This photograph originates from the historic archive of William Randolph Hearst's San Francisco Examiner newspaper. In addition to being the flagship of Hearst's newspapers, it was his original paper which he took over in 1887, and was the basis for the 1941 Orson Welles film, Citizen Kane. The date stamp indicates it was catalogued for the Examiner's Reference Library on January 31, 1950. The strip was for 03/08/1949 - so the article must have been in the works for a while! Al Williamson believes that Raymond mainly used models for publicity purposes and as a tax write-off. He probably liked to see pretty girls in bathing suits, too!
“The model should be freely interpreted and used only as a writer would use a dictionary; that is, for reference. I seldom use a model now. When I do, it is simply to check and correct drawings of figures that have already been drawn and to facilitate the drawing of a difficult pose or to help me work out difficult or more dramatic lighting of the figure.” (Alex Raymond in Roberts, ALEX RAYMOND, HIS LIFE AND ART, p.300)
