Young Romance #165

Young Romance #165 (On Sale: February 10, 1970) has a cover by Ric Estrada and Vince Colletta.

This issue begins with the cover story,"Second Choice - First Love" drawn by Ric Estrada and Vince Colletta. Based supposedly on 16-year-old fan Toni Anderson's letter to DC, young Toni finds herself in love with her best friend Val's boyfriend, Bill. When Val becomes ill during a party, Val asks Toni to watch out over Bill and they become a couple, but her guilt about doing her best friend wrong drives her to split with Bill so that Val can have him. Still she is unable to forget Bill and wonders if she did the right thing. The story ends with Romance Reporter Laura Penn asking readers if they think Toni did the right thing.

That is followed by "Any Man's Equal" drawn by Lee Elias, which asks the question, can a woman compete with a man in business? This is a really bad, sexist story. Just awful. Not gonna repeat it here.

Next is the letters page and the annual notice of circulation. There were 47 paid subscribers and 187,000 copies sold, nearest to filing date.

That is followed by "Love is a 3 Ring Circus" with art that looks like Bill Draut to me. Andy was always the "ugly duckling" of his family, never able to find a girl. Finally he decided to join the circus as a clown, but even then the other carny's made fun of him and he still could not get a date. One day a new singer tries out for the circus and when she goes on stage as a clown she freezes up and cannot sing. Andy goes out and talks to her, gets her to sing only to him, and in that moment he knows that finally he has found someone who wants to be with him for him.

We end with "Dates and Mates" a one-pager by Liz Berube.

Edited by Joe Orlando.