Hepcat

Rex is a great hero! And Rex the Wonder Dog is a fantastic title but it's difficult beyond belief to find copies in nice condition.

So here's the thread I just started on DC Funny Animal comics:

Strange Tales to Strange Adventures:

DC has a long history of publishing Funny Animal comics. Some of the titles over the years have been these: Animal Antics Comic Cavalcade Funny Stuff Hollywood Funny Folk Leading Screen Comics Real/TV Screen Comics Dodo and the Frog Flippity and Flop Fox and the Crow Nutsy Squirrel Peter Panda Peter Porkchops Raccoon Kids Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Three Mouseketeers Most of these DC titles got their start in the late 1940's but were defunct by 1960. The most notable exception was Fox and the Crow which lasted until the issue cover dated March 1968 although (the egregious in my opinion) Stanley and His Monster had taken over as the exclusive cover feature a year earlier. So post your DC Funny Animal comics here! But no, Spike and Tyke don't qualify for the purposes of this thread primarily because they have their own thread over in Silver Age. I'll start:

1 2 Cicero's Cat 1 and 2 were the first two comics I ever bought in the summer of 1959. I bought them at Ken's Variety on Wharncliffe Road in London, Ontario and I still very clearly remember my father initially telling me to take #2 back because he thought I already had a copy!

The first model kit I built was one I received in 1961 or 1962 at the John Labatt Limited employees' kids Xmas party at the old London Arena (whose main use by then was for roller skating, roller derbies and NWA wrestling): While we waited for Santa to make his appearance, we got cake, cookies and ice cream and were entertained by a wonderful magician. Every child's name was then called and we each received a wrapped present such as a model kit together with a boodle bag full of candy treats including a box of Cracker Jack and package of Mackintosh Toffee from Santa. It couldn't get any better than that for a kid at the time. The kit I received was definitely an AMT 3-in-1 car model but I'm not sure exactly which. It may have been this Chevy Nova: Or this Chevy II: I got glue marks/stains over the body and it only looked good from a distance. A few months later I purchased a tiny Revell model kit of a warship for $0.29-$0.39 from my local Les' Variety store. The box graphics to a certain extent resembled those of this much bigger Revell battleship below: But the model I bought came in a box that was only about six inches long and I think it was one of the British ships that fought in the Battle of the River Plate because I have a vague memory of reading about this battle on a model instruction sheet. I had bought it for the birthday party of Dave H. down the street but ended up building it myself when his party was cancelled. It was such a simple kit that I did a good job on it. So emboldened was I by my success that I then stepped up to a model kit of an Aurora P-38 Lightning. Here's the one from my present day collection: Mine may have been molded in a white, grey or cream coloured plastic though since Aurora Canada often cast kits in different coloured plastic than did Aurora in the States. Nevertheless I built it nicely but then painted the whole thing other than the canopy with blue Testors glossy enamel paint to better mimic the picture on the box. I did a wretched job on the paint though with very obvious brush marks all over the plane. One of my buddies, Paul S., even commented that it looked lousy which had me concluding that since I couldn't paint very well, I wouldn't paint any more kits. This was perhaps a premature assessment since I was only eleven or so years of age at the time.

The second cover here always makes me think of the first:

Boy, those are old ones! Our Gang lasted only until June 1949 after which it was retitled Tom and Jerry.

I've had a NM+ set of the 1966 Donruss Marvel Super Heroes cards for over twenty years: They're puzzle backs though. I prefer some sort of text on card backs.

Five more of my Tom and Jerrys: 186 187 188 191 192

Gorgo rules!

Do any of you fellows set up tracks for your Hot Wheels such as these?

I'll give you a heads up when I decide where to post them. A DC Funny Animals thread might best fit in the Golden Age forum.

The Fly was actually instrumental in turning me onto the superhero brigade. While I was already aware of "Superman" and "Batman" comics from the barber shop or wherever, the first superhero comics that really captured my attention were the Adventures of the Fly. I remember reading them in early 1961 at Lamont & Perkins drugstore a block away on Wortley Road before they chased me out, at which point I'd head for Tyler & Zettel's pharmacy six or so blocks to the south on Wortley Road. I believe the first issue of the Adventures of the Fly that caught my eye was #12: Bethlehem copy I think these drug stores only stocked Archie, Dell, Harvey and Classics Illustrated comics which is why the Fly was the first superhero to capture my fancy. The closest two variety stores/grocery stores from which I bought bubble gum cards and various penny candies didn't stock comics. The best selection of comics in the immediate neighbourhood was at Ken's Variety four blocks away but I usually didn't have to travel that far to spend what little money I had. Moreover what was the point of making the four block trek to Ken's to be tempted by comics I didn't have the money to buy? Therefore I just don't remember seeing any of the DC superhero titles that would have been on many newsstands/magazine racks at the same time. But then Adventures of the Fly 13 turned out to be even more of an eye opener for me: Because inside were these ads heralding the introduction of Fly Girl and the Jaguar! I also read through the Adventures of the Jaguar 1 when it first hit the newsstand at Lamont & Perkins or perhaps Les' Variety which had opened up beside Lamont & Perkins at about that time: Northland copy I was spellbound by this dashing new hero! The issue also included this tantalizing ad for the mysterious Fly Girl: Who would shortly make her debut appearance in Adventures of the Fly 14: Bethlehem copy These comics left such a profound impact on my impressionable young mind that Fly, Fly Girl and Jaguar have remained among my very favourite comic book characters and superheroes to this very day!

Just goes to prove that bad men aren't limited to Africa. They're found in other places including Canada.

Those are the same reasons I have little interest in "Superman" and "Batman" titles earlier than 1957 or so. Admittedly though I could be tempted by late 1940's Green Lantern and All-American Comics when Harlequin and Streak the Wonder Dog started making cover appearances. Plus All Star Comics 39-57 and the Jack Kirby's Sandman in Adventure Comics and Newsboy Legion in Star Spamgled Comics. Hey, I was a newsboy with a paper route once upon a time myself! That would though require mega$ which I currently don't have. Crisis on Infinite Earths served as my stepping off point from DC comics and I actually haven't bought any new comics since the late 1990's. I have been buying the hard cover Archives and other DC collections though and I now have several dozen. I'm that way with my Adventures of the Fly and Adventures of the Jaguar runs. They're so tough to find in high grade. i only wish I could make the same claim about my all too small collection of the Fox and the Crow. I think they're even tougher to find in nice condition than Sugar and Spike comics. Quite simply Sheldon Mayer has been highly regarded for well over fifty years which prompted more hoarding/collecting of the latter title and thus the preservation of Sugar and Spike comics.

This time it's a bad man preparing to hurt kitties:

A certain day in late July 1963 proved pivotal in instilling a lifelong interest in comics within me. There was a convenience store called Ken's Variety at Wharncliffe Road and Elmwood Street in London four blocks from where we lived. It was right beside the Hyland Theatre which featured wonderful double bill kids' matinees on Saturdays for twenty cents! Ken's was a great store for kids stocking everything from penny candy to bubble gum cards, ice cream cones, bottles of pop from an ice water cooler, Krun-Chee Potato Chips, AMT car model kits and others, PEZ dispensers, CFL bobbing head dolls and Halloween masks. It was very much a destination place for me and I have fond memories of shopping for various treasures at Ken's to this very day. On one of my frequent visits to Ken's, I happened to check out the spinner rack and saw these comics in all their shiny glory: Now at the time I had set aside any comic buying for nearly a year because my heart had been broken late the previous summer when my older sister convinced my mother to throw out my small stack of comics because they were surely going to corrupt me for life. (She was right of course. They did.) But there was no way I could resist the selection that was staring me in the face on the spinner rack that day. I had a pocket full of change and took the plunge back into four colour wonder. I bought the Aquaman, Flash and Justice League comics on the spot and returned a day or two later to buy the Atom and Wonder Woman ones. Within just over a week I'd bought them all. In addition to the above comics, I picked up these among other DC superhero comics at Les' Variety (I think) just a block away from my house within a couple more weeks: (Not mine.) So that was it, game, set and match right there. I was well and truly hooked again. In fact I was so specifically taken by the Aquaman issue with Queen Mera's introduction that I took advantage of DC's kind offer and sent in the money for a two year subscription to Aquaman. And no, I wasn't daft enough to clip the coupon.

To super-powered lizard:

You gotta love them flying reptile covers!

+1!

No taste clearly. But here's another fabulous one-shot Giant:

More of my Black Cats:

Were the "Superman" titles your favourites as a kid? Did they include Jimmy Olsen and the "Superboy" titles? What were your main collecting years as a kid? Mine were 1962-65 but of course I'd managed to trade back for a number of 1960-61 issues. That's like me. I want nice copies that fit in with the rest of my comics. My definition of "nice" though frequently differs from CGC's. I like white, bright copies and I hate spine/staple wear and mis-wraps. I don't focus as much on ancillary nicks as does CGC. My experience as well. When I seriously started recollecting the comics of my formative years in 1979, I defined my priorities very tightly. I actually didn't even include the Giants from even my favourite titles such as Flash or Justice League of America! But over the last few decades I've added lots of titles I previously considered secondary or tertiary - including the Giants of course!

How popular is America's Best TV Comics with Marvel zombies? Is it a "key" or one they prefer to ignore?