Tales of Horror

About Tales of Horror

Tales of Horror is a 1950s horror comic book from Toby Press that ran for 13 issues, from June 1952 to October 1954. Issues #1 to #9 appeared under Toby's Minoan imprint, whose logo was a Minotaur head, and #10 to #13 under the Toby name. Toby Press was founded by Elliott Caplin, the brother of cartoonist Al Capp.

Each 36-page issue usually held four longer comic stories and a short text story, plus short filler strips. Although it was a horror title, science fiction stories were common in the first four issues and grew scarcer from #5 on. Its artists included Myron Fass, Ben Brown, Max Elkin, Mel Keefer, Rocco Mastroserio and Jack Sparling, and Art Helfant was among its writers. Fass, who also became a publisher of pulp magazines and comic books, was a regular artist on the series.

Issue #1, dated June 1952, opens with "The Ugliest Man in the World!", in which a disfigured man buys a handsome face mask. It also includes "Demons Below Us!", pencilled by Fass, and "Willie", pencilled by Pete Morisi, and the Grand Comics Database credits its cover to writer Elliott Caplin and artist Myron Fass. Superior issued a Canadian reprint, and the cover of issue #1 was reprinted in the 2018 PS Artbooks collection Pre-Code Classics: Tales of Horror.

On LiveComics, every issue here plays panel by panel, with each line voiced by a full cast, plus sound effects and a score.

Sources, checked October 2026: Grand Comics Database: Tales of Horror (Toby, 1952) · Grand Comics Database: Tales of Horror (Toby, 1952) #1 · Grand Comics Database: Tales of Horror (Superior, 1952) · Grand Comics Database: Pre-Code Classics: Tales of Horror (PS Artbooks, 2018) #1 · The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction: Tales of Horror · Wikipedia: Toby Press · Wikipedia: Elliot Caplin · Wikipedia: Myron Fass