Scrooge

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.

I only have one word for this display: stunning. And this comes from someone with an obvious love of the subject!

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.

# 9 Astonishing 11 - eBay purchase Content: 9825 The Last of Mr. Mordeaux by Joe Sinnott 5 pgs 9643 Master and Slave - Text feature 9672 Freak by Bill Walton 5 pgs 9790 Reign of Terror by ? 4 pgs 9695 The Hound Dog by Myron Fass 4 pgs 9776 The Day Harrington Died! by Bob Fujitani 5 pgs Yeah, on the cover Mordeau is spelled without an "x". We see some early Atlas work by Joe Sinnott so I'll include it below as well as the splash page from the un-attributed story: Reign of Terror. Note that Joe's work for Atlas pre-dates this by about 1 year. The earliest Story Code with Joe's art I know of is 7923 for Kent Blake of the Secret Service 1 (Cover by Sol Brodsky) Note that I will actually buy two issues of Astonishing since there is both a March issue and a Spring issue. For all you Timely Atlas needs, please consult Greg Gatlin's wonderful site: Atlas Tales

# 8 Archie Comics # 55 - eBay Purchase Content: Cover by Bob Montana Very Kindly Yours by ? 6 pgs The Old Gray Mayor by 6 pgs Love is Blind by ? 5 pgs The Principal of it! by ? 6 pgs Lucky Puck by ? 5.66 pgs Let's Face it by ? 3.66 pgs Come Ona My House My Housa C'Mon by ? 7 pgs One thing I find rather funny as I look back at the Teen-age Heroes comics is that, despite the times, I find the 50's covers more "daring" than what Archie would allow in today's marketplace. I don't imagine the current editors would run this cover gag today. I noticed this also on many of the covers board member lotemo's website. Most Archies were still published with a higher page count making them one of the best deal on the newsstands money-wise. The following table displays, for publishers for whom I have indexed at least 3 comics, the average total page count of comics, the percentage of actual story pages, the number of story pages, the number of stories, the percentage of ads, and finally the cost per story page. What you don't see is the count of the number of 1) text pages, 2) short features, games, and sometimes 1 page gags and 3) in-house ads. Overall, because Dells, while offering a lower page, was carrying no ads, they were about as good of a deal as Archies. Notice that some of the laggards are both National and Atlas.

Jon, thanks for digging that information and for scanning the volume six with the Ayers cover. It's appreciated. Scrooge

VG+, Thank you! You bet it helps; it's all clear now. I have never seen these and I am glad you filled in the information for me. At the very least, it confirms my original impression that I'd better print and bind these few articles whose list you quote because I'd never seen them in my CBM collection.

How could I forget the Chesler piece? It was one of the best illustrated pieces. I admit that I stopped checking my CBMs after Gary left the editorship as I thought you'd become scarce after that time, but now that you mention it, yes! For those caring, it is in Issue 91. The Fox feature was The Weird, Wonder(ous) World of Victor Fox's Fantastic Mystery Men in issue 107. B-Littled Golden Age Titles in 108. Creation of Re-creations in 113 (cover listed as 112) Good Clean Fun - Collecting New Fun Memorabilia in 116 (My LCS is still holding 115, 117 - 119 for me) Going through these, there is also in 85: Ain't it a wonder! Unpublished art from Eisner's Wonderman #2. I only have Issues 1 and 2 of the Overstreet / CBM and no articles from you in these. Thanks for the info.

Jon, thank you so much for the information and the scans from your collection you've been putting up here for all of us to see. I don't want to miss any Berk insights you're providing us so I went back and drew up this Berk Bibliography to see which articles I should print for my records. I show you had in CBM: Wow What a Magazine CBM 11 [You put this up here] Love and Death (Censorship before Wertham) CBM 20 Spider and Arrow CBM 22 You only live thrice (Cap Am etc) CBM 24 Science Comics CBM 25 Champ Comics CBM 27 Comic Box Early Hillman CBM 30 Suspense 3 and All New 8 CBM 32 Crash Comics CBM 33 Squarebounds CBM 35 Superworld Comics CBM 38 Black Condor + other Lou Fine articles CBM 39 Amazing Man Comics CBM 46 [You put this up here] National Comics CBM 48 Grading Forum CBM 68 Lamont Larson Update CBM 71 Esoteric Oddities CBM 75 [You put up here the Mad Hatter part] I was then wondering if the following you recently posted were published in CBM and I missed in the above checklist (if so I'll go back and find where and let people know or do you yourself know?): FORGOTTEN FUNNIES : SHORT-LIVED TITLES OF THE GOLDENAGE SPACE WESTERN COMICS MIRACLE COMICS THE CLOCK (which you said was the first published) I have been in awe of your collection since you've been writing your articles and esp. since the feature about your collection in CBM 35 (see scan below). I never quite liked how they emphasized value when obviously you care about the books and the medium history. I had been envious (not jealous) of your collection but now that we got to know you, you are probably the best person to be the repository of these historical books. Thanks for everything

# 7 Apache Kid 10 - Bought as a VG/F from Doug Sulipa My copy seen above is a Canadian version. Below is the US version. Notice between the two copies that the Canadian version badly blocked out both the month (Jan) and the letter K below the price. My copy also has the addition of CDL in black type (sadly, I can't seen to figure out if it is part of the print or if it is a later stamp but I tend to believe it is printed on the cover). My guess is that they are distributor's code and should not appear on the wrong side of the border. But what about the month deletion? There is a date stamp on my copy, located in the stack of hay right below the A of Apache stated Dec. 12 1951 which is in keeping with others I have. So no explanation for the month deletion as it appears both US and Canadian version would have been on stands at about the same time. While the title lasted until # 19 (before becoming Western Gunfighters), # 11 would not appear until December 1954! [see one can easily be fooled thinking a title was published continuously but certainly wasn't]. Content: 8966 The Raid of the Renegades by ? 7 pgs with Apache Kid, a.k.a. Aloysius Kare (AK you see ) 9027 Red Arrow Strikes by ? 6 pgs with Apache Kid 9105 Where Danger Dwells by Allan Bellman 4 pgs with Black Panther 9028 The Winning of White Swan by ? 6 pgs with Apache Kid While I can't ID the artist on the Apache Kid sequences, a lot of Apache Kid work was done by Werner Roth. As far as the Bellman story, for those who like "fake" early appearances, how about this Black Panther? Who is he and what does he look like? For more on Bellman, see our beloved Alter Ego 32 for his interview by Doc V. whose complete transcript can be seen at Bellman Interview with accompanying art as well as wonderful Splash Gallery (sans the one above, my bonus to you). I particularly like the Western Outlaws & Sheriffs #72 2nd story splash on the second page of the gallery. As a parting shot, remember that these Canadian editions had Canadian ads and therefore in lieu of Charles Atlas, Canadian kids could dream to be as strong as Joe Bonomo:

# 6 Animal Antics 37 - eBay purchase Content: The Racoon Kids by Otto Feuer 6 pgs. The RKs are Rudy and Rollo. Dizzy Dog by Sheldon Mayer 6 pgs Biggety Bear by Rube Grossman 6 pgs The Racoon Kids by Otto Feuer 4 pgs I didn't know much about the Racoon Kids until last night. Here's edited for brevity from Donald D. Markstein (all text his ©2004): "... [DC] brought out two new funny animal anthologies in the early part of 1946. Nutsy Squirrel starred in one of them. The other, Animal Antics (first issue dated March-April of that year) introduced The Raccoon Kids. The kids started out in the back pages, with the cover and lead story featuring a rabbit prestidigitator named Presto Pete. The Raccoons replaced Pete for one issue in #3 (July), then took over the cover and lead spot permanently, starting with #6 (January, 1947). The artist who handled them, not just at first but almost exclusively throughout their run, was Otto Feuer (The Dodo & the Frog). The writing credit is less certain, but they're believed to have been co-created by Sy Reit (Casper the Friendly Ghost). The same team (definitely Feuer on the art, probably Reit on the -script) was also responsible for Peter Porkchops. Rudy and Rollo Raccoon were typical boys, only raccoons instead of humans, about 8 years old. They were twins, like Heckle & Jeckle or Dover & Clover, but few if any story points were made of their twinhood. They didn't even dress alike. In early stories, their nemesis was Uncle Percy, who frequently played mean tricks on them — but of course, they always managed to avenge themselves with even meaner tricks of their own. Though supposedly related, Percy didn't look like a raccoon. Maybe he was a short-haired weasel. Later, Percy was dropped from the cast, and the stars were played against a guy closer to their own age, named Muggsy Mole." A final and interesting note: " ... most [DC funny animal titles] modified their titles to suggest (without outright claiming) a connection to theatrical animation. Animal Antics became Movietown's Animal Antics with its 24th issue (February, 1950). Then all were re-titled after their lead features. Movietown's Animal Antics became Raccoon Kids with its 52nd issue (October, 1954)." Somehow I already had the first pages of each story scanned so I'll put them up here. Finally, I particularly like in-house ads across publishers, partly because they help me identify titles I need, partly because I like the manner in which they advertise their lines. As far as in-house ad, DC's, somewhat predictably, was quite staid (read: dull). Here's the then current line-up. Notice the additional ad for A Date with Judy TV show on ABC:

# 5 All True Crime Cases 49 (Continued from Official True Crime whose numbering started at 24 in Fall 1947) - Purchased from Southern California Comics listed as a Fine. Contents: 9532 Squeeze-Play by Vern Henkel 5 pgs. 9396 The Prisoners by Jack Keller 6 pgs. 9379 King of the Con Men by Bernie Krigstein 6 pgs 9446 The Frame-Up by Marion Sitton 6 pgs. Greg Sadowki's book on Krigstein should be on everyone's shelf. Volume 1 is a great look at this artist's life. It is also a very well crafted in-depth analysis of his work. As for Vern Henkel, the gentle folks at Alter Ego will be featuring an interview with him in the Eisner tribute May issue: AE 48 Useless Trivia: Fast forward over a year to November 1953. It seems that the cover art was still kicking around the office because it got reused on the cover of Justice 41 (look at the top left vignette) for of course a completely different story. Ah those were the continuity-free days

I dunno ... maybe Holy Robin Corner Shock Pose But then who wouldn't be shocked upon seeing your friend attacked by an inflatable buoyancy (sp?) device [read blow-up snake or eel or whatever]. Now after making fun, I should ask how fun is the story to read actually? I have never read any of these as I am generally turned off by the covers' goofiness à la Zebra Batman.

Not worried about fading much. This is in the basement so ambient light is minimal and the lights appear much worse in the scans than they are. I put the romances and westerns the closest to the lights anyway. Plus considering the average grade of the collection, I don't think I can do much more to harm their condition. The computer is on the other side of the room so I am down there a lot + my job has me reading a lot so at times I go down away from all noise and enjoy the room. As far as furniture, well ... I had no choice / say in this as my wife insisted we dress up the shelves (which means furniture and more furniture).