Who Am I? Week #803

The CBS field-sequential color television system was, we might say, a "knockoff" of the RCA color television system developed in the late 1940s and standardized in 1953. It lasted from June to October 1951. Around 200 CBS color television receivers were manufactured and only around a hundred were sold.
 
By jove, Koop, I think you've got it! If I had gotten here earlier, I would have guessed Trump. I have a copy of Trump: The Complete Collection, published in December 2016 by Dark Horse Comics. It includes the two issues that were published and the surviving artwork for the unpublished third issue. MAD artists Harvey Kurtzman, Will Elder, Al Jaffee, Jack Davis and Wallace Wood also contributed to Trump.
 
By jove, Koop, I think you've got it! If I had gotten here earlier, I would have guessed Trump. I have a copy of Trump: The Complete Collection, published in December 2016 by Dark Horse Comics. It includes the two issues that were published and the surviving artwork for the unpublished third issue. MAD artists Harvey Kurtzman, Will Elder, Al Jaffee, Jack Davis and Wallace Wood also contributed to Trump.
That's not the 1950s.
 
I have the compilation and I knew Hugh Hefner financed it. It was originally going to be called X, which is a terrible name for a magazine.
 
Regarding Listener's guess of After Hours – which is connected to Playboy but only indirectly – Google Gemini explains:

"In December 1953, Hugh Hefner famously launched the first issue of Playboy magazine. This monumental event completely transformed the landscape of men's lifestyle and cheesecake print culture. Playboy directly inspired a young advertising assistant named James Warren to enter the publishing business. He created a short-lived, direct imitation of Playboy explicitly titled After Hours.

Published by Jay Publishing Co. starting in 1957, After Hours was a men's fiction and 'girlie' magazine written and compiled by James Warren. The debut issue featured a nude centerfold of pin-up icon Bettie Page, mixed with jazz culture coverage and short fiction. The magazine lasted only four issues. Warren was quickly arrested on obscenity and pornography charges by a Philadelphia district attorney looking to make headlines."
 
Yeah that's what I saw Channel. It has nothing to do with the Trump we know these days it was just a rip-off of Mad Magazine called Trump like Trump card or whatever I guess and there were only two ever published. One was in January, the other was in March of 1957. So I don't know what you're talking about how it wasn't in the '50s.
 
Trump Magazine.
Congratulations, Koop!

This week's subject was Trump Magazine, the very short-lived humor magazine created by Playboy founder Hugh Hefner in 1957.

In the early 1950s, William M. Gaines was under the microscope due to the publications of horror comics like Tales From the Crypt. So, he started Mad with Harvey Kurtzman as a writer, artist and editor. Kurtzman worked relentlessly on Mad, but missed deadlines and fights with Gaines were taking its toll on Kurtzman. He threatened to go to the slick Pageant Magazine to become its art director, and Gaines was able to keep him after turning Mad from a fuzzy, lo-res pulp into a shiny slick. Many thought that Gaines turned Mad into a magazine from a comic to avoid censorship from the Comics Code Authority. This wasn't the case.

However, like Penthouse was to Playboy, Mad had its imitators, some of them notoriously took some of its writers and artists. Hugh saw the battles between Gaines and Kurtzman and wanted to hire Harvey away from Mad. So, he created Trump. According to Hef, he gave Kurtzman an unlimited budget and exceeded it. Although they sold well, Trump only lasted two issues. After Trump's demise, Kurtzman would eventually return to Hefner's playroll, along with Will Elder to create Little Annie Fanny for Playboy for some 25 years. However, Kurtzman developed Parkinson's Disease and both him and Elder returned to Mad in the 80s. According to Kurtzman, working for Gaines was like eating dog shit.

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New game next week!
 
Congratulations, Koop! You trumped this week's "Who Am I."

MAD began in 1952 as a 10¢ comic book and became a magazine with issue #24: "OUR PRICE 25¢ CHEAP." (The current issue, October 2026, says "OUR PRICE $5.99 CHEAP!")

Trump is one of many magazines that tried to imitate MAD. Among the others are Cracked, Sick, Snafu, Flip, Crazy, Eh!, Help!, Frantic!, Fooey, Frenzy, Yak Yak, Loco, Lunatickle, Humbug, Riot, Nuts, Madhouse, Bughouse, Get Lost, Thimk, Grump, Wild, Whack, Unsanity, Snafu, Drool and Buffoon. And MAD publisher William Gaines even launched his own imitation of MAD, using the same writers and artists. Twelve issues of the bi-monthly comic book Panic were published in 1954-55. Dark Horse reprinted all the issues in two hardcover books, 2016-17.
 
Thanks, King. This was a close one. I hate that complete fucking asshole No Winner almost as much as I hate the Dallas Cowboys. If he were to have taken this week it would have crushed me.

Great game as always man!
 
Yet another failure with the Trump brand. Makes sense to me. Good job Koop! You're neck and neck with that horse with no name. Thanks for the game King!
 
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