Tim Hanley

All the boys go crazy for her.

Archie is like middle class.

Veronica's quite rich, so he can't afford to take her to the fancy restaurants or all the expensive places she want to go.

And that creates a new dynamic in the comics where Archie has to work now, so there's a lot more struggle.

And so while Betty was there originally, within a few years, she kind of fades into the background.

Then Veronica is really the dominant one for the next little while until they reach a sort of equilibrium.

Betty and Veronica barely spoke to each other at all.

Archie was the focus and they sort of revolved around him.

They were satellites to Archie.

By the mid-1940s, they were putting out, I think, at least four or five of them, and it was only growing from there.

And comics back in the day were about 72 pages long.

It was a lot of material.

So it was these two female characters taking on what was a typically male story.

Just having the girls there, having them read their own stories was completely accidental, but massive for the characters and for the world of Archie as a whole.

Bay and Veronica could do what Archie and Jughead did.

They could have all these crazy antics.

They're terrible cooks.

They could play sports and get into all these activities.

In the 1940s, there were a lot of stories that involved cross-dressing.

There'd be a dance competition and Veronica would put on some pants and a sweater and would dance with Betty and they'd win the contest.