Scrooge

# 24

Boy meets Girl # 21 - Bought from Basement Comics

Content:

I hated the man I love by R. Atkinson 7 pgs [signed]

Danger Point! by ? 6 pgs

Unfinished week-end by ? 7 pgs

False Honeymoon by ? 6 pgs

Well, folks, it had to start. I have many romance comics and we somehow avoided all of them until today. Sadly, I can't claim this is one of the best offering of the genre so there goes my goal to sway the hobby's mind to give a chance to these comics.

Nonetheless, this will not prevent me from making an entry of it, especially since against all odds for romance work, the first story is signed and by no other than R. Atkinson, read Ruth Atkinson (Ford). A brief bio from Comiclopedia tells us that:

"Ruth Atkinson was one of the many female comic artists who worked for publisher Fiction House, where she drew 'Skull Squad' and 'Wing Tips'. She became the company's art director, a job which she quit because it did not leave her time to draw. She became a freelancer, launching the first issues of 'Millie the Model' and 'Patsy Walker' for comic book editor Stan Lee. By the end of the 1940s, Ruth Atkinson also drew romance comics, such as 'How Did He Propose?' for Lover's Lane. She left the comics field to get married and have children."

which is doing her career a disservice considering how important Millie and Patsy were for Timely / Atlas in terms of overall output. Plus, this puts her working with Stan because as Doc V. tells us: "MILLIE THE MODEL, TESSIE THE TYPIST and NELLIE THE NURSE were, at the very least, co-created by Stan. Their #1 issues featured covers by Mike Sekowsky. MILLIE THE MODEL and PATSY WALKER were inaugurated with artwork by Ruth Atkinson, an artist whose style would be the template for all Millie and Patsy Walker artists to follow." Trina Robbins places more importance to this early work on Timely characters in her short obit for Ruth:

"Ruth Atkinson Ford died of cancer June 1st [1997]. According to Trina Robbins, Ford was one of the earliest female cartoonists to work in comic books.

Ford began working for Fiction House in 1943, at a time when they had more women drawing for them than other comic book publisher. She became the company's art director and roomed with Lily Renee, their star woman artist.

Art directing left her too little time for actual drawing and she left Fiction House to freelance. Her earliest work was for Timely's (now Marvel) most famous and longest lasting girl comics characters. She drew the first issue of Millie the Model in 1945 and most of the first two years of Patsy Walker.

By the late '40s and through the early '50s, Ford was drawing for the Lev Gleason romance comics. Gone were the perky teen-age comics of earlier day, enjoyed by both girls and boys, for the heavier romance themes that only girls seemed to be able to stomach."

Did you notice the comment about Fiction House having more women drawing than other publsihers. That is confirmed in this interview excerpt with Murphy Anderson:

"Q: When you were working for the big comics studios, you said you had an office and a desk?

MA: Yeah, when I started at Fiction House they had offices where the "three sixes" are. If you know New York at all, that's where DC was located for many years.

Q: Most of those people working in those offices at the time were men; there were very few women

MA: No, just the opposite! When I started there they were all ladies, practically. There were only two or three males in there.

Q: What were the ladies doing? Comic books?

MA: Oh yeah, oh yeah. There was Fran Hopper, she did a number of adventure stories for Planet Comics and all over. Lilly Renée who did their lead feature for Planet Comics. Oh, Ruth McCully was a letterer. Ruth Atkinson was an artist who worked there. Her brother happened to be a very prominent jockey; he was one of the top jockeys in the country at the time. And Marcia Snyder, she did a very heavy adventure-type of material.

Q: Was that because it was around the war years?

MA: Oh sure, it was war time. There was a shortage of anyone to do the stuff. How do you think a 17-year-old kid could walk in and get a job?"

Story page from Ruth:

Splash for the cover story (Oddly this is the last story in the book)

Series Trivia: The series would change name before ending to become Boy Loves Girl (and as Scott Shaw! points out, there is some internal logic that Love arrives after they meet). Here's a cover example for the book after the title change. I always wondered why they use a baseball stitch for this dress though

# 23

Boy Comics # 75 - Bought from ? at last year's Chicago con.

Content:

The Space Platform by Norman Maurer 10 pgs

Atom Bullets by William Overgard 8 pgs

Loot in the Library by ? 2 pgs starring the Little Wise Guys Text feature

Vacation Jitters by Norman Maurer (?) 6 pgs

These credits are no thanks to the GCD. Indeed, it is surprising that the last story is tentatively IDed Maurer when it is clearly signed in the third panel by Hi Mankin. Remember always to take GCD IDs with a grain of salt.

Where to start on this one? Boy Comics also called Boy Illustories was a long running title that ended with issue 112. Our hero is "Chuck Chandler [who] was a young military cadet during World War II. His father was a reporter who had spoken out against the Germans in newsreels, acting as the "only official source of information from the lost country, France!", informing the people of America of what the Nazis were doing at the request of the President. An eye-witness to the invasion, he had returned to the States, leaving his wife Joan, Chuck's mother, to follow him a week later. But the night he was to make another broadcast damning the teutonic aggression, he was confronted by the Gestapo agent Iron Jaw, who tried to intimidate him so that he would alter the speech he was due to make. Iron Jaw, so named because a resistance bomb had blown the lower half of his face off, to be replaced by a steel prosthetic, pointed out that they had captured Joan, and would torture him if he did not read a version of the speech the Nazis had prepared.

But the intrepid reporter, torn by the dilemma, decided that his wife would not want him to give way to this blackmail, and told the truth anyway. It cost him his life, as Iron Jaw was waiting in the wings, and shot him dead. Chuck, back at Custer Military Academy, is stunned when he hears the news. He rushed to the hospital, taking no time to change from his hockey uniform which he had been wearing, instead wrapping the blue military school cape round his shoulders to keep him warm. He arrived to be told that his father had an excellent chance of recovery, and the doctor sent him to walk around the grounds while the operation was carried out to save him. But just after Chuck left, Iron Jaw entered the ward and overpowered the Doctor. Taking over the operation, he murders the reporter by cutting one of his main arteries.

Chuck followed his father's last wish and set off to Paris to rescue his mother, armed with a description of Iron Jaw furnished to him by a nurse. Intercepted by Nazis when he landed in a neutral Portuguese port, he swiftly deals with them, and managed to get a message to his mother to meet with him on a ship heading back to America. The two are reunited, but that night their clipper is sunk by a U-Boat. Chuck managed to find his injured mother floating among the wreckage, but realising she needed immediate medical attention, had no choice but to call to the Germans for aid. They agree to help, but then fire on the two swimmers as soon as they are close enough. Chuck suffers a glancing shot across his forehead, causing him to lose his hold on his mother and on consciousness, and the injured woman drowns. Rescued by an American airforce plane sometime later, Chuck returns to the States and vows vengeance on the Germans: "I swear it!! By all that's right to avenge their deaths! I'll fight terror with terror! They'll pay and pay and pay!" Adopting the outfit he had worn the night of his father's death, Chuck became Crimebuster, scourge of the Nazis. He swiftly gained a sidekick of sorts, in the form of his pet monkey Squeeks, and eventually managed to kill Iron Jaw, avenging his parents. He continued to fight the good fight even after the war ended, eventually dropping the cape and replacing the shorts with slacks after a girlfriend refused to be seen with him while he wore the ridiculous costume."

Well considering the events, he could be mad at the germans! In fact, "it took Crimebuster 12 issues before he caught up with and eliminated Iron Jaw, in Boy Comics #15."

The Iron Jaw in this issue is the same gestapo agent who came "back in #60 (December, 1950), and went back to bedevilling C.B. at frequent intervals.

But by then, C.B. was scarcely a superhero anymore. As the genre fell out of favor with the comics reading public, his adventures took on human interest overtones. Once again, readers were able to see that he had a life at school, tho since World War II was over, it was no longer a military academy but a regular high school called Curtis. There was still room for Iron Jaw, but not for long, as the heroics were being phased out."

As for the artist line-up, let me concentrate on Hi Mankin. We already saw Overgard as the co-creator of Black Diamond and Norman Maurer will be seen again in Daredevil. There is plenty of information about Maurer and I already took so much room with the origin of CB that I'll put it all off until then.

Hi Mankin (1926-1978) "went to work for Jerry Siegel while still only a youngster of 15! He stayed with Jerry's family and attended Cleveland High School all day while trying to ink Superman stories at night. The pressures of life in a strange city, high school and work all at the same time, plus the resentment of the other artists in the Shuster studio caused him to quit after only one month. He remembers working on one long Superman story during this time, which is as yet unidentified. Mankin later went on to a career in animation (including Johnny Quest) and drew Johnny Quick and Gangbusters for DC as well as the Roy Rogers comic strip and Crimebuster and Daredevil for Lev Gleason, all in the fifties."

Actually, the above is short-changing him as far as his strip work because it seems that Hi was very busy all the time as suggested by this strip-only credit list:

asst cs "Smilin' Jack," 1942

asst cs "Briging Up Father," 1943,1959-64

(animation in-betweens MGM, 1947-1949)

asst cs "The American Adventure," 1949

asst cs "Dotty Dripple," 1949

asst cs "Bugs Bunny," 1950-1951 (daily)

art cs "Roy Rogers," 1953-1958 (daily)

asst cs "Buz Sawyer," 1959 (Sun.)

and then he turned to animation

animation - Cambria Studios, 1959-1964

layout - Hanna-Barbera Studios, 1964-1967

Alex Toth credits him for the hiring of Doug Wildey to work on Johnny Quest as per this quote:

"Doug Wildey's "Jonny Quest" was in work and about to change TV/Animation for a very long time, it's effect still evident -I'd hired Doug for "Angel at Cambria during my art directing of the first series-brought him out from Arizona, put him up at my home his first week or so, til he found his own place to bring his wife and kids to live in, from Tucson-the hiring almost didn't happen, but Hi Mankin urged me to do so-despite my fears that Doug's reliance on photoswipes in his comic strip/book work would be a disadvantage in the studio when/where we all had to make it up/brain it out/imagine it-and draw it, cold!"

Story-wise, it is no doubt the work of Biro who scripted the book for its entire run. If there was any doubt, I scanned a page from the first story that is as text heavy as only Biro could create them! You should note that the book is tightly edited as each of the three stories segue into the other, which could not be practically done by a writer / editor to coordinate the work.

Maurer Story

Text heavy Biro -script

Overgard Story

Hi Mankin Story

Note the nice contrast of the cartoonish pet sidekick to the realistic CB and landscape

Pet Sidekick Trivia: Eventually, Squeeks got his own comic. He behaved just like any other funny animal for five issues, October 1953 through June 1954.

Concept Stealing (?) Trivia: Most of us would remember that there was another Iron Jaw as per this cover of issue # 1.

Adam,

great info about the book. I know you'd mentioned the Schomburg ID in another thread but wanted to let you confirm this here and show the MH copy (Now we only need Fuelman to show us his recent purchase).

P.S.: Adam, thanks for the Bud Thompson insight. That was one heck of a pretty cover on that Cap Jr. It's great to see someone with similar interests (despite your addiction to HG ).

Re: Addiction to HG. I resemble that remark. Usually the stereotype is high-grade collector = person with too much money and too little time = doesn't know much about comics. I think you can see that folks like Jon Berk and Gary Carter have shown that doesn't need to be the case. Frankly, those are the HG collectors in the hobby that really impress me. Other collectors and historians that I admire are the Jerry Bails, Pat Calhouns, and Michelle Nolans.

The reason, by the way, that I collect HG is that I so freakin' love the comics that I want to see them exactly as they were originally. That scan of the Cap Jr does not capture the electric blue, or the way it shimmers as you angle the book in the light -- it gives me goose bumps. At the same time, its pages are snow white, presenting the wonderful Bud Thompson art and colors as God intended. It's another fine comic, just from the wrong month.

Well, you can imagine it was far from my intention to slight you in any manner. It was intended tongue in check, hence the smiley added to the comment. If you took offense to it I am deeply sorry for it. Yes, there was a tease in it but a harmless one, just to highlight the different paths we obviously took to our collections. I made a point to tell Jon in another thread how I was glad he is the one owning the copies he does because of his willingness to share and educate people about the early days of the comics and I have always thought of you in the same light. Trust me, I know how long it takes you to provide the insights you do in this thread and always look forward to your comments as I am sure are other readers. You've proven that you know your comics and I was sincere in the first part of the comment you quote, namely "It's great to see someone with similar interests ". You must know how disheartening it is to find no-one with the same interest: unknown and forgotten golden and atom-age creators. No amount of Alter Ego reading is as fun as bouncing info on these boards with knowledgeable collectors. So sorry for the slight

# 22

Bobby Benson's B-Bar-B Riders # 14 - eBay purchase

Not as pretty as Adam's MH copy but I still this book

Content:

The head-hunter of Pirates Peak by Ayers 8 pgs

The Arena of Death by Bob Powell 8 pgs

The Brat! by Ayers 7 pgs

The Ghost Bell of Terror Valley by Ayers 7 pgs

Our first ME book but there's enough to talk about other than the publisher, we'll keep that for later.

Who is Bobby Benson? The complete show history is available here but here's an excerpt:

"In 1932 the Hecker H-O Company of Buffalo approached Rice and offered to sponsor a kid's radio series to promote their cereal products. The "H-O" in their title suggested a cattle brand to Rice and he quickly drew up a story about an orphan named Bobby Benson who inherits an H-Bar- O Ranch in Texas. Rice not only sold his idea to the Hecker advertising people, he also convinced CBS to give his new show a network slot.

This new series, called THE H-BAR-O RANGERS, began on October 17, 1932 at WGR with a cast of Buffalo actors. Richard Wanamaker, an 11 year old son of a local attorney, played Bobby while Rice, in addition to writing and directing the show, was also the voice of Buck Mason, the foreman, and Wong Lee, the Oriental cook. Others in the cast were Fred Dampier and Lorraine Pankow (whom Rice had married the previous year.)"

After a hiatus, the show, as we see it, resurrected:

"In 1949, Rice, by then a U.S. citizen, was a Vice President with the Mutual Network and he put the show back on the air. With no sponsor in sight, he re-named the ranch "The B-Bar-B" and pared the cast down to five regulars:Bobby, Tex, Windy, Harka, and a new character, Irish. The versatile Craig McDonnell was again in the cast, playing both Harka and Irish with completely different voice characterizations.

Don Knotts (who would later go on to TV and movie fame) was then in his mid-20s and got the part of the old geezer, Windy Wales. Ivan Cury, a talented 12 year old with over two years in radio acting, beat out several audionees to win the lead of the "Cowboy Kid." Rounding out the cast as Tex was veteran actor Charles Irving."

Bobby Benson would be completly forgotten even to us comic collector were it not for this well-known cover (as the fact that Frazetta happened to have some work published in this series). OS breaks it out of the run but I still don't know who the cover artist is. Maybe it's obvious to all of you but blimey, who is it?

It is a surprising experiment as all stories apart from The Brat! are above-average gruesome. I mean, besides the decapited heads on the cover and first splash, the Red Hawk story shows rampage and massacre on its first 2 to 3 pages. Still, by the following issue, the title goes back to its normal self.

Ayers carries the load for this book with three stories for a total of 23 pages. We all know who is. He is still around of course and his home page is here where you can see his current commission prices.

We get to see Bob Powell once more and also another Powell feline figure.

All said, this book is well worth having for his cover and interior.

Note that Ayers had and still has a peculiar way to draw horses. Here's a page from the first story and below is a recent drawing for the cover of AE 31, an issue that spotlights .

Personal Trivia: growing up I thought that Chiclets was a local term describing chewing-gum. Then I moved to the US and discovered that it was a brand. My guess is that the name outlived the merchandising of the brand in my area and I had been using it unknowing until much later. It seems that eventually the show picked up a sponsor as per this ad that features the main characters of the show.

See I couldn't stop scanning pages from this one.

P.S.: Adam, thanks for the Bud Thompson insight. That was one heck of a pretty cover on that Cap Jr. It's great to see someone with similar interests (despite your addiction to HG ).

# 21

Bob Steele # 8 - Bought from Basement Comics at the same Mid-Ohio con as the Bob Colt from yesterday

Content:

The Plague Plot by ? 14 pgs

The Race of Death by ? 10 pgs

Pet Crazy Pete by ? 2 pgs

First, let me thank all for the encouraging comments. Now, I just hope I can keep this as interesting as possible. I mean we haven't hit a single Romance comics yet and let me tell you I have quite a few.

Today's entry is also from Fawcett but this time Bob Steele is the real deal. His entry at the IMDB is over 200 films long. As usual, The Old Corral has extensive information about the actor and I will just give you a glimpse here of this cowboy that started his movie career at the age of 13.

"The 50+ year Hollywood career of Bob Steele begins in the low budget films of the 1920s when he was a youngster.

Bob, and his real life twin brother Bill, were in a batch of silent shorts labeled the 'Adventures of Bill and Bob'. These were directed by the father of the boys, Robert North Bradbury, Sr. And it was during this time, that Robert Adrian Bradbury became 'Robert North Bradbury, Jr.' ... sometimes shortened to Bob Bradbury, Jr. I've never seen any of these shorts --- however, Boyd Magers told me that at least three exist but their condition is very poor.

As Steele matured into a good lookin' young man with a mop of wavy hair, he wound up starring in silents at FBO, most of which were sagebrush adventures. The British R-C Pictures (Robertson-Cole) and their U.S. subsidiary, Film Booking Offices (FBO), were taken over in the mid 1920s by President John F. Kennedy's father, Joe Kennedy Senior. Kennedy was a shrewd, profit-oriented businessman who realized the potential of the hastily made and inexpensive westerns. He already had Fred Thomson and his trusty cayuse Silver King under contract, but Thomson was demanding substantially higher production expenditures and a larger salary. Kennedy and little FBO couldn't (or wouldn't) knuckle in to the extravagant demands, whereby Thomson left to fail with his expensive westerns at Paramount. Little FBO, which was the forerunner of RKO Pictures, continued on with a stable of silent cowboy heroes which included Steele, Tom Tyler, Buzz Barton, Bob Custer, and even a short tour for Tom Mix.

At around twenty years of age, Steele made his first starring western for FBO in 1927 (probably THE MOJAVE KID). There, he would make a dozen or so oaters, and would also go through a name change to Bob Steele."

As far as the hairier question of who drew the stories in this comic, I was able as I did for Bob Colt to garner one reference to Pete Costanza as an artist who worked on this book at one point:

"Born in New Jersey on May 19, 1913, Pete Costanza first worked in comics in 1940 when he joined C.C. Beck's studio at Fawcett Comics. He eventually rose to become Beck's right hand man and partner in charge of production. In 1944, Beck and Costanza jointly opened the Beck-Costanza studio in Englewood, New Jersey, in order to handle additional (non-Fawcett) accounts. During his thirteen years at Fawcett, Costanza illustrated such titles as Ibis, Golden Arrow, Bob Steele Western , and, most notably, Captain Marvel. When Fawcett folded in 1953 after losing a lawsuit filed by DC Comics, Costanza went on to illustrate educational comics and comic book adaptations of classic novels, as well as White Indian for Magazine Enterprises. In 1966 he joined DC Comics after a ten year stint at American Comics Group drawing science-fiction and monster comics, working primarily as the artist on Jimmy Olsen. He drew three issues of Adventure Comics featuring the Legion of Super-Heroes, specifically the two-parter featuring Dr. Mantis Morlo (who was also a dead ringer for Captain Marvel foe Dr. Sivana) and the one issue "Revolt of the Super-Pets!", a Legion fan favorite. Costanza continued to work for DC until 1971, when a stroke robbed him of the use of his right arm. Never daunted, he learned to draw and paint with his left hand, and would later teach a painting class for stroke victims. Mentioned by friend Beck as "...a fine artist...[who] never gave up until the bitter end," Pete Costanza died on June 28, 1984."

Now, the real difficult part of this is to find art from Pete from the same era. Indeed, while Pete's art from the early Fawcett days is well documented (for some examples, follow this link) and art from his later period at DC is documented (for some examples, follow this other link and look around for Pete), very little reference for his later Fawcett years is available so I had to settle for his Gilberton work published in 1954. Jones, Jr. comments that "where Rudy Palais emphasized hands and sweaty brows, Costanze highlighted eyes and tooty mouths, bestowing his characters a kind of cartoon-like cuteness ..." so I went and looked for eyes and tooth in this Bob Steele Western issue.

Here's the art from the first story:

with some specific panels highlighting eyes:

Left panel

and here are two splashes from Costanza's Gilberton work where his focus on eyes and teeth is strong:

So what's the group consensus? Costanza or not?

Also, is the second story artist the same as the first story?

Splash:

Story page with nice top tier panel if only for the classic sound effects:

P.S.: Adam, I do have a copy of Worlds of Fear but it'll be a while before it gets profiled.

Awesome VG+. See you had it in you to find cool repros to contribute. Thank you .

And yes I agree with you, it is a cool book + I failed to mention but notice how the stories are longer which makes them usually more enjoyable for books from that period. I hope that by the time I am done people have a better view / appreciation of those reviled genres that Western and Romance are in the hobby. Not all are great but neither were all books in other genres. I find the art in this issue attractive (even though I would enjoy it more if the artist drew "better" faces). So who is pencilling?

OT: I am partial to the Shadow myself and could never get into Doc S.

# 20

Bob Colt # 9 - Bought from Basement Comics

Content:

The Hidden Hacienda by ? 13 pgs

The Check Out by ? 4 pgs

The Search by ? 10 pgs

As mentioned yesterday, I probably need to bring everyone up to speed with our feature character for the day: Bob Colt. Isn't that a great sounding name? I know I personally prefer three-part names such as Johnny Mack Brown or Wild Bill Elliott but there is something nice about this Bob Colt with this crisp last name. How long was his career? Oh ... about 10 issues.

See, Bob is a fictitious western star made up of whole cloth by Fawcett for this title. You gotta think there were enough B western stars to go around to write titles about but ... apparently not. Fawcett production staff did go to some trouble to appear genuine. I mean, check out this neat back cover of Bob on Buckskin.

On top of that, it's not like Fawcett had a dearth of Western star in their line-up, here's the inside front cover with, yes again, an In-House ad and we see tons of well known Western stars here:

Bob was portrayed by Steve Holland and, for $250 , you could own this Original Art? Original Picture? What would you call this item?

The blurb used for the sale is:

"Wow! This is the photo setup layouts for the front cover of Bob Colt #4, from Fawcett Comics. This cover was published back in 1951, making this cover already 50 years old!

The cover features a photograph of male model Bob [sic] Holland, who was a popular magazine cover subject during the 1940's and 50's. James Bama used him as the model for Bama's Doc Savage painted covers!

The cover consists of a thick, stiff 10" x 15" illustration board."

Of course, this title is not in the GCD, no not just not indexed, there is not even a placeholder for it. However, I did find this interview with George Evans stating he did work on this title (Note the following excerpt "Everything that came along, they stuck me doing it and but, among other things there was Bob Colt, which was based, I think on a TV character, ... ". Apparently, even George was fooled). I did not have time to check other Evans work but I doubt this is his work in this issue. Could any one confirm this for me?

TV Trivia: Steve Holland played Flash Gordon in the 1954 TV series. Info thanks to Michelle Nolan (CBM 61), confirmed on IMDB.

# 19

Blondie # 40 - Purchased at an antique mall (with a missing centerfold )

Content:

Never Say Dye by "Chic Young" 5 pgs

Pattern of Life by "Chic Young" 5 pgs

Lost and Found by "Chic Young" 4 pgs

Light Work by "Chic Young" 4 pgs

I think we are all well acquainted with this character and I don't need to present him (I'll have to do that more tomorrow with a character and an interesting twist). What has always amazed me in the world of strips is the consistency and longevity of the creative team. Take a look at Blondie: the strip started in 1930. Over the ensuing 75 years, the strip has been in the creative hands of two main people: Chic Young and his son Dean Young. The main artists and assistants list isn't much larger either: Chic Young, Dean Young, Jim Raymond, Stan Drake and Denis Lebrun. For this history, check the official strip site or the strip's summary at Toonopedia.

Here's a sample splash from the book:

In keeping with my interest in In-House ads, here's the advertised line-up for Harvey. Can you pick out the incongruous book in this line-up?

A little help: which book shows an attractive woman in bondage in the midst of wholesome characters? Yup, Black Cat Mystery!

More strip trivia: Jim Raymond was Alex's brother and Chic's younger brother Lyman Young created Tim Tyler's Luck.

Collection trivia: if I find one of the books I need at an antique mall, I will buy it no matter what the condition is (proof above) just to show that these books are still floating around.

P.S.: Nice hijack Adam. This is exactly what I was looking for Any opinion on the Bill Ward attribution of yesterday? Brush up on your George Evans for tomorrow because I will ask if it is him or not. Oh, and are you people reading my posts in between all this? I admit to have tracked the "daily hits" to the thread and my audience seems to be about 20. Thank you for keeping on coming back!

# 18

Blackhawk # 50 - eBay purchase

Content

The Killer Shark? by Reed Crandall 10 pgs

Chop Chop by Paul Gustavson 4 pgs

The Lost Express! by Bill Ward(?) 7 pgs

The Flying Octopus? by Bill Ward(?) 7 pgs

Note: there is also a 1 page Origin recap (This is a text feature with head shots). This page is "reproduced" here.

When it rains it pours as far as Quality artists! Note that the tentative Ward attribution comes from the GCD. In any case, we are looking at a top caliber line-up in this issue. I don't need to mention Crandall further as we will see more of his work later.

For an overview of Bill Ward's career, you can follow this link. The page focuses on his comic career more than his pin-up work.

More of interest is this page which provides us with a look at the complete history of the group over its decades of existence. In fact for all things Blackhawk, go the main page here.

You'll note that, despite Gustavson's use of stereotypical representation of both asians and native americans, the Chop Chop story is some fine cartooning.

Now for the innards of this book:

Collection trivia: in spite of the ad-hoc fashion in which I select books in this collection I still manage to encounter "famous" characters like this first appearance of Killer Shark. We already saw the Valkyrie in Airboy. The Batman (which I still need) has an early Catwoman appearance and of course FC 386 is really U$ 1 among others.

# 17

Black Diamond Western # 32 - Bought at the Remember When shop in Dallas

Content:

The Greedy Paleface by ? 8 pgs

The Sioux Slaughter by Rockwell 8 pgs

The Vicious Cheyenne Episode by ? 8 pgs

I have to admit that this masthead (term.?) has to be one of the busiest, ugliest and largest I have seen with its multiple logos and cramping the area for the cover illustration. Now, if only it was limited to the cover but I ahve noticed that Lev Gleason's titles in general are text heavy. I won't show you such an example today because we will see this again before we leave the Bs and I'll show you then how much text they could pack in a panel.

For a fairly obscure Western title, it had legs because after taking over from Desperado 1 through 8, Black Diamond Western ran from # 9 to # 60. Online scouring provided this brief summary:

"The Black Diamond was Bob Vale, who adopted his masked identity when his family was slain by outlaws. Wielding the typical six-guns and basically indistinguishable from many another masked cowboy (although he had a diamond insignia on his shirt, that was distinctive), the Diamond would leave a playing card of that suit as a calling card, and eventually became an official U.S. Marshal, possibly the only masked one in history. A reader contest gave his horse the name Reliapon."

You might remember that I was appalled earlier at the horse's name but this would explain it. If this was the best entry, I doubt I want to hear the rejections.

An unidentified Internet source list William Overgard as the Black Diamond creator, whose brief bio the comiclopedia gives as:

"William Thomas Overgard found his way to comics through the work of Milton Caniff. Overgard and Caniff started a longtime relationship, starting when Overgard wrote Caniff a fan letter at age twelve. Overgard joined the Navy for two years, but he still sent his artwork to Caniff, who gave him tips and encouragement. After the War, Caniff introduced him to the field, and Overgard started out working for Lev Gleason publishers under Charles Biro. There he cooperated on titles such as 'Daredevil', 'Boy' and the 'Black Diamond' western series. He continued his activities at Western Publishing with 'Jungle Jim' and 'Ben Bowie', among others. In the early 1950s, Bill Overgard ghosted Caniff's 'Steve Canyon' strip for a while.

Afterwards, Overgard contributed many comics to syndicates like United Features. In 1952 he was contacted by Publishers Newspaper Syndicate to take over the 'Steve Roper' series. Overgard accepted and he drew the series until 1982, giving it new popularity."

The second story is signed by Rockwell (nephew of Norman and also long-time assistant to Caniff). It is in sharp contrast in style from the other stories that are more cartoony while 's is style was more realistic (at least for this story).

Series trivia: Black Diamond Western is probably only remembered by Wolverton's completists as he had a 3 page feature run in the title from # 16 to # 28 called: Bingbang Buster and His Horse Hedy.

Here's the cover to the same story that I have cherished for a long time:

Not a first (Magica first appeared in US 36) but one of my favorite Uncle Scrooge covers:

Here's the censored version with Scrooge apparently just waiving at the non-existent crowd:

I love that Magica story from childhood. I still have my original copy. Will try to scan it tonight AND reread it! Thanks for posting it. Also I have the USA 42 with the censored Treasure of Marco Polo cover which I'll post if I have time.

# 16

Billy the Kid Adventure Magazine # 9 - Bought as a VG from Motor City

Content:

Killer of Eagles by ? 8 pgs

The Purple Back by ? 7 pgs

The Last Extra by ? 8 pgs

Pot Shot Pete Sheriff of Yucca-Pucca Gulch by H. Kurtzman 5 pgs

Not a lot to say about this title really. Once we get to a book from a smaller publisher, the information available (to my knowledge) dries off quickly. Sure, we all know why Toby was created and who worked it (see below) but as far as detailed information on the artists stable, that's scarcer. Internet searches return very little more than dealers' inventories with copies for sale.

This issue was edited by Mell Lazarus who went on to work in strips, particularly Momma as listed here.

In one of Oddball Factoids, Scott Shaw!, master of trivia, tells us that:

"After seeing the success that Harvey Comics experienced with their LI’L ABNER comic book, cartoonist Al Capp decided not to renew Harvey’s license and instead formed his own comic book company, Toby Press, to publish LI’L ABNER and other funnybook titles. One of Capp’s employees was cartoonist Mell (MOMMA, MISS PEACH) Lazarus, who wrote a mainstream novel, THE BOSS IS CRAZY TOO!, in part based on his personal experiences at Toby Press!"

I ILLed the book last night. We'll see what the book's like. The subtitle is actually given as: the story of a boy and his dog of a boss. Promising.

As you've probably noticed, there is a bonus in this issue with a 5-page gag story by Kurtzman. I'll give you two of them below. If I had to pick a better story of the three Kid stories, The Last Extra would be it as the Kid helps a small newspaper to be delivered. A local baddy wants to prevent its distribution because it reveals the government is selling land cheap and he wants to purchase it before others know about it. He tries to turn the Kid against the newspaper. telling him that the extra is actually revealing the Kid's identity. That's without counting that the Kid was suspiscious of this typical grease-ball.

P.S.: Adam, thanks for showing the Powell cat. It made my day that I wasn't looney in thinking that Powell's curves in the feline looked familiar.

OF,

for the best reference about DUCKs and reprints, visit the INDUCKS database .

As for the US 64: The Treasure of Marco Polo, the reprint information in the US is as follows:

The Adventures of Uncle Scrooge McDuck in Color 52 Treasure of Marco Polo

Uncle Scrooge 64 Treasure of Marco Polo (1966)

Uncle Scrooge 134 Treasure of Marco Polo (1976)

Carl Barks Library (hardcover, b/w) 5 pg. 544 Treasure of Marco Polo (1989)

Uncle Scrooge Adventures 42 * Treasure of Marco Polo (1997)

You can probably find a copy of USA 42 really easy. The version is still censored with for example thrown gems removed from the cover.

# 15

Big Town # 14 - Bought as a Fine from Southern California Comics

Content:

Mystery at the Big Town Zoo by John Lehti 6 pgs

The Disappearing Diner by John Lehti 6 pgs

The Accusing Parrot by Irwin Hasen 4 pgs starring Johnny Law

Shadow of the Underworld by John Lehti 8 pgs

All threes storyies by John Lehty are Big Town stories and they star Steve Wilson and Lorelei Kilbourne, the main characters on the cover. Big Town has received more coverage than The Beyond we saw yesterday.

For one, Michelle Nolan covered the series in her Notebook article Stop the Presses! in CBM 67 (March 1999). Due to her profession, she had a different slant on the stories in Big Town. She also points out that the book started at the same time as the TV show of the same name in 1950 (while the Radio show Big Town itself had been in re-runs since 1948). Most of the feature though concentrates on information about the other media outlets of Big Town.

For another in-depth look this time of Big Town, we can turn here where many stories from the long 50 issue run are profiled. Today's issue is an issue in transition to which John Broome (the later principal scripter) already contributes but from which Manny Stallman (later principal artist) is absent.

Here's the summary of the lead feature of this issue from the source linked above:

"Mystery at the Big Town Zoo (1952). Art: John Lehti. Steve investigates why someone is trying to destroy the gorilla's cage at the Zoo. It had to happen, because this was a DC comic book of the 1950's: somebody had to put a gorilla on the cover! Gorillas on the cover apparently increased comic book sales. The Big Town cover shows a ferocious gorilla escaping from its cage, while Steve is sleuthing at the zoo. Broome subverts this cover in his actual story. While the gorilla in his tale, named Africa, is indeed mighty, he is a sympathetic character, and never escapes from his cage.

This is a fairly minor, if likable and good nature story. It shows Broome's fondness for gorillas, which will repeatedly show up in his later work. The tale does not attempt to convey the feel of the zoo as a whole; it is less oriented to Big Town institutions than many other Broome stories.

This is one of the earliest stories in which the Illustrated Press' publisher McGrath is named. The publisher had appeared unnamed in Robert Kanigher's "Stand-In for Murder" in the previous issue. McGrath is always a sympathetic character. He is Steve's boss, but treats Steve respectfully. McGrath seems like a traditional looking figure of wealth and power, and is somewhat slow moving and dignified, in contrast with Steve's energy and dynamic talent. I've always suspected that McGrath was born to wealth and social position, unlike Steve: he seems to be a representative of the traditional upper classes. This is not actually stated anywhere in the stories. Rather, it is an impression one gets from the traditional way in which McGrath is dressed, and the way he talks. Upper class figures used to look stuffy and tradition oriented, wearing a lot of three piece suits. McGrath fits in this mold, although he seems decent as well."

For a quick look at Lehti's career, you can also look at the Comiclopedia.

Here are the splashes to the first two stories:

Adam,

I understand you about fearing to scan from your HG copies. No one would! Heck, I am fearful enough when I put my mid-grades on that scanner bed, I can't even begin to imagine what it'd feel like if I had a book in a grade higher than Fine to scan.

Before today's rather short post, I'd like to thank Adam for his insight into Bob Powell's art. This was exactly the kind of information I was looking for. I wish that Gary Carter had pursued your suggestion. Maybe he feared this would be impractical a proposal for the mag as, to cover such a topic, it would involve more graphics what with the publication of an artist style reference sheet. I know that most people good at IDing artist keep such reference binders as you suggest. Unfortunately, right now, I only have at most a few stories for a large number of artists; a different problem from yours, where your taste for HG copies limits the amount of books you have (even though, combining your posts in the GA and the SA forums, you' ve been doing well accumulating a good size collection even in HG. Maybe we should talk in 10 - 15 years when I'll have had as much time as you to accumulate books in my low grade collection). Moreover, these people concentrate on select publishers or select genres while I cover them all!

Anyway, I'd like for this thread to be the place for people to share such knowledge (because, as much as I like to see HG versions of classic and under-exposed books, what is somewhat missing for me on the boards is more extensive discussion of the art inside the books.)

Oh, and as far as the Heath attribution, I wasn't feeling very strongly about it (plus I cheated and had stolen it from somewhere online) especially since I have some signed Heath work from the period to compare this one against. We won't see these examples for a while though as they are in War Adventures and War Comics respectively.

# 14

The Beyond # 9 - bought as a Fine from Motor City Comics

Content:

Horror blown in Glass by? 7 pgs

On the Other Side of Death's door by ? 7 pgs

The Vampire of the Opera by ? 7 pgs

The Face in the Mirror by ? 7 pgs

I sure hope that the writers on these stories were not paid much because these stories are very cliché. We go from an art object molded from unholy material taking possession of its creator to death acting as a hitchhiker to a vampire unearthed from a closed room in an opera house to a writer who sells his soul to access his unfinished manuscript. Add to that huhum art and this is a far less enjoyable comic than a good rip-roaring yarn from the old west, let me tell ya pard! For that I'll only post two splashes.

OTR trivia: The classic story of The Hitchhiker was aired on September 2, 1942 in Suspense narrated by Orson Welles. Anyone interested I can send you a MP3 of the show.

Aha! Adam, thanks for the tip-off. Looking over the pages with my limited ability to ID artists, I'd say in my ignorance that the figure of the feline on the splash page and the curve on the prow of the ship on the next page make me see the Powell in these pages. Could (or anyone else) you tell us what are the clear Powell traits on this story that allowed you to ID the art? That's the kind of knowledge / ability I'd like to improve these days.

Also thanks for the kudos.

# 13

Battle Stories # 2 - Bought as a Fine from Terry's Comics

Content:

A Bird of Prey by ? 11 pgs

The Mark of a Hero by ? 9 pgs

A Pill for Pu-Yi by ? 9 pgs

Working on putting this thread together is allowing me to go back to some books I haven't had the chance to look at in a while. This one was one of the first 10 I bought. Now that I have read over 200 of these, I can reflect back on the relative quality of books from the period. I have to say that I really enjoyed the first story and found the other two rather tame and by the book.

Reading this Fawcett War comic right on the heels of the two Atlas War books I just profiled shows clearly the contrast in their approach to a War comic. Far from the grittiness of war (not grimness as this will be the realm of EC) in an Atlas War book, Fawcett tells us stories of ordinary heroes surrounded by violence that they have no control over and a violence they do not question.

The first story (of which I'll show 3 pages) is different. The art is open (very little framing is used). The story uses very little dialogue (reduced really to simply background announcements) but internalize the story of John Drummond through the presence of an observing narrator relaying the protagonist's thoughts and the story emphasizes the nature around the event through the heavy use of sound effects (see the second page in particular). The story ends with only 2 sounds on the last page: the shot and its impact. Very nicely done. We have a writer who understood the medium at work here or possibly a writer / penciller (which would be quite rare for the time period). Anyone can venture a guess as to who this artist is?

Pulp Trivia: This was not the first time that Fawcett published a book titled Battle Stories. The company had already published a Battle Stories pulp from 1927 to 1936 (although the title had gone to one issue a year for the last few years). Here are two cover from the series: January 1932 and May 1931.

I don't know about you guys but I sure am taking notes for the next grading contest Nikos will be hosting. ... so where was I? Oh yes that's one Hulk 112 in 9.4 . There, it's on the list

VG+ ~ As usual, full of great insights + you edited your post - Way to go over the call of duty. I was (somewhat) ahead of your checking on the other titles as you will see in today's post.

# 12

Battle Action # 1 - eBay Purchase

Contents:

9340 The Gold Brick by Joe Maneely 7 pgs

9360 The Steel Coffin by Mac Pakula 5 pgs

9419 The Good Guy by Cal Massey 5 pgs

9559 Bayonet Charge by Paul Reinman 6 pgs

I am going to start with yesterday's comments about the survival rate of these Atlas war titles. These were the most numerous in Atlas' line at that time period as Atlas had 12 War, 10 Horror / Mystery, 8 Crime, 6 Romance, 6 Western, 6 Teen, 2 Science Fiction and 2 Misc. titles out. Looking at the war titles gives us a good opportunity to illustrate the 1957 Implosion VG+ mentioned. Graphically, here's the life line of War titles for Atlas:

The first block of lines represents the titles I have to buy (crossed by the blue vertical line = March 1952). You notice that there are two trends at play: either as a title you get cancelled very soon in 1953 (especially if you have a red-baiting / red-hating / spy slant) or you fall prey to the 1957 implosion (except for Battle).

The second block of lines represent additional War titles that started later than March in 1952 and their fate is similar. I excluded from the charts the multitude of Navy and Marines titles put out by the company (which VG+ mentioned).

For everything you want to know (and more) about the implosion, you'll have to wait until June and read Tom Lammers' article about it in Alter Ego 49 .

Notice the black dash in the middle of the lifeline of one book: that's Young Men on the battlefield. Talk about a schizophrenic title: it starts as Cowboy Romance for 3 issues, then becomes Young Men with stories of Danger and Suspense (read fire story, sports, outdoor adventuring) until issue 12, transforms into Young Men on the battlefield (a War book) until issue 20, transmutes into a Hot Rod book until issue 23 and then hosts the failed superhero revival from issue 24 to 28. Whew!

As far as the comment about the rebooting of Battle with the addition of Kirby. This attempt is only really full-fledged with issue 65 because 64 has one Kirby story (with a T story code), all others are inventory (M story code). In 65, there are 4 T-code stories (2 Kirby and 2 Sinnott) and only 1 inventory M-code story (Stein story). Note that the revival of 1960 is generally associated with T-code stories. (Thanks to the Timely/Atlas mailing list archive for some of this info).

Before I forget, the Maneely story is this book is better than the one in Battle and because I don't know when next I'll have the chance to mention Joe, let me direct you to a short overview of his carreer by Doc. Vassallo here or you can check out Alter Ego 28 for extensive coverage. Doc. Vassallo also maintains a Maneely OA page here that includes 2 complete Two-Gun Kid stories.

Oh and yes, here are splash pages and 1 non-splash Maneely page from Battle Action 1. In all this is an enjoyable issue with story lines representative of Atlas War books of the period.

Adam, always ready to WOW the forum with his diverse HG collection. Thank you! (+ I needed a better scan of this book)

# 11

Battle # 7 - Bought as a VG from Tomorrow's Treasures

Content:

Cover by Burgos (?)

9512 P.O.W. by Al Hartley 6 pgs

9458 The Sniper by Heath (?) 6 pgs

9597 The Deadly Number 2 pgs Text story

9511 Over the Hill by ? 5 pgs

9502 Cavalry Charge by Joe Maneely 6 pgs

Battle ended up being a work-horse title for Atlas as it ran a complete uninterrupted 70 issues from March 1951 to June 1960 (I don't have the dates in mind right now but would that make this title a victim of the distribution debacle that curtailed publishing for Atlas / Marvel? In which case this series could have lasted longer). However, despite its upcoming longevity, this issue is lackluster as you will see from the splashes below. Moreover, the stories don't hook you up either.

In my opinion, Hartley is the one with the strongest showing here. I'll concentrate on him by adding a nice non-splash page from his story. As you probably know, this work is a far cry from his Christian Comics work from a couple of decades later. For a reasonable length career overview of Al, please follow this link.

A final note, for those paying attention, to point out that by the early 50's Burgos was mostly do "production" work such as laying-out and providing covers for the issues (of course, if I am ever wrong or inaccurate, anyone with more knowledge is allowed to jump in and enlighten us / correct me).

Tomorrow, we'll talk / see more Atlas war comics. For today, all we have left is comic art:

Something different for today. I plan at the end of each letter listing to show you a visual want list, that is, books I know I will need and for which I have a scan. So for the As and tomorrow we'll start the Bs.

# 10

Adventures into the Unknown # 29 - Recent eBay arrival (hence the alphabetical lateness)

Don't you just hate it when Sue gets pi$$ed! And yes, there is no story inside relating to the cover.

Contents:

Cover by Ken Bald

Invasion of the Ghost-Monsters by Ken Bald 9 pgs

Ship of Death by Charlie Sultan 9 pgs

The Mark of the Monster by Edvard Moritz 8 pgs

The Hands of Darkness by ? 8 pgs

The Witches' Brew by Edvard Moritz 9 pgs

I find that ACG could have been more than what it was. It certainly had the artists needed to be successful but I feel it's the stories that put them in the forgotten publisher of the Atom age category. Think about it, this is the company that put out the first (continuing) horror comic book but you'd be hard pressed to have the general comic book community (twenty and thirty-something readers) remember their output. I'll come back to ACG later on other books and will also talk more about Michael Vance's book: Forbidden Adventures - The History of the American Comics Group at that point.

Today, I just want to concentrate on Ken Bald. You can find an excellent overview of his career and examples of his strip work on Dr. Kildare and on Dark Shadows at the Rules of Attraction website and the second part here. For that matter check the entire feature here. Hurry, the articles are not permanent.

From Vance's book, quoting Norman Fruman, ACG Assistant Editor:

"I remember - it was Ken Bald in fact, one of our artists - talking to me about how uncomfortable he was drawing this stuff, and realizing when his wife and kids came into the room he'd want to cover it up so they couldn't see what he was doing. ... They were getting bloodier and bloodier."

Actually, I find there is stronger art in this issue than what Bald did so I won't show you his splash page. However, it illustrate a characteristic of Richard Hughes (ACG's editor) to favor the story to the art. Otherwise, on most books, the strongest art story is in front to hook the casual peruser to clinch the sale but Hughes chose to ignore this in favor of a story involving famous literary characters brought back to life, an idea that I know what have appealed to him (and for that matter, he may have written it himself). Also, Hughes was running an editor column (the first one of his genre(?)) as seen here:

Ok, since most everyone that chimed in likes to see interior art, here are two examples (Thanks everyone for the kind words of encouragement, I am thrilled that you like to see the inside of these. I'll keep on posting those. They are the most important to me as well).

DD: as far as buying that Astonishing, you'd probably be better off buying this and have more fun that with some lackluster endings in that Astonishing issue.