Archie’s Influence

Natalie Balzarini

When we visited Special Collections, I was immediately drawn toward the table with a wide variety of comic books. Specifically, I was quite interested in taking a look at the old Archie comics. I had read a few Archie comics when I was younger, and I always thought it was cool that the series was so long-running, and that it had such staying power. When I think “Americana”, Archie Comics are one of the first things that come to my mind.

Volume 1, Number 51, found in Special Collections and originally published in July of 1951, was in surprisingly good shape for a nearly 70-year-old comic book. The thin pages were a bit yellowed and slightly torn in some places, but all things considered, I was impressed. Since comic books were cheap to make, cheap to buy, and new issues came out so regularly, they were not really intended to last. A bit worn down at the edges, this particular book was showing some wear, but it was still perfectly readable.

Inside each issue’s colorful covers were multiple stories of the classic characters living the everyday lives of American teenagers. The cover of Vol. 1, No. 51 boasts that it is “America’s largest-selling teen-age magazine”, and “The mirth of a nation”. A big claim, to be sure, but also one that implies a sort of “universal appeal”. The cover also calls Archie himself “America’s typical teen-ager”. If Archie is so typical, why shouldn’t he be the mirth of an entire nation? The comics depict a generalized teenage experience, or in a way, what the teenage experience should be. Billing the characters as the standard teens pushes a norm of what the teenage years are supposed to be like, what is normal and good.

Comic books in general were quite popular with children and teenagers, so it’s no surprise that the subject matter would apply to them. Showing this idealized vision of American youth gave the readers an experience to strive for and desire. Working off of this desire, advertisements were placed in the middle of the comics, giving specific things to desire as well. Everything from bicycles to car-seat covers was advertised, showing the wide variety of things American consumers were concerned with at the time.  With comic books so popular, both explicit advertisements and less obvious promotion of social norms reached a very wide audience, with new issues coming out every week. Though the popularity of comic books as a form has waned, some, including the Archie series, have retained their relevance.

Though the Archie series of comics has been in publication for seventy-seven years, the characters’ images as typical teenagers has not changed. Over the years, the characters’ fashion senses have changed with the real worlds’ own, and if I recall correctly, their usual activities did not change a whole lot either. The image of the standard American teenager doesn’t seem to have changed a whole lot, all things considered. Going to school, going on dates, and messing around with friends are still thought of as standards of teenage behavior. The notions of teenagers and the things they do, though formed and furthered years ago, remain in our social consciousness today.