The Distribution of US Published Comics in the UK (1959~1982) 15 15

[Malacoda]

Wow. Are we really doing this? OK.   There's a Derek Robert Wright who was born in June 1944 which would make him the (w)right age for this lad. Now (or in 2010 anyway) living in Rayleigh.  Plenty of East End lads moved to Essex after the war (and became car dealers and named their daughters Sharon....not that I'm stereotyping here).   

[themagicrobot]

I wonder if this letter is genuine or really written by the Editor?

I was surprised by the results of a competition. This shows Miller's did have national coverage, reaching Scotland, Northern Ireland and remote outposts like Tottenham, Paddington and even Monument Road Birmingham. I think I can picture the two newsagents round the corner from there where young John may have purchased his Captain Marvel comic. I wonder if he noticed/approved a few weeks later when it turned into Marvelman and his Captain Marvel fan club badge was suddenly obsolete.

 

 

Edited April 10 by themagicrobot

[Malacoda]

On 4/10/2024 at 8:48 AM, themagicrobot said:

I wonder if this letter is genuine or really written by the Editor?

Indeed.  It does have a whiff of....

 

On 4/10/2024 at 8:48 AM, themagicrobot said:

I was surprised by the results of a competition. This shows Miller's did have national coverage, reaching Scotland, Northern Ireland

Good spot.  Probably means they were distributed by Surridge Dawson, John Menzies or one of the other national newspaper distributors.   If Tommy Tompkins was setting out on his delivery round from Hackney every morning, he'd have been knackered by the time he got to Glasgow. 

[Albert Tatlock]

On 4/10/2024 at 8:48 AM, themagicrobot said:

I wonder if this letter is genuine or really written by the Editor?

I was surprised by the results of a competition. This shows Miller's did have national coverage, reaching Scotland, Northern Ireland and remote outposts like Tottenham, Paddington and even Monument Road Birmingham. I think I can picture the two newsagents round the corner from there where young John may have purchased his Captain Marvel comic. I wonder if he noticed/approved a few weeks later when it turned into Marvelman and his Captain Marvel fan club badge was suddenly obsolete.

 

 

Very narrow age range in the readership. One at 9, one at 14, the rest all 11 to 13.

Probably a slightly older lot than Beano, etc.

I suppose that in those days, school leavers would develop different priorities on being cast out into the world of work.

My mother left school at 14 on the Friday and went to work in the cotton mill across the road on the Monday.

Stay on at school? Not when you can help with the breadwinning in those pre-safety net days.

Further education was the preserve of the toffs back then.

I would have liked to see Lord Snooty turfed out of Bunkerton and earning a living shovelling coke into the boiler of Bash Street school.

[themagicrobot]

I was always taught not to run with scissors. Flying with them could be equally dangerous.

PS: Yes, I had to look at it twice. It does say "the greatest news of the ear" ?!?

Edited April 10 by themagicrobot

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/10/2024 at 8:48 AM, themagicrobot said:

This shows Miller's did have national coverage, reaching Scotland, Northern Ireland and remote outposts like Tottenham, Paddington and even Monument Road Birmingham.

And sometimes, The Common Wealth!

Cockneys made good. Not to be confused with The Commonwealth. 

[Malacoda]

On 4/10/2024 at 11:28 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

And sometimes, The Common Wealth!

And this also says printed in Italy for Publishers in Italy, so presumably other countries in Europe too. 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/11/2024 at 12:56 AM, Malacoda said:

And this also says printed in Italy for Publishers in Italy, so presumably other countries in Europe too. 

I read that as 'printed for the publishers (L Miller) in Italy' 

It's all in the phrasing, I suppose...

[themagicrobot]

L. Miller certainly covered all the bases. From Adult magazines, horror, westerns right through to Nursery Age books. There were a bewildering number of "Jolly Miller" books. I'm not really sure what age group they were aimed at. They were just cut-and-paste jobs full of grainy photos of Trains, Planes, Ships etc along with nursery rhyme stuff.

 

I'm surprised to see the prices being asked for Captain Video comics. I'm also surprised to notice that the first two issues cost 9d and contained alternate colour pages. That experiment quickly ended and No 3 was back to black and white and a 6d price. Most of their comics were 6d until the introduction of the squarebound Shilling Mystics etc.

PS: I don't think UK readers would have had a clue what the Dumont Television Network was. At the time the comic was published we still only had just the one TV channel (Auntie Beeb) and our first commercial TV channel began in 1955. I wonder if they showed Captain Video? Even in the US the Dumont Television Network will be forgotten being as it only broadcast from 1940 to 1956.

 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/11/2024 at 9:42 AM, themagicrobot said:

There were a bewildering number of "Jolly Miller" books. I'm not really sure what age group they were aimed at.

I've ordered one for a laugh.

Do we think this is him then...?

He certainly looks jolly, in a Pie in The Sky sort of way.

[Get Marwood & I]

Actually, JM looks more like Arnold.

Miller, not Schwarzenegger...

 

[Malacoda]

On 4/11/2024 at 10:32 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

Actually, JM looks more like Arnold.

That's weird.  The two people I first thought of looking this image    were the puppet master (plump version)  and Inigo Pipkin, who, of course, was also a puppet master.  That must be an association from childhood, but I never made it before.  

Edited April 11 by Malacoda

[Malacoda]

On 4/11/2024 at 6:47 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

I read that as 'printed for the publishers (L Miller) in Italy' 

Yes, of course, you're right.  With paper rationing/shortages here, they were printed all over the place.  Amazing to think it was cheaper to get it printed in Italy and shipped back than printed here.  That said, Transworld lived up to their name when it came to getting the UK Marvels printed in the 70's (Spain, Belgium and, bizarrely, Finland).  

[themagicrobot]

Here are a couple more tatty comics. This Uncanny Tales is unusual. It actually contains two complete consecutive Daredevil stories (Nos 57 and 58). Alan more usually printed stuff randomly. I assume with the dual pricing that the comic originally appeared in late 1970 or early 1971. So the material was quite recent. Other Class comics at the time published Spider-Man material from a similar time. How and why did he manage to get hold of this when most of his other stuff was from the late 1950s/early 1960s? Was it a lucky accident?  Odhams had finished with the Marvel reprints and Marvel UK was still in the planning stage so I guess the material was fair game for a period.

Thorpe and Porter's Race for the Moon No 1 for once does actually contain the contents of Harvey's first issue (along with Man in Black tales to fill all the "Big 68 pages". Later issues, when they had used up the Harvey material, continued with Atlas, ACG and even the odd DC strip. 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/12/2024 at 10:47 AM, themagicrobot said:

So the material was quite recent. Other Class comics at the time published Spider-Man material from a similar time. How and why did he manage to get hold of this when most of his other stuff was from the late 1950s/early 1960s?

Who cares.

The real question of the day, Robot, is what the focaccia is in Jolly Miller's big yellow jolly sack? 

[themagicrobot]

I see you're back to your normal mode of telling me I'm posting in the wrong thread. AGAIN. Give it a rest eh??  WHO CARES. 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/12/2024 at 5:57 PM, themagicrobot said:

I see you're back to your normal mode of telling me I'm posting in the wrong thread. AGAIN. Give it a rest eh??  WHO CARES. 

You just don't get my humour, do you Robot. I don't know what to do with you, I really don't. 

[Yorick]

On 4/12/2024 at 9:32 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

what the focaccia is in Jolly Miller's big yellow jolly sack?

Paper pulp... of course.  He's got paper to make and comics to print on it.

[themagicrobot]

@Get Marwood & I Stop and think how it looks for a moment. You quote me (why?) and then say “who cares”

Just because you start a thread doesn’t mean you own it.

I’ve always tried to show some positivity in my posts here. Try it.

PS I would have laughed at the “who cares” if it didn’t contain a link to the dead Class thread. That was just rude.

 

 

 

 

Edited April 12 by themagicrobot

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/12/2024 at 9:31 PM, themagicrobot said:

@Get Marwood & I Stop and think how it looks for a moment. You quote me (why?) and then say “who cares”

Just because you start a thread doesn’t mean you own it.

I’ve always tried to show some positivity in my posts here. Try it.

PS I would have laughed at the “who cares” if it didn’t contain a link to the dead Class thread. That was just rude.

 

 

 

 

It was not my intention to be rude, far from it. The Class link was to show that I care, but I see now how you interpreted it. You and I don't gel, so I think it's best that we avoid each other from now on.