Favourite Stories from Girls Comics

[bookmum08]

Inspired by the favourite children's books thread I was interested in people's fave stories from the old weekly girls comics - Bunty, Mandy, Tammy etc.
My favourite was definitely Angel in Mandy Comic. The story of a rich Victorian girl who discovers she only has a year to live so she fakes her death, runs away from home so she can devote her time to caring for homeless waifs and strays in the poor part of London.

I can’t get over the level of detail you all remember, it’s amazing! I know I read them, I know I liked them, but I can’t remember anything!

I know that me and friends would share them, and have a vague memory of a stack of them being brought over to my house when I wasn’t well and I was really excited to read through them all.

The only story I can vaguely remember was about a girl who pretended to be blind. Think she did some really horrible things, but no one ever thought it was her. Apart from one girl figured her out? I think she finally exposed her by throwing something across the room at her, and the “blind” girl instinctively reached out to catch it before it hit her?

There was a girl who used to catch the same bus sometimes, who was one of the models in one of the photo mags - we were all a bit jealous of how pretty she was - it was Terri Seymour who went on to date Simon Cowell at some point.

This thread is ringing a lot of bells.
The maid who helped the rich girls learn to ride a bike, i remember the blusher one. Rich girl bought make up, papa furious and throws it on roof. Maid has to climb up and get it. She falls into decorators equipment and it ends with her washing her face saying something about "She buys the makeup and I end up in the paint."
The two poor girls who end up at a mansion and are given a meal by two old ladies. One girl says, "Oh I don't want much in life, 3 meals a day and a warm bed." 2nd girl says about how all the things she wants, loads and loads. She ends saying, "I want to be positively killed with kindness!" The old ladies boot out the 1st girl. She turns around to see the 2nd girl waving from a window. 1st girl says something like, "I bet she's boasting about her good fortune. I better get out of the rain." BUT 2nd girl is shouting for help as the old ladies are overfeeding her to death.
Another. Horrid girl somehow ends up in local rich womans house. Rich woman is only ever seen around town wearing a hat with a thick veil. Horrid girl is greedy and when offered the womans life style, she agrees eagerly. Rich woman and her servant hurry away, throwing off hat and veil. Greedy girl wanders around mansion wondering why all the mirrors are covered over. She pulls off the cover to find out that her face has turned green! Turns out there was a curse. You had to find someone greedier than you to take over the life and then you were free.
I remember one comic with a daft story about sisters and their blind single mum/nan. One girl was overweight and unmusical. For some reason this girl was the family hope. She would pretend to be playing the piano(but really it was her sister) She would pretend to hold her nans hand(but it was another but slim sister) meanwhile she was on a diet and taking music lessons. I remember thinking wouldn't blind person recognise their voices?
I remember a girl and her family going to live on an island. No horses are allowed. A horse gets washed up on the shore and girl hides it, feeds it her porridge oats, takes it for walks at night. One day there is a storm and the girl and her horse rescue a boy from the sea. Afterwards horses are allowed.
There was the tunic wearing marathon runner. She used to run the ancient trails but the races were modern now.
Another. Poison Ivy. Vague memory of not nice school girl pretending to like rich girl to get or steal stuff like earrings.

Priestly's Pride. Wealthy family fall on hard times. Privately educated girl now has to go to comp. The family maid packs her crested plate for her to eat the comp. dinner off. She gets mocked. There is a party but there is no disco but a quartet. More mocking. The girl runs away from school to her home to see her Gran asleep in a chair. The gran looks tired and worn out. So girl bravely keeps her bullying to her self.
The gardens get vandalised. Gardener gets one small Priestly Rose growing again. It is a sign of how perseverance can overcome obstacles(or some such moral)

There is a cave where the village go to tell their troubles too. A voice tells them what to do. Turns out it is the girl in the cottage next door giving the advice. She inherited the cottage from her gran. She pulls a plug out of the wall, hidden behind a picture. She talks through the hole.

@furries sadly my memory of plot subtleties of 1970s and 1980s comic strips for girls has left little room for more current knowledge; e.g. My mobile phone number and where I have left my keys/bank card/vitally important letter.

I remember the one about the girl whose life was connected to the tree, and was really sad when the tree was cut down for the developers and she died.
I also remember Tanya from Tongo!

And there was another story I remember about a young girl who had done some modelling (not catwalk, but for catalogues) and her mother/guardian got paid well so she decided to keep her nice and thin so she would get more modelling jobs, Poor girl was starving all the time and forever nicking scraps of food from cafes.

I've got a bunch of annuals I bought on eBay. The best story was Mary Brown's schooldays when Mary and her little chubby friend woke up one night to see a crack in the local dam and had to somehow save everyone in the school by running round in sheets or something. Also the secret skater about a lazy skater who is coached back to being good by a mysterious masked skater who turns out to be her coach, Gooch.

I loved reading my Mum's School Friend annuals. I was absolutely gutted when she told me she had Freecycled them all to a vintage stallholder

I adored getting my own weekly mag and still buy adult ones. It is still a treat to open a new issue and see what is inside.

The story that sticks with me is a photo story. A teenage girl was very clever but she wasn't trendy at all. She went on a quiz show where you doubled your money for a right answer but lost everything if you were wrong. She was so clever she got everything right and was on the show for weeks. It got to the point where she would win so much money she would own the TV station or something. Anyway, thanks to snooping, the producers found out she new nothing about popular culture so the ultimate question was something like 'Who is the singer in A-ha?''. She got it wrong and went home with nothing but didn't care because she had realised that despite being really brainy she didn't know the important things and she needed to learn to be a normal teenage girl.

I wrote to a PenPal from Bunty..for years and years....
Lost touch about ten years ago.

This thread got me thinking about 'Cult of the Cat' and 'Roots' - the latter has always stuck with me, the vivid image of the villagers who never left or died instead growing roots where their legs once were instead.

I found this Misty site and discovered both these stories were in issue 1 of the magazine (with the Cat one continuing as a series). All the stories across all issues are listed with some plot context here mistycomic.co.uk/Misty.html

Ooh a trip down memory lane @Fluffymule! I'd also forgotten Tammy magazine existed. Wasn't there a clothes shop called Tammy too? I remember clothes from it and from Topshop always featured in the comics.

Can't remember if I linked to this upthread, but there's a site devoted to these comics. It hasn't been updated for a few years but is still worth a look as it features Valda and Angel etc.

http://girlscomicsofyesterday.com

The clothes shop was Tammy Girl.

@WelcometoGreenvale I remember the Victorian acorn story. It was in one of my sister's annuals so either Mandy or Jinty.

@JoyceTempleSavage I think the ice skater one was in a Jinty annual. A talented ice skater was offered the chance to train with a famous coach and went to a castle abroad. When she got there, she found other girls who all looked like her.

They were all being trained, but one day she woke up and found that all the other girls (who were less talented than her) had been sent home.

Then she discovered another girl who also looked like her but had been hidden away. It turns out that she was the orphaned daughter of a famous ice skater. The coach would get a lot of money if she turned the girl into a champion but she had no talent so the coach was going to pass another girl off as her.

@QueenOfTheAndals That Diana annual you linked to is the one I was trying to remember with a story about a cursed necklace with seven diamond stars, and it passed down through the years to seven different girls. They all suffered some sad or horrible fate until the last one in modern times ended up throwing it down a well and breaking the curse.

I’m sure the last time there was a thread about girls’ comics someone came on and said her dad was the illustrator of The Man In Black stories. So creepy, but I loved them. There was a really scary one about a girl who went on a witch-themed coach tour and was never seen again; all the evil characters had glaring red eyes

There was a really scary one about a girl who went on a witch-themed coach tour and was never seen again; all the evil characters had glaring red eyes

I remember that!

@SydneyCarton yes the necklace was called something like 7 sisters, I think? I really will have to buy that annual now!

Here it is, opposite a poster of Cliff!

I remember a story, probably in a Christmas annual, rather than the weekly comic. It was a young woman who had had a baby but didn't know what to do in terms of looking after it, didn't want to pick the baby up etc. Post-natal depression maybe? A gobby friend came round, and was all over the baby, maybe picking it up a bit roughly(?) and that was the trigger for the mum to start looking after the baby 'properly'.

Lisa the lonely ballerina.

Aw, Cliff looks cute!

Queen I just got it on eBay

I can’t remember if it’s the same story but there was one about tragedies and broken relationships down the years until the curse or whatever it was ended. The women in each section always had black hair and the men had red hair. That might have been Diana as well, it seems a bit too grown up for Mandy or Judy

@blueskys72. I've still got my old Judy annuals so have just checked. It's from the 1976 annual which I had for Christmas that year. It's from a story called Val of the Valley about a distric nurse.

@blueskys72. I've still got my old Judy annuals so have just checked. It's from the 1976 annual which I had for Christmas that year. It's from a story called Val of the Valley about a distric nurse.