Sex to Sexty: The Most Vulgar Magazine Ever Made! [Hardcover]

Dian Hanson (Editor), Mike Kelley (Preface)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2008

Daring sexual humor from the irreverent magazine Sex to Sexty Some call it the most vulgar magazine ever made; others see it as the last honest compendium of American sexual humor, starting just as the sexual revolution was expanding minds and stomping taboos, and ending when political correctness made all such humor socially unacceptable. Whatever your stance, the magazine Sex to Sexty was and is an outrageous collection of dirty jokes and cartoons published from 1965 to 1983 by Texas entrepreneur John Newbern, whose life was lifted straight from the pages of his publication. His partner in crime against good taste was hillbilly artist Pierre Davis, who created elaborate oil painted covers for each issue that celebrate every permutation of manly humor. No topic was safe from the lowbrow wit of these two men and the cartoonists they recruited to preserve what they called the ?True Jokelore of America?. Sex to Sexty reproduces all 198 covers of the magazine and many of the original paintings that adorned them. Then, in the first in-depth analysis of American sexual humor, author and editor Dian Hanson categorizes the great themes revealed by the thousands of cartoons and jokes into spreads with titles like ?Stinkfinger, ? ?Incest on the Best, ? ?Cannibal Cuisine, ? and ?I Love Ewe!.? Raw, irreverent, uncensored and all-American, Sex to Sexty spares no gender, sexual preference, ethnic orientation, or hygienic dysfunction in bringing you what the magazine's original publisher called the ?World's Largest Accumulation of He-Man Robust Humor in the World.? Special fold-out dust jacket shows every cover image and unfolds to reveal a poster of a never before seen, unreleased Sex to Sexty coveroriginally deemed ?too tasteless? by the magazine's publisher, but definitely ?suitable for framing in your bar, rumpus room or bathroom?.

Editorial Reviews

From the Author

The editor: Dian Hanson is a 25-year veteran of men's magazine publishing. She began her career at Puritan Magazine in 1976 and went on to edit a variety of titles, including Partner, Oui, Hooker, Outlaw Biker, and Juggs magazines. In 1987 she took over the '60s title Leg Show and transformed it into the world's best-selling fetish publication. Most recently, she authored TASCHEN's Dian Hanson's History of Men's Magazines six volume set, The Big Book of Breasts, Richard Kern's Action and The New Erotic Photography.

About the Author

artist Mike Kelley, born in 1954, works with performance, installation, drawing and painting, video, sound, and sculpture. Drawing from historical research, mass cultural sources, psychological theory and Sex to Sexty, his artworks reference both high art and vernacular traditions. He lives and works in Los Angeles. Dian Hanson is a 25-year veteran of men's magazine publishing. She began her career at Puritan Magazine in 1976 and went on to edit a variety of titles, including Partner, Oui, Hooker, Outlaw Biker, and Juggs magazines. In 1987 she took over the '60s title Leg Show and transformed it into the world's best-selling fetish publication. Most recently, she authored TASCHEN's Dian Hanson's History of Men's Magazines six volume set, The Big Book of Breasts, Richard Kern's Action and The New Erotic Photography.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 419 pages
• Publisher: Taschen (March 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 3822852236
• ISBN-13: 978-3822852231
• Product Dimensions: 11.2 x 8.5 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.9 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #538,739 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dian Hanson was born in Seattle, Washington, November 2, 1951. A hippie and high school drop out, she moved east at age 20, first to Oxford, Mississippi, then Allentown, Pennsylvania, finally settling in New York City in 1976 to work on the sex magazine Puritan. Over the next 25 years she edited magazines including Partner, Oui, Adult Cinema Review, Harvey, Hooker, Juggs and Leg Show. She founded the magazines Outlaw Biker, Hawgs, Big Butt, Bust Out and Tight. In 1993 Hanson became friends with Benedikt Taschen, and in 2001 she finally agreed to leave sex magazines and take over the Sexy Book division of TASCHEN Publishing. She currently lives in Los Angeles with her husband, the novelist Geoff Nicholson.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars From the gas station men's room to your coffee table, March 19, 2008

By 

Jerry Block (Anaheim, CA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sex to Sexty: The Most Vulgar Magazine Ever Made! (Hardcover)

Here was X-rated HeeHaw for Flyover Country.

Editor Dian Hanson opens her text by revealing the contempt even smut lords had for this oddball publication out of Arlington, Texas. "When we the editors of New York-based men's magazines paused to think about Sex to Sexty at all it was to wonder where something like that came from." But the vast populace between California and New York, ignored and reviled by the mainsteam press, tore Sex to Sexty off newsstand racks in the 1960s and '70s. The pages of the magazine were dense with non-stop gags: six cartoons a page and as many jokes and limericks. Hanson writes: "Sex to Sexty's humor is their humor, a humor more intrinsically American than any cartoon to ever appear in The New Yorker."

The humor was recycled from the "rich folklore" of America's dirt roads, often contributed by readers themselves. The themes were timeless: cheating wives, wedding nights, streetwalkers, mermaids, nudist camps, homosexuals, unwanted pregnacies, loose secretaries, impotent husbands, desert island castaways, the cannibal stewpot. The politically incorrect magazine also skewered ethnic groups and popular trends like women's liberation and hippies.

The man behind the dirty jokes was John Newbern, a Texas advertising executive and "God-fearing Christian" who believed God created everything, including sex and humor. The garish, eye-catching covers were painted by hillbilly artist "Pierre" Davis. Taschen has rescued these issues from restroom trash bins and presented a beautifully glossed up tribute to this "adult" classic. After the introductory texts, the book is padded out with hundreds of these smutty gags and the eye-popping Davis covers. The jokes are categorized by theme: Injuns, stinkfinger, Peeping Toms, etc.

I like this organization, but the great Sex To Sexty artists are almost completely ignored. This where I dock a star. It was this talented group of gagsters that made the magazine more naughty than filthy, more cheeky than gross. Unheralded and rejected by the big-city glossies, these guys were some of the best single-panel cartoonists around: Bill Ward, Bill Wenzel, Bob Tupper, Dick Lucas, Ted Trogdon, Ward Kimball, Pete Wyma. The project would have been more complete with some biographical sketches and their thoughts about the trade.

As a postscipt, I've bought original cartoons from the magazine on eBay from the founder's son, John Newbern Jr., at his seller ID tambo53. He calls them "American heirlooms" and makes them consistently available.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars No wonder folks from the '60's & '70's are called "Baby Boomers"!, April 4, 2008

By 

B. Dube "Bear" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sex to Sexty: The Most Vulgar Magazine Ever Made! (Hardcover)

Got this book for my Dad-a long time fan of the magazine and who bemoaned its demise! Course I had to check it out...

It's a great collection of both subtle and not so subtle jibs at what polite folks don't talk about at the dinner table (but really DO talk about when it's just us guys or the gals think we aren't around and it's safe for them to "trade notes...").

Just make sure that you haven't a full mouth, bladder, etc., while reading it, cause at some point-you're going to hit a cartoon or joke that might just make you lose it when it hits your funny bone or offends your sensibility...

Only reason it didn't get the last star is that the first 50 or so pages are in French-not much good unless vous parlez français. Definitely something for stress relief after a long day, so enjoy.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Welcome back Sex to Sexty - We missed ya!, March 17, 2009

By 

Avid Reader "Geronimo" (Potomac, MD USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sex to Sexty: The Most Vulgar Magazine Ever Made! (Hardcover)

Sex to Sexty might have been the most vulgar magazine on the planet, but it also made more people laugh than any of the other so-called funny magazines of its day. This is a great look back at humor in America before political correctness killed off print humor.

Okay, so the lords of the print world in New York didn't like the folksy humor that populated its pages, but issues never stayed on the newstands very long, and that is clearly highlighted in the pages of this book.

As one of the artists who helped to pollute impressionable young minds through the pages of this magazine from the late 70s nearly until its demise in 1983, I salute Dian Hanson and Mike Kelly for reminding us that there was a time when we could laugh.