Scrooge

# 53 Dinky Duck # 2 - Bought from Tomorrow's Treasures Content: Three multi-pagers starring Dinky Duck Many 1 page gags with the usual TerryToons gang As per usual, the Toonopedia is a marvelous resource and we learn there that: "By the late 1930s, Disney was having great success with irascible but entertaining Donald Duck and Warner Bros. was starting to do the same with irascible but entertaining Daffy Duck. Terrytoons responded with Dinky Duck but though they got the species and the surname right, they missed the "irascible" part. Dinky was so non-irascible, he was downright cute. Dinky Duck made his debut in The Orphan Duck, which was directed by Connie Rasinski and released October 6, 1939. Terrytoons, never an innovator, was finally starting to experiment with color by then, but this was a black & white cartoon. Dinky made four more appearances during the next three years, all by Rasinski and only one, The Lucky Ducky (1940), in color. He was such a minor character that when, in 1942, Marvel Comics licensed the studio's properties for comic books, Dinky wasn't even included. In fact, the character disappeared from animation that same year, though he was picked up again in 1946. Nine more Dinky Duck cartoons (all in color) were released between then and 1953, all directed by Rasinski, Eddie Donnelly or Mannie Davis. The three were career Terrytoons men, and among them directed a large majority of the studio's releases over a period of about 20 years. Dinky's voice was provided by Paul Frees, also the voice of Ludwig von Drake, Crow (of The Fox & the Crow) and Rocky & Bullwinkle's Boris Badenov. [scanned from "Of Mice and Magic" by Leonard Maltin, here's an ad for the Terrytoons featuring our Dinky Duck next to his more famous studio stars] After that, hard times befell all the established Terrytoons characters. Founder Paul Terry retired, selling his studio to CBS. The new owner installed hotshot young Gene Deitch, straight from UPA Studio and Gerald McBoing-Boing, as creative director. Under Deitch, even stars like Mighty Mouse and Heckle & Jeckle went out of production, replaced by Tom Terrific, Silly Sidney and other 1950s-style characters. But a couple of years later, a few of the old characters started peeking out again. In 1957, Dinky appeared in It's a Living, directed by Win Hoskins. Hoskins was not one of the old Terrytoons regulars, and this fifteenth and final Dinky Duck cartoon was radically different in style from any that had gone before. The character then went out of production for good, as the studio moved on into bold, new directions such as Deputy Dawg, Hector Heathcote and others equally memorable. Even while the old characters were going out of production, they were getting new exposure on TV, as CBS exploited its Terrytoons properties to the hilt. During this period, they were licensed by a couple of minor comic book companies, St. John and Pines, where Dinky (a regular on The Heckle & Jeckle Show in the late '50s) finally made it into print. He was published in his own comic from 1951-58, 19 issues in all. He also appeared in the back pages of a few Dell and Gold Key comics during the early 1960s. Dinky Duck was last seen in on local TV stations, which ran him as part of a package that also contained Gandy Goose, The Mighty Heroes and other Terrytoons characters. Even there, however, he faded into complete obscurity around the late 1980s." Let me present to you the title screen to that original 1939 Dinky Duck cartoon: followed by his complete cartoonography: The Orphan Duck (1939) Much Ado About Nothing (1940) The Lucky Duck (1940) Welcome Little Stranger (1941) Life With Fido (1942) Dinky Finds A Home (1946) The Beauty Shop (1950) Flat Foot Fledgling (1952) Foolish Duckling (1952) Sink Or Swim (1952) Wise Quacks (1953) Featherweight Champ (1953) The Orphan Egg (1953) The Timid Scarecrow (1953) It's A Living (1957) showing that the early 50s were a busy time for our duck. Let me concentrate the scans on one particular story: The Joking [#@$%!!!]. The art you'll see even though crude is quite wild. If you pay attention to the next few pages, you'll notice how the artist plays with props such as the bag of tricks and with the way the toons interact with the readers off camera. I chose these words carefully since the story reads like a series of gags rather than a true story and has a story-board feel overall. Is this the case of a studio artist making a few more bucks on the side? Also, here's a one pager with Sourpuss to give you a flavor of the rest of the book. Finally, in keeping with the George Olesen coverage as a B-24 pilot, here's a picture of the Dinky Duck B-24.

Then, here's Beyond 9, a repeat from the Month thread

# 52 Tracy # 49 - Bought from Tomorrow's Treasures Content: Strip Reprint Many aspects to cover today as we will look at both the strip and its creator. We are all familiar with Tracy but here's his time and life as per Don Markstein's Toonopedia: "Steel-eyed and hawk-nosed, with a chin that could slice bologna, Chester Gould's Tracy made his debut on Oct. 4, 1931 — and crime comics were never again the same. Before long, American newspapers were crawling with Tracy knock-offs, including but far from limited to Red Barry, Radio Patrol and Secret Agent X-9. In the strip's first week, Tracy's girlfriend, Tess Trueheart, is kidnapped and her father murdered. Tracy joins the police as a plainclothes detective, tracks down the killers, and rescues Tess. He then decides to stick with the force. His determination, incorruptible honesty, and well-known willingness to use violence in excess of any that had ever before been seen in comics (devastatingly parodied by Li'l Abner's "ideal", Fearless Fosdick, Al Capp's strip-within-a-strip), combine to carry him quickly to the top of his profession — where he remains to this very day. It was Captain Joseph Patterson, the Chicago Tribune Syndicate editor who decisively influenced the direction of such diverse strips as Little Orphan Annie and Gasoline Alley, who named the strip (Gould wanted to call it "Plainclothes Tracy"), as well as Tracy's girlfriend. Although he never contributed so much as a single pen stroke to an actual published strip, Patterson's effect on American comics was profound. It's anybody's guess how much a snappy title contributes to a work's success, but the fact that " Tracy" rolls so easily off the tongue certainly didn't hurt. The Tracy strip quickly became famous for more than just its unflinching use of gunplay. Its villains soon became proverbial for their bizarre deformities. The Blank (1937), Little Face Finney (1941), Pruneface (1943), The Brow (1944), Shakey (1945), Pear Shape (1949) — these are only samples of an endless parade of memorably ugly criminals defeated by Tracy. So recognizable was the Tracy style of villain that when, in 1946, Daffy Duck came up against Jukebox Jaw, Pumpkin Head and Neon Noodle, viewers would have known who was being parodied even if Daffy hadn't done it under the name "Duck Twacy". The vast majority of those criminals appeared only once, because when Tracy kills 'em, he kills 'em dead. Another thing Tracy has always been famous for is up-to-date technology. In 1964, he traded in his two-way wrist radio, which had been given to him in 1946 by inventor Diet Smith, for a two-way wrist TV; and in '86 he exchanged the TV for a two-way wrist computer. It was the technological bent that led to what many consider the strip's low point — during most of the 1960s, it was dominated by a magnetically-powered vehicle called the Space Coupe, and the horned people that device brought back from the Moon. Gould seemed to regain balance after Apollo 11, and the strip came back down to Earth. (It is perhaps significant that Gould's two Reuben Awards — 1959 and '77 — neatly flank the "Space Coupe" era, but do not occur within it.) Tracy made an early and successful transition to comic books. He was the star of Super Comics, which also featured reprints of other Tribune strips, including Terry & the Pirates, The Gumps and Moon Mullins, from its beginning in 1938. Ten years later, he moved out into his own monthly title, still featuring reprints from the newspaper strip. Published first by Dell Comics and then by Harvey, it lasted until 1961. Since then, he has been published sporadically in that venue. In the late 1980s, Blackthorne Publishing undertook to put as much of the Tracy strip as it could into comic books, and before folding, succeeded in reprinting almost all of the pre-Space Coupe material. Tracy was a radio show from 1935-48, and the character was featured in a series of novels and Big Little Books during that time, as well. He made a leap into movies in 1937, when Ralph Byrd portrayed him in a 15-part serial from Republic Pictures. A long series of B-grade feature films followed, some with Byrd and some starring Morgan Conway as Tracy. They came out regularly for the rest of the 1930s and all through the '40s. A highlight was Tracy Meets Gruesome (1947), in which the eponymous bad guy was played by Boris Karloff. Tracy's screen career came to a close with a 1951-52 TV show, starring Byrd. In 1960, UPA, the studio that had done Gerald McBoing-Boing and Mr. Magoo, produced a seemingly endless series of five-minute TV cartoons of which Tracy was the titular star. For some reason, he never actually did any police work in these — his role was to assign each case to one of his assistants, who included such ethnically questionable detectives as Joe Jitsu and Go-go Gomez. Famous criminals from the strip, including dead ones, were used as recurring villains in this poorly produced and unfunny series. Tracy got a second shot at animated success in 1971, when he appeared in a few obscure segments on an Archie Saturday morning show, but that went nowhere. After that, Tracy went back to being just a comics character, until 1990. That was the year Warren Beatty starred in a major motion picture, in which great effort was made to capture both the feel and the look of the strip. Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman and Madonna played various villains in this film. In 1995, when the U.S. Postal Service issued its "Comic Strip Classics" series of commemorative stamps, Tracy was right up there with The Katzenjammer Kids, Little Nemo in Slumberland, Barney Google, and the rest of that select crowd. Chester Gould retired in 1977, and died in 1985. The writing of the strip was taken over by Max Allan Collins, a detective novelist and long-time fan of Gould's work, whose other comics credits include Ms. Tree; and the art by Gould's assistant, Rick Fletcher. Fletcher died in 1983 and the strip was passed on to Pulitzer-winning editorial cartoonist Locher, who, teamed with writer Michael Kilian, draws it today. The secret of Tracy's success? Not a great love of civil liberties, to be sure! No, Tracy has always been a tough cop — but an absolutely honest one, and compassionate toward the innocent and helpless. That's the combo that made him popular, and has kept him that way for seven decades." The current strip's page is located here and also offers several neat galleries including one of villains where we find our protagonist's nemesis from this comic listed: Mumbles. Today's comic reprints are from 1947, a year during which: "• The closed circuit TV police lineup makes its debut in the comics. • June 1, Sparkle Plenty, daughter of B.O. Plenty and Gravel Gertie, is born. Like her parents, Sparkle Plenty is extremely popular with fans. She inspires a line of dolls. • Junior creates Crimestoppers, a club introduced by Gould to get kids excited about safety. The syndicate receives a flurry of mail from readers asking if they can create local branches of Crimestoppers. • July 13, Brilliant concocts a miniature ring camera that Tracy wears on his finger. • December 7, Mumbles, a singer and conman whose nearly incoherent speech becomes endearing. He is deadly! • Notable villains include: Coffyhead, Gruesome, Mumbles and Hypo." For the complete strip's timeline, please browse to here. As for Chester Gould himself, let me quote the biography from the Comic Art & Graffix Library: "Born in Pawnee, Oklahoma on November 20, 1900 his first commercial illustrations were published in a local paper at age 7. Gould went to Oklahoma A&M from 1919 to 1921 when he decided to move to Chicago to attend Northwestern University, graduating in 1923. He did his first strip "Fillum Fables" for the Hearst syndicate in 1924 and several others strips including "the Girlfriend" for the Chicago Tribune before he had an idea to create a new type of comic strip lead. At the time mobsters were kings in Chicago. It was the heyday of Al Capone and these criminals were revered in the press and in public. Gould had seen enough! The public needed heroes to look up to not crooks. So he created a detective to do battle with them. When he showed his square-jawwed trench- coated cop to his publisher, Joseph Patterson, Patterson suggested that he change the name from "Plainclothes Tracy" to " Tracy" and history was written. The first detective hero in the strips, Tracy became a model for a variety of comic strip detectives including "Dan Dunn" and "Red Barry". From the first the villains that populated Tracy's world were the prototypical super villains of today. These seedy characters were often grotesque fiends whose very image foretold of their heinous crimes and their internal, moral bankruptcy. Stooge Viller, Doc Hump, Boris Arson, the Blank, Littleface Finny, Pruneface, the Mole, BB Eyes and of course the immortal Flattop. So famous were some of these villains that even though they each appeared in only one episode (the Mole returned for a second), they were each indelibly burned into the American psyche. Forty five years after Flattop died drowning in a daring escape from the detective, Gould still received mail from fans. He still stands as an icon of evil. But the character was not all that Gould contributed to the medium. He created an artistic style all his own that would be copied by dozens of artists over the years. Heavily dependant on huge swathes of black ink, his chiaroscuro extended to the psychic battle of good versus evil. Black ink versus white space was his tool. The morality of Tracy was inescapable. The Brow in his own attempt to escape Tracy plunges out of a window and is impaled on a flag pole, Boris Arson and his gang are gored by tigers guarding their own hideout, 88 Keys trying to hide in a small hole during a Chicago ice storm is sealed in to suffocate & freeze to death. That was the Gould way of retribution for your crimes against society at large. The popularity of Tracy did not go unnoticed by many. As early as 1936 he appeared in movies, he had a radio show and toys toys toys. There was not a single piece of merchandising that did not exploit his fame. But after many years Chet Gould finally decided he had enough and the creative team of Max Allan Collins & Rick Fletcher took over the strip in 1977. Since then Fletcher has been replaced by longtime Gould assistant Locher (Fletcher was also a Gould assistant). Gould died on May 10, 1985 but his visage of justice lives on in four colors every Sunday somewhere in the world. Thanks Chet." As for the artistic approach on the strip, here's an excerpt of Couton Waugh's opinion from The Comics: "[ Tracy] is another of the half-and-halfs; it is based on continued story, but the art work belongs to the earlier cartoon tradition, with a very particular, tight, defined style of its own. Chester Gould does, it is true, use perspective; but he makes no attempt to indicate the play of light and shadow that dances in nature. He takes each form as it comes before him, reduces it to an effective essential, and draws it with a hard, wooden outline. The process does no sound attractive; actually, however, it is extraordinarily effective; it allows Gould to dwell with a kind of passionate insistence on the procession of criminals who knife their way through the strip, and on the minute details connected with their crimes - both of which are presented there with more tang and force than in any other picturing crime we have before us. ... All details, however, lead to the great pictorial feature of the strip, the heads of the criminals; for the strip's tight style reveals them to the reader with all they dager souls unsheathed. Perhaps never have more horrible faces been conceived; compounded of folds and sinister deformities, they are diagrams, severe lines drawn around a black mouth or pouched eye slits. This master physiognomist is at his keenest when faced with such a problem as that of a man, with his jaws locked tight, who had previously been in freckled, rubicund health; whose very name of Laffy, points up the terror of the change. Once Laffy had fat jowls, which swayed with his mirth, but these are replaced by long, parched, drawn lines, and his eyes are dead, staring buttons filled with death." On to our visit with Mumbles who despite his apparent demise would return in 1955 only to die for good, drowned in a lake. P.S.: Every time I read this story with Mumbles, it reminds me of the "heavy" in Paul Grist's series Kane (even though Grist plays on the same concept of muddled speech but achieves the same effect via creative spelling).

# 51 Diary Loves # 20 - Bought from Mile High Subtitled Glimpses into the intimate secrets of girls in love Content: Winter Queen Carnival by ? 9 pgs Bad Company by ? 6 pgs Terror in my Heart by ? 8 pgs Kiss of Ecstasy by ? 7 pgs Quite a contrast as far as artist ID. This is one of four Romance titles published by Quality at the time; the other three were HeartThrobs, Love Confessions and Love Letters all of whom I already have. In fact I am only missing Ken Shannon and Marmaduke Mouse to have the 13 Qualitys I need. Reflecting the trend of the times, Quality then had short of 25% of its output covered by the Romance genre. Diary Loves endured for a while. It started with # 2 in November 1949 (as a continuation of Love Diary #1), lasted through # 31 (April 1953) before morphing into G.I. Sweethearts, the run of which Silver posted in the Shadow of the Atom Age thread. Diary Loves also happens to have participated in one of the hobby's oddities as it is documented as having been one of the books distributed under the covers of left-over covers to Red Circle # 4 as recounted here and reproduced here as well: "For anyone who thinks variant-type comic books are something relatively new, think again. Comic book variants have been around since at least the time when DC Comics (then, National) stuck a fifteen cent sticker over the original price of the 1940 World's Fair comic and re-released it for sale. What I think was one of the most interesting variants ever published was Red Circle No.4 (pictured above). Red Circle was published by Rural Home Publications (also known as Enwil Publications) from January to April of 1945, producing four issues. Each issue in the series contained stories about such characters as "The Pranster", "The Judge", or "Red Riot". But obviously, sometime in the early 1950's, this company discovered they had a LOT of left-over covers around for the 4th. issue. So they re-released the comic, but this time they put all of these covers on some OTHER comic! Now, other companies had re-released remainer issues before, most notable Fawcett with their Gift Comics in which they bound together various comics with a cover and re-sold them, and even EC did that with a title or two, but each time they'd created a new cover , AND, they'd used their own publications. Enwil wasn't so picky. They'd just used ANY coverless remainer comics they could find (or maybe even removed the original covers just so they could have coverless books) and reattached their OWN cover back on it. So finding a copy of Red Circle No.4(cover date April,1945) could have just about ANYTHING within it from the early 1950's. Some of the variations that are known are: Woman Outlaws(published by Fox), Dorothy Lamour (also by Fox), Crime Does Not Pay (Lev Gleason Pub.s), Sabu (Fox as well), Diary Loves (Quality Comics), Love Confessions (also Quality), Young Love (Prize Publications), as well as the above book (that is from my personal collection) which contains Strange Adventures #24 (from 1952, and is a National/DC Comic)." First Story Splash Second Story Splash - Bill Ward did work for this title before and after this issue. Just imagine what this slash would have looked had it been assigned to Bill. Second Story Page - Ouch! Check out that bottom tier left panel. No wonder she rats on him to the police on the next panel! Third Story Page - Yeah, yeah I know there is a lingerie panel - big deal. I see more skin just watching commercials. Third Story Page - I prefer her cleaned up for her date anyway Fourth Story Page

# 50 Detective Comics # 181 - Bought from Titan Comics Content: (and credits as per GCD) Win Mortimer Cover Batman and Robin in The Crimes of the Human Magnet by Jim Mooney 12 pgs Roy Raymond's Perfect Double by Ruben Moreira 6 pgs Robotman in The safest Safe in the World by Joe Certa (?) 6 pgs Pow-Wow Smith, Medecine Man by Leonard Starr 8 pgs Having all IDs on the art makes this too easy as compared to the next entry where I have no ID on art but because I have appreciated Jon et al.'s posting of early Mooney works in the GA threads, let's put the focus on Jim Mooney. Jim has done so much over the years it would be difficult to cover his career in depth and so for once the brevity of the Comiclopedia is welcome. It sums Jim's decades long career as follows: "Jim Mooney's career as a comicbook artist began in the Golden Age of comics, in 1940. Jim started at Ace and then went to Timely Comics where he met Stan Lee for the first time. At Timely he did his first funny animal work. Jim worked as a freelancer since there wasn't a great deal of work for him at Timely. So he started to work at Fiction House where he worked on 'Camilla' and 'Suicide Smith'. Mooney worked for many of the early Golden Age comic book publishers (namely Fox Features, Ace Comics, Quality Comics, Timely Comics, Fiction House and the famous Eisner-Iger Shop). Jim Mooney had found a professional home at DC Comics where he stayed for the next 22 years, from 1946 until 1968. He left DC when they changed their style and no longer had any work for him. Mooney worked on many of DC's (and Marvel's) top-selling characters, such as 'Spider-Man', 'Superboy', 'Supergirl' and 'Batman'. He then began work on Marvel's Spider-man. He has done continuing work on 'Elvira' for Claypool Comics and inked a retro 'Lady Supreme' story for Awesome Entertainment." There are several interviews with Jim available online varying in length and depth from the short at the AC website, to the longer here to the longest from CBA 7. What is nice to see is that Jim's still got it as you can judge from his commission work at this "official site" that carries many samples which I'd encourage you to browse. One of my favorites has to be: Batman Mooney Page Moreira Page Robotman Splash Pow-Wow Smith Starr Splash

Here you go Welcome to the boards. I really like that Marvel Mystery 66 you show on your website.

Since we now know she'll soon be back from the folks at Archie for her 60th, I guess it's time to show her as a young lady. Please share your Katys.

Adam, thank you for coming through with these. Could you describe the material / medium these are in / on and what's going on with this last one. What is it on? I assume we have more knowledgeable forum members who can tell us where in the production process this last piece fits? Those proofs are simply a marvel to look at. I really like this cover and need to get a copy soon.

# 49 Dead-Eye Western v.2 #8 - eBay purchase Content: Rico's Secret Saddle by George Olesen 6 pgs The Spiked Gun by ? 7 pgs The Story of the River by ? 6 pgs The Silent Draw by ? 5 pgs I can safely say we are dealing with the obscure Hillman western title today. Even though the series ran from Nov-Dec. 1948 to April-May 1953, it has nothing to call attention to itself (unless you count the fact that Krigstein did some work for the series, but who's counting?) which will be clearly illustrated today as the art is huhumm, pretty much in the vein of the Ace Magazine book of the other day. This is a sign that while there are diamonds in the rough in the third tier publishers books, there is also plenty of rough! We'll come back to Hillman later so let's concentrate on the one artist IDed in this book: George Olesen. According to the Comiclopedia, "George Olesen has been drawing since he was at school, doing art for school yearbooks and art magazines. While being a pilot during World War II, he drew a daily cartoon for the Officer's Mess. After the war, Olesen studied at the Pratt Institute, where he majored in illustration. In 1949 started working on the comic book 'Little Beaver'. He also drew the newspaper Sunday page Ozark Ike , created by Ray Gotto, in the mid 1950s. He later went on to NBC TV-news and became the only daily Metropolitan News artist. From 1965, he was also active as an advertising artist. In 1961, Olesen started pencilling Sy Barry's ' Phantom ' Sunday pages. In 1978 he also took on the daily stories." [NB: I linked to the Ozark Ike Toonopedia entry because Ike had his own comic book for a while as well] The entry is dated because I think he is no longer doing it since a time after 2000 as currently Paul Ryan is doing the dailies and Graham Nolan is doing the Sundays both on Tony DePaul scripts. I know I read an extensive interview with Sy Barry in the last year but I can't remember where and I wish I did because Sy was bound to have mentioned George as he did assist him for years. Here's the Who's Who of who worked on the Phantom, courtesy of the Comic Strip Project: THE PHANTOM art Ray Moore 36-48 asst. Wilson McCoy 42-48 Wilson McCoy 48-60 Bill Lignante 61 Sy Barry 61-95 asst. John Rosenberger (p) 74 asst. Andre LeBlanc asst. Rich Buckler 80's asst. Carmine Infantino 1 wk.- 61 asst. Jose Delbo asst. Don Heck 72-78 (asst. George Roussos) asst. Bob Forgione asst. Frank Springer asst. Joe Giella (p) 72-88 asst. George Oleson [sic] 60-95 asst. Ben Oda (letter) asst. Milt Snappin (letter) George Oleson 95-- asst. Keith Williams (i) asst. Fred Fredricks (i) wr Lee Falk 36-99 asst.wr. Rod Reed asst. Alfred Bester 42-45 So we see that George assisted Sy for 35 years before taking over the Sundays for a while and retiring when he was 75 or so as George was born in 1924. Here's another example of a long life in syndication. One of the surprising aspect of doing these write-ups is discovering the real extent and "relationship" of sorts between the comic books and the syndicate strips as we have seen artists weaving in and out of both fields, coming back to comic book when a syndication gig fell through, waiting for the next strip opportunity. George performed his duties during WWII as a B-24 Pilot in the Pacific as can be seen at this site as well did (either as a pilot or crew member) Robert Altman, Walter Matthau, George McGovern, Jack Palance, Jimmy Stewart and others and Robert Stack, Joe Kennedy, Jr and Tyrone Power were flying the PB4Y. Olesen Splash Second Story Splash Third Story Splash Fourth Story Splash P.S.: Adam, yes about the Daredevil. I am starting to develop a new "respect" for the Lev Gleason line after examining their output more closely. The books are well put together: well edited, cleanly illustrated, well crafted stories, production quality is high. Nothing gory but it's ok as it fits my personality better.

To quote Jon himself from the Have a Cigar thread where he answered that question before, here's Jon's assessment of his copy: "about a VG+, there is a small chip out of spine by the No. 1 and a sun shadow in lower right.....nice pages.....nice solid copy" Scrooge, the reference librarian

That's a very nice T-Man. That's a series that had a great streak of covers with T-Man going all over the world. As usual for this Quality series it has in my opinion better covers than the ACG Soldiers of Fortune series who had the same potential for exotic locales. Here's another Airboy. From the Gerber I thought I'd like the cover more than I realized once I had the book in hand (even ignoring extensive writing on the cover). What are your opinion on this one? Oh well, there are many other good covers in this series. GP: you mentioned Rex's scarcity earlier; I was about to tell you I never see #1 but one was put on eBay tonight so you never know. I see # 2 about once or twice a year on eBay but I don't really recall seeing # 3. I have never seen the Congo Bills.

I'd trade my collection for his. But I'd still miss my 50s stuff. If he just gave me his, then I'd have everything. Not true. You'd still be short of a PWC 102 and to me that would be a sad hole in your collection. Soooo let me offer you this trade to fill that eye-sore. I'll take off your hand that trashy FC 386 and send you a nice copy of PWC 102 in exchange. I have been answering too many emails tonight. tth2

# 48 Daredevil featuring The Little Wise Guys # 84 - Bought from A1 Comics at San Diego Content: Vicious Cycles by Norman Maurer 9 pgs Dilly Duncan of Dorset High in Sherlock Duncan by ? 6 pgs Scarecrow does it again by William Overgard 10 pgs Ahh, some of our regulars are back. We've seen Overgard in both Black Diamond Western as the creator of the feature and in Boy Comics and Maurer did also the first story in the same Boy Comics. Let's first talk about The Little Wise Guys. Here's an excerpt from the Toonopedia entry for Daredevil dealing with The Little Wise Guys and how they took over the series: "Daredevil Comics #13 (October, 1942) introduced The Little Wise Guys, a kid gang along the lines of Gene Byrnes's Reg'lar Fellers or DC Comics' Newsboy Legion. Reader interest in these new supporting characters was kicked up a notch two issues later when one of them, Meatball, was killed off. After that, The Little Wise Guys consisted of Scarecrow, Peewee, Jocko and Curly. The series continued that way for years, Daredevil and his four quasi-sidekicks. But toward the late '40s, when superheroes fell out of fashion, Daredevil was de-emphasized. As the decade closed, he was generally there just to introduce stories in which The Little Wise Guys were the stars. After the 69th issue (December, 1950), he didn't even do that. Daredevil Comics continued years longer, but Daredevil was no longer a member of the cast. The series ended in 1956, when the publisher left the comic book business." And here's an excerpt from Bob Rozakis column (located here if you want an extended entry for Daredevil in its hero days): "Infinitely more significant was the debut of a kid gang called the Little Wise Guys (Pee Wee, Scarecrow, Meatball and Jock) in #13 (October, 1942). The quartet immediately became co-stars in the strip and, in #15's pivotal episode, nearly took over entirely. After Pee Wee was seized by a gang called the Steamrollers, Meatball set out on a desperate mission to rescue him, trudging through falling snow and hiding in frigid waters before he succeeded. Unfortunately, he did so at the cost of his life. Heartsick that Meatball died of pneumonia because of him, Curly of the Steamrollers helped bring his old gang to justice and became one of the Wise Guys from that point onward. Charles Biro was, as some have noted, the Stan Lee of his era and the Lev Gleason Publications have many of the hallmarks of the Silver Age Marvels, from the intense, humanized characterization of the stories to the immodest twin taglines that sandwiched the Daredevil logo throughout most of the 1940s ("The Comic Magazine That Dared To Be Different" and "The Greatest Name In Comics") to the personal dialogue Biro had with readers in his letter columns. Norman Maurer, only fourteen when he began working for the Biro/Wood studio, recalled some of his excursions with Biro in an interview in THE COMICS BUYER'S GUIDE #575 (1984). "We'd drive around, see a bunch of kids playing stickball (he would pull over, he loved kids, especially boys -- I don't mean that way -- 'cause Charlie was quite a ladies man), and we would pull up and stop the game and say, "I'm Charles Biro and I do DAREDEVIL, and he would sit there for hours talking with those kids. And I think that's why (strictly speculation on my part), he switched DAREDEVIL to a kid's story with kid characters. "As I say, it's strictly speculation. I think it was a first love. He wanted to do something about kids so he gave DAREDEVIL a bunch of kids and finally the kids took over the story. I can tell you there've been maybe 50 occasions, where I've been with Charlie, when he would pull over, stop the car and get out and start talking to a bunch of kids. They just loved it, they ate it up and he ate it up, too!" Whatever the reason the Wise Guys took over, the public's appetite for costumed heroes was clearly on the wane. During 1947, the kids had pretty much replaced DD on the covers of the book and, three years later, he exited the series altogether. In issue #69 (December, 1950), he left the U.S. to play bodyguard for a ruler in Eastern nation of Tarkabia. He returns to visit the Wise Guys in #s 79 and 80 during 1951, revealing that "the Air Force is going to call me any day, and I wanted to see you guys before I left." And that was it for DD. The Little Wise Guys continued in the book bearing his name until #134 (September, 1956). It was, ironically, the same month that DC launched the modern version of the Flash in SHOWCASE #4 and ignited a new wave of popularity for costumed heroes. Poor Bart Hill not only didn't get to share in the revival but also lost the rights to his name when Marvel rolled out blind attorney Matt Murdock as their version of Daredevil in 1964. Pete Morisi, who'd done work for Lev Gleason in the 1940s, reported in COMIC BOOK ARTIST #9 (2000) that he'd actually attempted to buy the rights to Daredevil in the early 1960s. Gleason gave him his okay but Biro balked, requesting a percentage of future profits. Morisi said no and went on to create a hero of his own for Charlton in a scaled-down version of DD's red and blue costume - Peter Cannon ... Thunderbolt." Our artist of interest today is Norman Maurer As usual if there is an unusual connection between our hobby and the world at large it is that information that will be clamored over and over so let's get it out of the way: "Norman Maurer was the son-in-law of one of the Three Stooges. Maurer was married to the former Joan Howard, the daughter of the Stooge’s bowl-haired leader, Moe Howard." A (very) short biography of Norman states: "Producer/director Norman Maurer got his start as a comic book illustrator when he was a teen working on such series as The Little Wiseguys and Boy Comics. He also was a ghostwriter for Hank Ketcham on Dennis the Menace and did a series of comic books based on the Three Stooges. Maurer became a producer in 1956 and made a few entries in the Three Stooges' series. He then spent 15 years managing the rambunctious threesome. Maurer became a story editor and writer for Hanna-Barbera in 1975 and later became a cartoon consultant for CBS television." Norman was also a long time collaborator of Joe Kubert, especially when "[they] first invented 3-D comics for St. John Publishing in 1953. When "Three-Dimension Comics" featuring Mighty Mouse sold a million copies in less than a week (at 25 cents each when most 4-color comics were selling for a dime) the publisher wanted to convert all St. John comics to 3-D in a big hurry. So Joe and Norman hired a bunch of extra artists to convert the flat St. John comics to depth. They all got a case of the "3-DTs" and produced this funny story that appeared in "Whack" 3-D Comics." And finally, if you want to know more about Joe and Norman correspondance course, refer back to your CBA 3 to know all about the Comic Book Illustrators Instruction Course along with a Kubert interview about the project. Maurer Story Splash - Notice the editorial comment by Biro, testament to his truthful dedication to children and their welfare Dilly Duncan Story Splash Dilly Duncan Page Overgard Story Splash

# 47 Dale Evans # 22 - eBay purchase Content: (with Credits as per the GCD) The Challenge of the Cheyenne Princess by Jim McArdle 8 pgs Sierra Smith in The Double who almost Died by Allen Ulmer 8 pgs Pal's Last Ride by Jim McArdle 8 pgs While the official site for Dale Evans and Roy Rogers is here and a biography of Dale is there on the official site. I prefer the Old Corral presentation with its illustrations. The Old Corral text tells us that: "Frances Octavia Smith was born October 31, 1912 in Texas. But there's a bit of confusion or mystery with this, and I asked Bobby Copeland for some further info. Bobby writes: "although Dale has always claimed, and her mother told her, that she was born Frances Octavia Smith on October 31, her birth certificate lists her birth date as October 30, and her name as Lucille Wood Smith. As a youngster she loved cowboys and her favorite was Tom Mix." She began her career vocalizing on the radio in the late 1930s as well as being the resident songbird with a couple of big bands ... and she adopted the name of Dale Evans. Dale also had a child and was on her third marriage. Her radio work included a season as the featured vocalist on the popular THE CHASE AND SANBORN HOUR (which starred Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy). She was signed to a contract by 20th Century Fox, but all she got were bit parts, and her contract option wasn't renewed. Herbert Yates, the boss at Republic Pictures, signed her to a term player contract and these agreements ran from April, 1943 through December, 1947. In her early Republic contract days, Dale got some screen work including IN OLD OKLAHOMA (Republic, 1943), which starred John Wayne. The story goes that Yates was much impressed with the broadway musical Oklahoma, and made the decision to enhance the Roy Rogers' westerns with lavish musical numbers ... basically a lot of singin' and dancin'. The first film pairing of Roy and Dale was THE COWBOY AND THE SENORITA (Republic, 1944), and their last was PALS OF THE GOLDEN WEST (Republic, 1951). PALS was also Roy's finale at Republic. Roy and Dale clicked on screen and off. In many of their film collaborations, Dale played a heroine who was feisty, hot-headed, and independent. And quite often during the early reels, she was cantankerous and abusive to poor ol' Roy. She was definitely not the typical sagebrush heroine who had a few lines and was a passive figure in the background. Dale's roles in the Rogers' films were often that of an author, newspaper writer, or the usual "gal/relative from back East who comes West". Some examples of the comedic hijinks and interplay between the two follow: In SAN FERNANDO VALLEY (Republic, 1944), Roy is almost run over by a car driven by Dale. The pair wind up getting arrested and spend some time behind bars of a prison wagon. And Roy gets Dale to agree to a date, but when he arrives to pick her up, down comes a bucket of water that was set by Dale. In ALONG THE NAVAJO TRAIL (Republic, 1945), Roy has to rescue Dale from a dunking in a lake. In RAINBOW OVER TEXAS (Republic, 1946), Dale gets pitched off a boat, makes it to shore, dons some men's clothing, and hides out in a railroad car where she is found by her idol, radio and recording star Roy Rogers. In ROLL ON TEXAS MOON (Republic, 1946), Dale is in the water again, this time due to a car mishap, and Roy has to rescue her. Dale and Roy were married on December 31, 1947. Roy's wife Arline (not Arlene with an e) had passed away a year earlier. Dale was married in 1937 and divorced in 1946 from Republic musical director Robert Dale Butts. From 1944-1951, Roy and Dale appeared together in 29 films --- there was a yearlong break when Dale had a baby. (Want more info on the specific films and film titles in which Dale starred with Roy? Click HERE for the filmography on Roy Rogers, and look under the column marked Leading Lady.) And when Roy exited Republic in 1951, he and Dale went into television with their THE ROY ROGERS SHOW, and the popular series ran on NBC from 1952-1957 before going into reruns and syndication. Dale also played herself during several years of the radio THE ROY ROGERS SHOW which was broadcast from 1944-1955 on NBC and Mutual (as best I can recall, songstress Pat Friday played Dale during some of the radio show run). Of course, there were all kinds of products carrying Roy and Dale's name and likeness. And they both had comic book series. Dale's movie career lasted about ten years and about 45 films, most of which were for Republic. Of these, 30 were westerns. In real life, Roy and Dale wrote songs, created their own Museum in Victorville, California, adopted and raised a bunch of children, were most vocal about their Christian beliefs, and supported many charitable causes. But there were some difficult times, including the death of several of their children. Dale is also a prolific author, and probably her most remembered novel is Angel Unaware, the best seller which was about their daughter Robin. Their theme song "Happy Trails to You", was composed by Dale. Overall, a classy lady ... and a classy couple that were appropriately billed as "The King of the Cowboys" and "Queen of the West". Dale Evans passed away on February 7, 2001." Dale's adventures lasted in DC for only 24 issues, all of which are on display here at Mike's Amazing World of DC website. The DC run stopped in 1952 and Dale went on to comic adventures for Dell. It appears contemporaneous (more or less) to the start of their show on NBC and probably a lot of contracts were renegotiated and Dell was willing to pay more. As for our artists, they were completely unknown to me in the sense I had never even heard their names. Here's what the Internet tells us about Jim McArdle from the Comic Strip Project: McArdle, Jim b. (1899) st. Fordham Univ., ASL, NAD staff - Brooklyn Eagle cs "Dr. Bobbs," 1940-1952 cs "Davy Crockett," 1952-1959 d. Feb. 11, 1960 As per the GCD, his career in comics starts in 1948 with Dale Evans and once the series stops, he moves over and works first in the War books: Star Spangled War Stories and Our Army at War, has quite a bit of Tomahawk work for a series of "The Legend of ..." stories, and occasionally works in Mr. District Attorney, Gang Busters, House of Mystery, House of Secrets, Tales of the Unexpected until he dies young at 61. Interestingly, he is of an older generation and apparently came to the comics via the newspaper world. Allen Ulmer bio found online on here at a gallery site, hence the flavor of this write-up. "Allen Ulmer (1922 - 1990) Born and educated in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Allen Ulmer started drawing at an early age. He he has studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia, and the Art Students League in New York. After graduating high school he moved to New York , where his talents earned him almost immediate success in the art field. Mr. Ulmer's professional career began in the field of Magazine Illustration. Ulmer was soon Illustrating such popular magazine and newspaper features as The Shadow, The Green Hornet, The Saint, Tarzan, and others. These early original illustrations are in some world wide collections. Mr. Ulmer turned to Fine Arts in the late 1950's. His great love fro realism too him from Oils to Watercolor and Egg Tempera. Many of his paintings are in private collections, Libraries and Educational Institutions. He has had many successful on man shows and won numerous awards for watercolor and tempera mediums. In the 1960's, after a successful Commercial art career in Illustrating, he turned to fine art. Soon watercolor became his favorite medium, He now devotes his full time to painting. He is a member of the Salmagundi Club and the Huntington Art League Many of his early illustrations are prized by collections today. He is listed with the best illustrators of his time in the who's who of A.A.S.I." As per the GCD (if the Al Ulmer credits are for the same artist), Al worked extensively for Holyoke on Catman and Captain Aero comics and also worked for Hillman on Air Fighters, Clue eventually finding his way to DC and Dale Evans. This is a time I wish I had a subscription to the Who's Who so I wouldn't miss some credits between 1944 and 1948. First Story Splash Second Story Page Third Story Spash

# 46 Blondie # 16 - Bought from Mile High - Part of the Ronny Garcia Collection Content - Let me show you the ToC I have already profiled this strip when I showed the Blondie comic. At that time, I concentrated on the history of the strip, referring you its Toonopedia entry and highlighting the strip's creators and contributors over the years. Today, let me talk more (or at least let others talk) about why the strip was and still is popular. Coulton Waugh in his 1947 book The Comics declared it the Number 1 Strip for the following reasons: "Blondie’s eminence over other […] strips is probably due to a few very simple factors: 1. She is prettier and cuter than other strip heroines, yet she’s no sloe-eyed vixen. With all her sex, she’s “good”, and so are the gags. 2. Dagwood is young, which makes the whole marriage more romantic. He may be dumb, but he’s a “good skate.” The fact that he isn’t too strong or clever makes us feel better about ourselves. If a Blondie goes for Dagwood, just think what we rate. If he were Tarzan, we’d be left out. 3. There’s romance in the house. Compared with the back-biting Gumps, or eternally nagging squabbles of Mr. and Mrs. Cute, homy things happen, such as the making of enormous “icebox sandwiches,” following some midnight bout with a teething baby. (They are becoming embedded in the language as “Dagwoods.”) 4. The truth and brightness of the small Bumstead clan also helps, for Baby Dumpling was followed by Cookie, an equally famous toddler, and there is a hilarious dog Daisy, and a raft of hilarious pups. 5. When the boys came home and married, there were millions more Blondies and Dagwoods to experiment with the fascinations and frustrations of life in a cottage built for two or more. These are days when the young husband is apt to roll up his sleeves and help with the dishes, which is exactly what Dagwood would do, or at least what Blondie would expect him to do. This pair reflects the lives of a large group of people at the present time, which is proved by the fact that when newsprint paper was made available after the war, and news comics came into existence, it was “Blondie” which most of the newcomers tried to imitate. Yes, it’s not a bad strip to have on display as the favorite. It shows that in their hearts people enshrine sweet and normal things: youth, romance, home, and babies yelling for milk." We learn from R.C. Harvey about Baby Dumpling in his Children of the Yellow Kid: "In 1934, the Bumstead had a baby; christened Alexander (after Flash Gordon cartoonist Alex Raymond, who had assisted on Blondie the preceding year), the boy was called Baby Dumpling, and his arrival sparked another leap in circulation. (Tragically, Young's first-born, Wayne, died of jaundice in 1937, in the midst of Baby Dumpling's popularity; a sorrowing Young and his wife took a year-long sabbatical in Europe to recover, while the strip was continued by his assistant, Raymond's brother Jim, who drew the strip until he died in 1981.)" Before moving on today's comics scans, let me show you two older strips depicted in Harvey's book to show you the strip's look evolution: December 7, 1930 (I had to play with the scans to make them, hopefully, readable) December 5, 1937 First story Splash Dagwood doing home repairs Dagwood prepping a Dagwood Dream sequence as Dagwood escapes through the laundry chute

Thanks Adam, I had never seen as large a scan of this book before nor have I seen it in person. It is up on eBay regularly so it's not that rare but generally since Guide is so high the opening bid is unrealistic. Now that I can see, I like the cover even more. I had never really noticed the caravane of UFOs in the background nor had I ever paid attention to the embossing on the main figure's belt-buckle. Yes, I'll be glad to have it in the collection some day.

Easy post today. Here are the C I still need. Not pictured here is Combat Kelly # 3.

# 45 Crime Suspenstories # 9 - Bought from Tomorrow's Treasures Content: Understudy to a Corpse by Johnny Craig 8 pgs Medicine by Jack Kamen 7 pgs Cut! by Jack Davis 6 pgs A Tree Grows in Borneo by Ghastly Ingels 7pgs It is not easy for me to sit down and plan this one out as so much is known and has been written about EC and its gang and I would only been duplicating common knowledge but I'll try. We'll focus on our cover artist today: Johnny Craig (on far left). Here's where we see the limitation of the Comiclopedia as their entry is this paltry: "Johnny Craig joined EC Comics in 1947 after attending the Art Students League. At first he worked on the Love comics ('Modern Love' - a moon, a girl... Romance); later he did the lead stories on 'The Vault of Horror'. Unlike other E.C. artists, Craig not only drew but also scripted his own stories and soon he was in charge of the whole comic book. His style of artwork was clean and uncluttered, and gave the stories a spine-chilling Hitchcock-style atmosphere. Many of his covers for 'The Vault of Horror' were very controversial at the time. Johnny Craig died 13 September 2001, aged 75." For a more detailed overview of Craig's life, I would recommend jumping over to Mark Evanier's site where he keeps his Craig obit up. Here's an excerpt about Craig and pencilling: "From all accounts, Johnny Craig was a slow, meticulous craftsman. "Jack Davis was our fastest artist and Johnny was our slowest," Bill Gaines once recalled. "This was not to say Johnny also wasn't our best, or one of our best, but we couldn't always get a story out of him for every book and I regretted when we had to go to press without a Craig story in there somewhere." Craig once explained his problem: "I had no formal art training...no art training in any real sense. I learned to draw by trial-and-error, and I continued to work the same way. I was never satisfied by the first version I did, or the second, and often not the third. I'd draw things over and over, roughing them out, correcting them until I got them close to the way I wanted. I usually wasn't satisfied with what I ended up handing in, either, but I had to hand something in." It was frustrating for the EC crew and for Craig himself, but readers loved his work, especially his covers. "He did some of our best covers," Gaines recalled. "Including the infamous severed head cover, which may be the most famous cover ever in comics, and certainly the only one ever to be the focus of an inquiry before the United States Senate." so this would explain that in final analysis, as Evanier again states: "In a career that spanned roughly four decades, Mr. Craig favored us with fewer than 150 stories, most of them no longer than 7 or 8 pages. That such a relatively small body of work has been so influential and well-remembered is testimony to his skill. He was an enormous favorite of virtually everyone who encountered his wonderful, unassuming imagination." Incidentally, Mark Evanier also mention an EC book in yesterday's blog (you might have to scroll down): Foul Play! with a Craig image. The book sounds interesting and I'd gladly listen to any opinions about it. On the lighter side, For a few more of these which I couldn't upload here, please go here. Craig Page Kamen Splash Davis Splash Ingels Splash

Since people don't mind the PWCs, here's the first American Eagle. There are "better" covers in this series but I don't have all of them. Could anyone please post a copy of 102?

# 44 Crime Must Pay the Penalty # 24 - eBay purchase Content: Strange Fate of Alibi Mike by ? 8 pgs "This is Big Mouth Speaking!" by ? 7 pgs Terry Foley - Colossus of Crime by ? 7 pgs The Nine Lives of King Crown by ? 8 pgs Notice that there is a logic to these write-ups. Yesterday Crime must Lose! and obviously it must be followed that Crime Must Pay the Penalty once it lost. Considering that Ace (or Ace Magazines) published comics for 16 years from 1940 to 1956, I have read (and could find) very little about this outfit. Certainly, the 50's output was not much to recommend as you will see with these pages and few would claim their pre-code horror are a sight to marvel at but if you've kept track of Jon and Adam's posting elsewhere, they put out cool books in the 40's. In contrast to EC's 9 books for this month (one of which we will see tomorrow), Ace had 10: Baffling Mysteries Beyond Crime Must Pay the Penalty Glamorous Romance Hand of Fate Love at First Sight Love Experiences Real Love Ten-Story Love Web of Mystery thereby putting out 4 horror, 1 crime and 5 romance books. For little more about Crime Must Pay the Penalty, you can browse this way where we see that: "Crime Must Pay the Penalty started out by retelling true stories of gangsters and other criminals. These early stories are lurid and terrible. Eventually it moved on to more modern material. The later stories still claim to be based on actual events. This is hard to confirm or deny, but one suspects that the later and better issues are pure fiction. Crime Must Pay the Penalty is a transformed version of the super-hero comic book, Four Favorites. When super-heroes lost their popularity in the later 1940s, many such comics were converted over to genre material, such as Westerns. The first issue of the new crime format continued the numbering of Four Favorites, and was #33 (February 1948). The next (and second) issue was then labeled #2 (June 1948). The new magazine ran through #48 (January 1956). The last two issues simply had the title Penalty. The logo of the comic had long featured the word "Penalty" in vastly bigger letters than the rest of the phrase "Crime Must Pay the", so this is not that much of a change." I would also explore the main page at that site for links to many similar articles across all genres. This is where I gathered a lot of the Big Town material. Also this is where I found the information I just posted in the Comics go to War thread. All well worth a look. Story 1 Splash Story 2 Splash Story 3 Page Story 4 Splash P.S.: Adam, I found an old post in the Atlas group from Doc V. agreeing with your opinion about the Roussos story. It is Roussos, scripted by Carl Wessler.

From Adam's compiled list I've just found another site to help us in this inventory. This is only one piece of the puzzle but the site does provide an "index to some comic book stories offering political and social commentary." I didn't have time to look too deep into it but at least there appears to be an earlier mention of concentration camp (to be confirmed that it is what we are looking for) as seen in: Star Spangled Comics 1 (October 1941) The Bund Saboteurs - anti-Nazi Bunds in US 2 (November 1941) Vortex of Doom - anti-slum lord 3 (December 1941) Mission to Germany - anti-Nazi, concentration camp (my emphasis) I don't have a Star Spangled Comics 3 (nor 2 nor 1) so if someone on the boards could look this up in their copy that's be great. Hope this helps you Mark. Oh and you can always crack open that Rockford copy of # 1 listed on your site to read all about saboteurs

Adam, thanks for sharing these again. And you're right the proof looks better than my copy would let on. I still need that 86. What do you think of the coloring choices on the warrior's leggings though? Oh and I do like the cover to the 117 but remember that I was following the Everett Mystic.

GP, nice Everett cover on that Mystic. It had to happen eventually. I present to you American Eagle versus an american eagle. Not the best cover but I like bald eagles.

Thanks for the kind words Sal. If I can have every or any comic fan at least to give a looksy at these 50's books, I am happy. I should point out to everyone that the Lambiek site is what I refer to when I say Comiclopedia if I wasn't clear about it before. I try as best I can to cite my sources so as not people to think I plagiarize. As Sal mentions, while not always a thorough resource, it is at times the only source of information about some of the artists whose artwork is displayed in my books.

# 43 Crime Must Lose # 11 - Bought from Southern California Comics Content: Mob Rule by Tony DiPreta 8 pgs Not Dead Enough by ? 4 pgs The Man in the Lake by ? 5 pgs Man Hunt by Jack Keller 6 pgs Yes, another Atlas crime book but let's cheer up as it is the last (at least for now). You'll notice that it is again the same crew on this book: DiPreta and Keller. In all honesty, while Keller wasn't out to wow you (and as Romita, Sr. once said "I could have used the Keller method and put smoke in the panel" when describing a scene a scripter (Stan) packed with a complete battlefield, reflecting that Jack could take shortcuts), he is the most consistent artist in this batch (and his style is clean). However, our focus today is Tony DiPreta who, according to the Comiclopedia, "[w]hile still at school, Tony Di Preta started out as a letterer on Lyman Young's 'Tim Tyler's Luck'. Afterwards, he took art courses at the universities of Columbia and Connecticut. He worked on several series, like 'Doll Man' (1941), 'Airboy' (1943) and 'Daredevil' (from 1942). In 1949 he became an assistant to Lank Leonard on 'Mickey Finn'. After working with Leonard for ten years he took over the 'Joe Palooka' series. Di Preta illustrated this series until the final episode in 1984. The next year he succeeded Marvin Bradley on the daily 'Rex Morgan' comic." Note that since Tony has retired as per this syndicate announcement: "May 25, 2000 - Readers can expect a bold, new look to Rex Morgan, M.D in the weeks to come. After drawing the famous comic strip for more than 15 years, artist Tony DiPreta has decided to retire. Beginning with the June 19 release, the new artist for Rex Morgan, M.D will be Graham Nolan. He will work with writer Woody Wilson on the strip, which is syndicated by King Features to more than 300 newspapers. "Tony DiPreta has done a great job on Rex Morgan. In selecting Graham Nolan to pick up the artist's reins on the strip, I was impressed by how well he captured the crisp, realistic drawing style that first made soap opera strips a daily reading habit for so many fans," says King Features editor-in-chief Jay Kennedy." If you sit down and do the math, Tony's strip longevity can only be praised. You'll note that this makes 25 years on Joe Palooka - 1959 to 1984 and then 16 years on Rex Morgan - 1984 - 2000 when he retired at age 79. So far, I am not counting his prior assist on other strips such as over 15 years on Mickey Finn for a total of 25 + 15 + 16 = 56 years in syndication! Tony's association with Lank Leonard and the Mickey Finn and Joe Palooka strips is recollected in AE 43's interview with Morris Weiss who, after turning down drawing the strip, wrote Joe Palooka for DiPetra from 1961 to 1973. DiPetra Splash Unknown Splash Unknown Splash (even though I'd been darned if we didn't see this guy here before) Keller Splash