IMAGE: Steve Canyon Volume 3: 1951-1952, published in 2013. Copyright 2014 the Milton Caniff Estate.

If you look at the cover of the “Steve Canyon Volume 3” put out by the Library of American Comics, you might think that Miss Mizzou is featured on the cover punching Steve Canyon. This is not Miss Mizzou, but another blonde character named the Duchess of Denver.

The Duchess of Denver made her debut in the strip on April 17, 1951. The Duchess had a background in the theatre, but in her appearance she’s part of a scam run by her crooked husband. Steve Canyon and Foo Ling save her from her predicament, but it seems like she wasn’t happy with being saved either. She later apparently drowns at sea at the end of the storyline.

IMAGE: Steve Canyon daily comic strip, April 17, 1951 — Copyright 2014 the Milton Caniff Estate. The introduction of the character the Duchess of Denver. Her name is mentioned on the sequence from the previous day, but she first appears in this strip.

If you look at her as Caniff drew her in the strip, she looks quite similar in some ways to Miss Mizzou; the only major difference is her haircut. This begs the question: Was the look of the Duchess influenced by Marilyn Monroe, just like Miss Mizzou? I kind of doubt it. While Monroe was starting to get some momentum in 1951 (She was named “Miss Cheescake” by the “Stars and Stripes” newspaper later in August.) the major feature that’s against this comparison is Monroe’s hair style. In 1950-1951, Monroe had a hairstyle that was mostly straight compared to the Duchess and her curly hair.

One might be tempted to think that the debut of the Duchess of Denver might have been a play by Caniff similar to the Miss Mizzou roll-out the next year; she’s seemingly named after a specific town after all. Unfortunately I doubt her debut caused many eyebrows to be furled in Colorado. The name “Duchess of Denver” was probably borrowed from the Lord Peter Wimsey mystery novels by Dorothy Sayers from the 1920s and 1930s, so I doubt Denver, Colorado, saw Caniff’s character as anything but a an amusing facsimile. If you read enough of Caniff you begin to see that he often references things from the 1920s and 1930s, just like many artists reference the influences of their younger years.