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THE INSIDE SCOOP PART ONE: BIRTH OF AN ICON (1941-1949)
When the 70's began, Archie Comics was at their peak, producing some 18 regular titles, the line-up swelling to include Betty and Me (Betty's first solo title, which became Betty in 1992), Archie At Riverdale High (stories about the gang at school), Reggie and Me (a spin-off of the original Reggie title from the 50's) and separate joke books starring Reggie and Jughead. Add in a dozen or so giant sized books (Betty and Veronica had four alone!), and three books expanded to giant size (Archie and Me, Betty and Me & Reggie and Me) kept the company pretty busy!
But, the 70's would end with the first major elimination of titles by Archie. As with publishers like Marvel and DC, comic book sales in the latter half of the decade horribly sagged, and the only way to stem the tide was to jettison unproductive books. At Archie, the ax fell on Reggie and Me, Reggie's Wise Guy Jokes and Jughead's Jokes. The subtraction would continue well into the 80's with the demise ofsuch titles as Archie and Me, Archie at Riverdale High, Archie's JokeBook, Archie's TV Laugh-Out, Josie, Laugh, Sabrina and, ironically, Pep where Archie got his start in 1941.
The newsletter ran for four years and featured the work of Katy's creator, Bill Woggon along with Barbara Rausch and John S. Lucas, Katy's number one fan. The grass roots rebirth of Katy, spurred on by Craig's newsletter and Katy themed conventions he sponsored, paved the way for a brand new Katy comic series. In 1983, the first Katy Keene Special hit the newsstands, featuring reprinted stories from the original series with cover art by Archie's main artist, Dan DeCarlo. Following three more reprint books, new stories followed in subsequent books. The new Katy series didn't really take off until John Lucas took over as the regular artist, and the book quickly soared to all new heights. Just like in the original series, readers were encouraged to submit designs for Katy and her friends, and a brand new generation of fans around the world enjoyed being part of the creative process of the book with their designs. In addition to the comic book, there was a Katy Keene Fan Club with pens, notepads, buttons, plus t-shirts and sweatshirts, all of which had been designed by John. The early 80's would see the arrival of far and away THE most controversial character ever seen in the long and storied history of Archie Comics: Cheryl Blossom. Cheryl, a buxom, saucy, devil-may-care redhead with a blatant come hither personality made her infamous debut in Betty and Veronica #320 (August 1982) where, in a story called Dare To Be Bare, Cheryl caused quite a stir on the beach when she proudly showed off a shockingly brief bikini that horrified even Veronica, then casually tried to go topless, only to be stopped by a panicked Betty! After only two years of entertaining stories that dealt with Cheryl and Jason causing trouble for the Riverdale High crowd, not to mention Cheryl's dogged pursuit of Archie, the Blossoms suddenly vanished from Archie series comics without a trace. While no official explanation was ever given for their disappearance (A regular practice at Archie when characters outlive their usefulness). The stories, written by the likes of Kathleen Webb, Frank Doyle and Rod Ollerenshaw, were warm, funny, touching, thought provoking, occasionally heartrendering, but always told with a down to earth realness that often eschewed the typically mindless slapstick approach of all the other Archie titles. Humor was not the primary goal of storytelling in Betty's Diary. The stories made you smile, and they made you think about life. Unfortunately, despite how well crafted the book had been, Betty's Diary was cancelled in early 1991. Meanwhile, in 1987, Archie would return to television in a brand new animated series produced by DIC for NBC called "The New Archies". In this series, Archie and the gang were portrayed not as full fledged teenagers, but as thirteen year olds at Riverdale Junior High. The dress and slang and fads employed by the kids were constant with the day, and while the stories were mildly amusing, even leading to a New Archies comic book, the show itself didn't have the staying power of the original Filmation series and only lasted until the end of the year.
These new books would more or less take place outside the normal, everyday realm that had come to be known as the Archie Universe, and, in some cases, WAY beyond that particular realm. Archie 3000 featured the gang in the 31st century, in Archie's R/C Racers, the gang, on separate teams, would race radio controlled cars, sponsored by competing companies, across the country. Next came Archie's Explorers of the Unknown where Archie and company were troubleshooting adventurers in a hilarious tribute to DC's Challengers of the Unknown. Dilton's Strange Science saw the diminutive genius in science fiction based stories like time travel, alien invaders and what not. Faculty Funnies, had Mr. Weatherbee, Miss Grundy, Professor Flutesnoot and Coach Kleats as hapless superheroes. Jughead's Time Police, had Jughead as a guardian of time with Archie's 30th century descendant as his partner. Veronica was depicted in her first ever solo title featuring stories set in foreign locales. Jughead's Diner rounded out the lot. While these books were innovative and imaginative, they were not well received by Archie fans. At one point, the editor for this new line of books practically begged for letters from readers! However, his pleas fell on deaf ears as those books all fell victim to the ax, most of them never lasted more than five or six issues, R/C Racers ran for ten, and Archie 3000 stretched to sixteen. By July of 1991, the only title that survived this third major purge was Veronica. PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE |
The expansion would also extend into rather small areas as well with the debut of the Archie digests. Going as far back as the 30's, digests were very popular with the reading public, so, Archie created the digest series which would feature reprinted stories from the 50's and 60's. This was a unique concept as it would allow Archie fans to read both new stories as well as stories from decades past without having to spend huge sums of money on the original books. The digests became extremely popular with readers and remain so to this very day, what with some 15 different titles being published. 
It was also during the 70's when the country's social consciousness was expanding that Archie Comics recognized the need for racial diversity. To that end, they responded by adding minority characters to the cast. African-Americans were represented by Chuck Clayton who would become a close friend of Archie, especially in athletic endeavors at school, and his girlfriend Nancy Harris, while Hispanic-Americans were represented by Frankie Valdez, a cocky, Latin version of Reggie and his girlfriend, Maria Rodriguez, who's father was the school's Vice-Principal. 
To balance things out, the late 70's would also see the much heralded return to comics of Katy Keene. Despite being away for over fifteen years, Katy had not vanished from the public eye. In 1978, a Katy revival began when Marilise Flusser, a fashion coordinator for Saks Fifth Avenue enlarged Katy Keene covers for window display backgrounds for Saks fashions and the response was good. This led to renewed interest in Katy and, in 1979, Craig Leavitt a California native launched a Katy Keene newsletter. 
Portrayed as an international jetsetter who was just as rich as Veronica, (if not more so), nowhere near as coy or demure as Betty while displaying a talent for deviousness that would put Reggie himself to shame, Cheryl, along with her smarmy twin brother Jason, looked upon the population of Riverdale as beneath her notice, calling its residents "townies". Cheryl sought to make life miserable for them. Except for Archie, whom Cheryl was absolutely crazy about, much to the outrage of Betty and Veronica, because his red hair turned her on.
The 80's would continue to see new things emerge from Archie Comics, most notably, one the more memorable, though short lived titles the company ever produced: Betty's Diary. The original concept of Betty's Diary began in the pages of Archie's JokeBook with the hopelessly lovesick Betty relating rather exaggerated, and humorous tales of her exploits with Archie in her diary. In this version which debuted in 1986, stories, told with first person narrative by Betty herself, would focus on the day to day events in her life as she truthfully related them in her diary. 
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