a feeling that they took a Western cover they had in their files (I'd swear I've seen that cowboy somewhere else) and added the guy with the Tommy gun to it. "Killer Lightnin'" by Andor de Soos sounds like a story I'd like to read. "Gangdom Invades the West" has a nice ring to it. Luckily, Adventure House has reprinted this issue, so I can read it. Also on hand in this issue are Margie Harris, a regular contributor to the gang pulps, and Abner J. Sundell, writing under his pseudonym Cliff Campbell, which later on became a house-name, as well as Harold Ward, probably best remembered for writing the Dr. Death stories under the name Zorro.
Thanks to David Lee Smith for this scan of one of the most unusual Western pulp covers I've seen. The artist is George Gross, and he came up with a striking way to illustrate Forrest Brown's novella "Range Hog". In the Fifties, Sixties, and Seventies, Brown wrote numerous Western novels under the name Ford Bowne. I've read one of them, MASTER OF THE LASH, and while it wasn't very good, it was eccentric enough to be interesting. Judging by this cover, "Range Hog" probably falls into the same category. I may have to read more of Brown's work. Also in this issue are stories by Andor de Soos (not a typical Western author name), Cliff Campbell (in this case, really Abner J. Sundell, originator of the Campbell pseudonym which later became a house-name), and an author I'm not familiar with, Russell Hays.
