tb

[...]

While I know this wasn't Dell, I'm reminded of a conversation that I had on the boards about how amazing the colors are on so many 40s-50s Dells are. This cover reminded me of that as the blue and the way it fades toward the horizon is really cool. Add in the eye popping reds and you can see how a kid would be drawn to it on a newsstand.

Thanks to adamstrange, inaflash, and silver, I recently got to see a lot of super high grade Silver Age DCs. Seeing how gorgeous the DCs from the 1950s can be left me feeling that the Dell Disney covers generally fell behind after the 1940s. The DCs are certainly more sophisticated. To me, the '30s Mickey Mouse Magazines remain the most consistently beautiful Disney covers for any run ever produced.

As I was scanning the books yesterday (I happened to have them home since another board member was visiting), I was wondering if they might still look as fresh and attractive in 25 years when they turn a sharp corner. It almost seems freakish that you could have a 100 year old book looking newsstand fresh like this. I hope I'll be around to find out. Unless something unexpected happens, I'll probably keep all these books until they are well over 100 years old.

Scanned a few more slabbed books today. Actually got two copies of the second in the same grade. They look pretty together.

Incredible.

Great book as usual, ES1. There's something about her distorted torso and mad eyes that strengthens the visual impact and give that cover a truly disturbing, nightmarish feel. Fascinating stuff.

Interesting propaganda films (although the first one was excruciatingly boring).

I tried to dig for some historical context for "Education for Death" but only got a few hits from the New York Times.

-//-

It's fascinating to watch the funny animals go to war. Probably the closest they ever got to the horror genre...

Thanks for posting the link to the cartoon. I have not been able to find more info about Duvall, but here are a few pages from the first part of the war story.

It starts out as a love story where Bucky is engaged to the mayor's daughter and promoted to general since the mayor prefers an officer for son-in-law. The first 3 scans show the Fly King preparing his troops for war. Since the story was conceived in 1932, it is either a remarkable coincidence or Duvall was ahead of his time. In any case, the use of cartoon characters to tackle difficult issues related to war reminds me of "Maus". I find it interesting that it was reprinted in WDC&S during WW II.

A few pages later: chemical warfare:

On a personal note, my own great grandfather was a Danish citizen who was forced to enlist as an ambulance driver for the German army during WW I. Unfortunately, he lived in an area that Denmark had just lost to Germany in 1864. He was exposed to gas at the front and had severe coughs for the rest of his life as a result. I imagine the subject of chemical warfare would have been very sensitive to many families in 1932.

I found a raw copy of WDC&S 23 today and the "War with the Flies" story actually starts in this issue (15 pages, including a gas attack). It's strange that I've never seen this story discussed before. I've never paid much attention to Bucky Bug, but this story has been just as readable as Gottfredson's longer adventures. The unusual story elements also make it interesting from a historical angle. Now I wish I had an unslabbed #24 so I could read the middle part.

While going through some of my early Walt Disney's Comics and Stories, I came across a Bucky Bug story in #25 that is unlike any Disney comic I've ever seen. It's so unusual that I ended up reading it a couple of times. The scans below represent 11 of the 28 pages and give an idea of the storyline.

"War with the Flies", which appeared along with Gottfredson's Mickey Mouse Sundays, was written and inked by Earl Duvall starting in 1932 and ending with his departure from Disney in April 1933.

The first part of the story has a World War I storyline. Upon reading the list of men's casualties in the newspaper, Bucky's fiancée becomes a Red Cross nurse and heads off to the front to meet him on the eve of a major battle. The battle scenes are highly unusual for a Disney comic.The first 6 pages are shown below.

After the land battle, the war then moves on to the sea. In the end, the enemy capitulates and a peace treaty is negotiated.

The epic tale then shifts to a depression storyline. Bucky heads home to his parents as a war hero, only to find that they have lost their home as the could not pay the mortgage.

The last few pages, which I've not included, show Bucky taking up farming to pay for a new home.

I did a little research on Earl Duvall who did serve on a US Army base in New York during World War I. According to Inducks, the last page of the story is actually not by him as he left Disney abruptly in April 1933 after some tensions with Walt Disney.

Here's a new pickup. These early ducks have been hitting the sweet spot lately...

 

 

Just back from another trip to Europe and am catching up. .5's entry inspired me to dig out my reading copy of WDCS 4 and, as usual, I had a good time enjoying the interior artwork. Gottfredson's stories often have very high quality sequences with memorable panels and this issue is no exception. The down side of my own narrow focus on slabbed high grade is that I have almost no reading copies left. When I see raw books like those posted over the last couple of weeks, I really do wish I had more copies that I could take out and read.

I think the Large Feature Disney books are fun for a few different reasons. The two Duck books with Taliaferro reprints in b/w comic and paint book format are late examples of the experiments that I like so much about the 1935-40 period. The high quality artwork make them visually attractive, closely resembling the 1938 Bubble Pipe book which I find more important historically. "Pluto Saves the Ship" features a quite un-Disney story with a war theme that has a bit of the same feel as "Too Many Pets" from FC 29. I think this book is underrated and actually made a video recording of my own copy a while back, which I unfortunately couldn't post because I forgot to turn off location services on my iPhone. I don't recall ever seeing an article about WW2 stories in Disney books, but I would love to see more examples of how and when Gottfredson, Taliaferro, Barks etc. incorporated the war into their stories.

Look great, AJD. It's fun to follow your progress: seems like you picked a great time to build your run. I got to see some fabulous WDCS with Kelly covers last week, including the one with Donald pointing a toy gun at a bee on his beak. There are some truly fantastic Disney collections out there that make my own pale in comparison. Hopefully we can convince more of the owners to share them online someday.

Looks much better in person.

 

Ken

 

Great cover and exceptionally attractive book overall.

I really appreciate the nice surprise, YK. It's the first time I see the books presented so beautifully myself. When I started out, I never dreamed that it would be possible to put together a run like this. And as for the cost, there are less than 10 issues that I paid over $1,000 for each; I was lucky to get most in the early days of eBay, long before CGC grading became available. No one ever recommended the title to me and there were never any bragging rights to claim; I just started assembling the books because I somehow really liked them myself and went by my own instincts. All the nice feedback I've received over the years has been a pleasant surprise which made the project even more rewarding as I unexpectedly saw many of you appreciate the beauty and history of an extreme niche title like this the same way I did. Another very positive surprise has been all the help I've received from strangers who unselfishly sold me books that they valued because they wanted my project to succeed. In many ways, the end result is evidence of how nice and enjoyable collecting comics can be. If my upcoming projects turn out anywhere near as rewarding, I will be very happy.

AJD, thanks for taking time to give credit to Rosa. He is extremely popular back in Scandinavia, especially among the generation that grew up with his stories. When I read Scandinavian comics message boards, I sometimes feel a generation gap and wonder if these younger collectors can relate to the books that I treasure. More discussions about Rosa would be one way to bridge the gap and possibly get them interested in Golden Age comics.

And thanks to everyone for the feedback on the group shot. I'll try to make a few more later. I took a group shot of all my Mickey Mouse Magazines around 5 years ago, before they were slabbed. It would be hard to do the same today.

I've been admiring adamstrange's pretty octuplet shots and wanted to make one myself (volume 4#2-9, #1 was in storage).

Congratulations. This brings back memories of when Ian Levine was looking for New Adventure 26, except there's less melodrama this time. I've been searching for the Redskin 8 regularly and will continue to do so.

Over the years I have found that the search for a special item has usually been more exciting than actually owning it. Probably the biggest mistake I ever made in collecting was to buy a friends collection of Yellow Kid rarities. All of a sudden I had virtually everything after integrating it with my own collection. For a few weeks l was thrilled, and then I essentially lost interest in continuing as an active YK collector. Enjoy the hunt, and enjoy sharing knowledge and material with your friends, and you'll always be happy that you are a collector. I know that tb has done that and he is a great guy in addition to having a great collection.

 

Rich makes a great point. I only really starting diving into the sub 100 WDCS run over the last ten years. I actually don't even know how many I have (but I know a cover I don't have!) It makes going to the conventions a lot of fun as there are usually not too many there and prices can sometimes be reasonable vs. the superhero books. Picking them off one at a time is really a fun endeavor and you can cherish each book that way. In my case finding a special hour to read them when the kids aren't around (although my daughter is a Lulu and Duck fan so she gets to see them all.)

[...]

YellowKid's experience is extremely interesting as I've never heard of a specific example of this phenomenon before. Like 40Yrs, I've built my collection piece by piece over many years. My Mickey Mouse Magazine run is now at a point where, realistically, I will only be able to improve it marginally in the rest of my lifetime. I still enjoy it a lot, though, in part from the sense of accomplishment that comes from all the thought and work, not least being smart about the funding in order to keep it a fun hobby, that went into cherry picking the best parts of many different collections over more than a decade. If anyone ever were to buy it from me intact, they would never have that aspect of gratification.

Stick in Camp AJD, the grass is always greener! Or in this case CGC grade lower or higher!

+1 Only you can decide what's right for you. If you're having a good time, know what you are buying, and the collection never becomes a distraction from real life, you're doing the right thing. I used to collect more like Scrooge when I was younger, but gradually I found that my own passion was towards very rare and high grade comics. Eventually, I stopped buying filler copies completely in order to focus exclusively on books that I found exceptionally beautiful, i.e. more like a piece of art than a comic book. I do miss reading the stories, though, and at some point I will probably take a step in Scrooge's direction myself.

Thanks, AJD. I've chosen to keep my collection very small and focused in order to be able to afford a few key books if I am very disciplined with my purchases. I remember being unable to qualify for the "Show us your top 10 books of 2011" thread because I only bought 9.

40 Yrs: Great copy. I also have a Benny K WDCS somewhere.

And I think one other factor is required to pull together that particular group...

When I was photographing the books, I was thinking what the group would have looked like if I'd had unlimited funds available in addition to the two other factors. The WDC&S 1 would have been a CGC 9.4 and the #2 a 9.0 (both books from the Leonard Brown/Crescent City collection), but otherwise it would have been exactly the same. You just can't find most of the books in this condition, no matter what you're willing to pay. I think I paid around $200 for the V5#11. I'd love to upgrade it but I've never seen a nicer copy, certified or not, after checking eBay (and all other online sources) weekly for the past decade. That's the kind of challenge that makes collecting fun for me: it wouldn't be any fun if it was just a matter of writing out the checks.

It takes time and luck to build a consistent run of these.

Don't know anything, I often check cgcdata on Mondays to see what's been submitted. There's also a FC 159 in 9.4.

A new Four Color 386 in 9.6 was added to the census today.

It was fun that you were the buyer. I like this cover a lot, and so does someone else evidently as it is one of the few times where I've been outbid on a Mickey Mouse Magazine (usually high grade copies are cheap compared to other titles from the 1930s).

Thanks for posting the article. If it is possible for outsiders to subscribe, I would appreciate the details.

Edit: this comment was a response to the NYT article posted by 40Yrs.

I read this article last Sunday and liked it a lot. When things don't go as planned, the press is often quick to use the word failure, but the angle in this article was interesting and constructive. One of the things that struck me is how Disney's management is protective of their talent, in particular Iger's emphasis of learning from a failure rather than pointing fingers. I didn't get to interact with Andrew Stanton myself when I was at Pixar, but many of my friends worked for him on "Finding Nemo". Lasseter and Catmull are both exceptionally nice and sensitive people and they took always very good care of the directors. Being a director on one of these movies is hard enough when the outcome is a success, and I can only imagine what it must be like to be in Mr. Stanton's shoes right now.