Obadiah Oldbuck vs. Superman

[BLBcomics-migration]

Actually, new research noted in the new Overstreet proves that Dell and Eastern were partnered up with THE FUNNIES, the 2nd all-original news stand comic book, which began in late 1928, cover dated Jan 1929.

 

Eastern went to oil companies Standard Oil, Gulf Oil, others(?), and got them to order give away promo comic books which began as early as Dec 1932, before Funnies On Parade.

 

Funnies On Parade got a lot of hype for many decades

 

so did Gulf Comic/Funny Weekly and Jon Berk and i proved the Standard Oil Comics giveaway predates it by months

 

Lots of history books merely cited previous history books

 

once a wrong piece of data gets into our system, it seems to take a lot of effort to get it corrected

 

Which is why John Snyder asked me to intro correct data to these price indexes, a task i take very seriously - something some choose to call arrogant, i call passionate about "truth"

 

In the decade since John Snyder asked me to assume this labor of love , i have read 1000s of 1800s comic strips in 100s of publications housed in various libraries, university holdings, antiquarian societies, private collections.

 

My fervant wish is a reprint book akin to a "Best of" could be published - several hundred pages of the best representations of this huge 1800s comics business which i know for a fact existed, because for the simple reason i have read the goods - i have seen the light

 

Robert Beerbohm

[Theagenes]

Yes, but The Funnies and the oil promos were tabloids, though, not comic magazines, correct? It was the comic magazine format, not the tabloid format that proved to be the one people wanted. The Funnies was definately part of that equation though because of the Eastern/Dell connection you uncovered. I don't believe The Funnies or Comic Monthly (which probably is the first modern comic) are just "interesting footnotes" either. Likewise for Detective Dan, Ace King and Bob Scully, one or more of which might have predated FoP. All of these are important pieces of those early days of the modern comic book and deserve more attention. But none of these are as significant a catalyst for creating the modern comic book industry as FoP,Carnival, Century, and FF were. Bob, do you believe that FoP is nothing more than an interesting footnote?

[BLBcomics-migration]

Yes, but The Funnies and the oil promos were tabloids, though, not comic magazines, correct? It was the comic magazine format, not the tabloid format that proved to be the one people wanted. The Funnies was definately part of that equation though because of the Eastern/Dell connection you uncovered. I don't believe The Funnies or Comic Monthly (which probably is the first modern comic) are just "interesting footnotes" either. Likewise for Detective Dan, Ace King and Bob Scully, one or more of which might have predated FoP. All of these are important pieces of those early days of the modern comic book and deserve more attention. But none of these are as significant a catalyst for creating the modern comic book industry as FoP,Carnival, Century, and FF were. Bob, do you believe that FoP is nothing more than an interesting footnote?

 

Yes, they were larger than Famous Funnies - but so were New Fun 1 2 3 4 5 6 for that matter - which draws it sdirect inspiration from Comic Cuts 1-9 from 1934. Comic Monthly was 8.5 x 9 inches, also not Famous Funnies size

 

All this stuff are comic MAGAZINES - which fits in well with personal favorites of Creepy and Eerie (at least the early Archie Goodwin issues) and the first 100 MAD comcs magazines

 

The three known Humor comic mags Tec Dan Ace King Bob Skully are 10 x 13 and I believe preceded FoP cuz Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster began work on their aborted Humor Superman version, the one i printed up the Superman cover for back in 1971, covered in CBM 36, around April 1933 and one can see elements of all three Humor books in that surviving cover

 

The Cupples & Leon comic books are mainly 10 x 10 from 1919 thru 1933

 

Yes, i believe FoP is nothing more than an interesting foot note in history nor more or less than most all of the comic magazines and books are also interesting foot notes in comics history.

 

To me, the three most important comics magazines are Obadiah Oldbuck, Action #1 and ZAP #1 in that order.

 

Obadiah introduced a comics business to America, Action #1, well, need i say more and ZAP because it intro'd the concept which later became known as the Direct Sales Market

 

The formats were driven by economics

 

Formats evolved with the ability of the people to purchase them.

 

The "modern" comics magazine format of FoP, FF etc are taken directly from the later stage Dime Novels - how many here are acquainted with Dime Novels of the teens and 1920s? The stuff all these early publshers and creators grew up with as kids

[Theagenes]

But Bob, it was the early success of the Eastern books that brought all of the other big syndicates into the business. It was this entrance of the big name publishers with their nationwide distribution networks and large circulations that created the market for these "comic books." Without that, National and the other little publishers would have folded, there never would have been an Action Comics #1, and comic books would never have become the cultural phenomenon that they became. Do you think King, UFS, MacKay and the rest got in because of Ace King or the unsuccessful Funnies or the L&C books or Olbadiah Oldbuck? No, they got in because of the success of Famous Funnies.

 

BTW, I never said anything to downplay the importance these early books from the 20's and 30's. I was complaining about that ridiculous comic strip in the OPG. Just because new information comes to light that can be added to our existing knowledge, that doesn't mean all the previous scholarship on the subject is now wrong and needs to be discarded and forgotten. There are good reasons that FoP and the other early Eastern books have been given such prominence over the years (some of which I gave above) and just because new information has come to light that puts them in better context it doesn't mean they have lost their significance. "First" or "Oldest" does not always equal "Most Important" or "Most Significant."

[showcase4]

Post deleted by showcase-4

[BLBcomics-migration]

But Bob, it was the early success of the Eastern books that brought all of the other big syndicates into the business. It was this entrance of the big name publishers with their nationwide distribution networks and large circulations that created the market for these "comic books." Without that, National and the other little publishers would have folded, there never would have been an Action Comics #1, and comic books would never have become the cultural phenomenon that they became. Do you think King, UFS, MacKay and the rest got in because of Ace King or the unsuccessful Funnies or the L&C books or Olbadiah Oldbuck? No, they got in because of the success of Famous Funnies.

 

BTW, I never said anything to downplay the importance these early books from the 20's and 30's. I was complaining about that ridiculous comic strip in the OPG. Just because new information comes to light that can be added to our existing knowledge, that doesn't mean all the previous scholarship on the subject is now wrong and needs to be discarded and forgotten. There are good reasons that FoP and the other early Eastern books have been given such prominence over the years (some of which I gave above) and just because new information has come to light that puts them in better context it doesn't mean they have lost their significance. "First" or "Oldest" does not always equal "Most Important" or "Most Significant."

 

Yes, note what you say,"...Famous Funnies..." not Funnies On Parade which is what i thought you were referring to

 

Not the promo giveaways prior to the newws stand intro of Famous Funnies, a comics magazine eastern and Dell were in partnership with till #7 -just like they were partnered up by late 1928 thru 1930 with the earlier THE FUNNIES original material experiment - also an important foot note to comics history

 

American News Company, a distribution network which came together to get reading material to Civil War soldiers in the 1860s, which, by the 1890-s was a virtual monopoly, which had begun distributing George Delacorte's Dell output by 1921, distributed Famous Funnies news stand version as well as many of the earliest "modern" comicbook companies - it was pretty much the only show in town, er, the country, owning 90,000 outlets to everybody else with approx 25,000 outlets by the 1930s

 

Comic Cuts (British comics rerpints) which morphed into New Fun (USA original news paper strip wanna-be rejects), were put into the marketplace first by S-M News, major NYC area distributor, an independent, and then went into Donenfeld and Sampliner hands with their Independent News - arch enemy of American News aka ANC

 

Of course success breed competition and mimicking something is the sinceresy form of flattery

 

The early Stokes, Hearst large size oblongs began as 88 page behemoths for 50 to 60 cents

 

The C&L B&W reprints of the then-new daily strip phenom were 48 pages for 25 cents

 

with the deflation of the 1930s, 64 pages for a dime was all people could pay

 

America has not experienced deflation since then - not on the scale of the pre World War TWo days

 

I know you were not complaining about the earlier sections - the comic strips the guys in Timonium chose to run were not something i had a thing to do with, but that is another story

 

David McKay published the final C&L size 10x10 comic books in 1935. having started doing with with an annual Mickey Mouse by 1931 with the #3 being a color job - their last ones were 1935 Popeye comic books

 

They then switched to the bargain format of a dme for all those color pages - no one could compete with the new format and survive

 

The earliest Eastern stuf fgets so much play cuz they are in the modern format - but i see the comics business in America as 164 years old now - with a multitude of varied formats in books, magazines and whatever else you want to call them

 

One long evolutionary progression

[showcase4]

 

To me, the three most important comics magazines are Obadiah Oldbuck, Action #1 and ZAP #1 in that order.

 

 

2 out of 3 ain't bad....how about:

 

1. Obadiah Oldbuck ( 1st comic book )

2. Yellow Kid in McFadden's Flats ( square bound, but can't be ignored- 1st comic book feauturing a key character )

3. Action 1 (1st key superhero appearance/comic book)

 

These 3 were chosen as they form a logical progression of developements leading to our world today as we know it. I would call these the main 3 events that set the stage for the superhero explosion. 1st you have to have a comic book, then it has to be popular due to it featuring a key, well known charcter, and then you have the key character wear a cape and have super-human powers.....magic formula for success !!!

 

Just out of curiosity Bob, why do you think Zap is one of the top 3 most important comic books? I would put about 50 books ahead of that one, such as ( not in any particluar order ):

 

 

Funnies on Parade

Comic Monthly #1

Famous Funnies #1

Funny Pages V2 #10

Detecetive Dan

More Fun #14

Detective #27

Marvel #1

Batman #1

Superman #1

AF15

Motion Picture Funnies Weekly #1

Showcase-4 ( no pun intended )

All Star #3

Detective #1

 

 

[Theagenes]

Yes, note what you say,"...Famous Funnies..." not Funnies On Parade which is what i thought you were referring to

 

Well you're right I was; I tend to lump those early Eastern books together as they were all part of the same experiment by the same people that led to the first successful monthly modern comic book. Without FoP there is no FF. But yes if you look at them individually then FF #1 is the most important of them certainly. FoP, Carnival, Century, Skippy's, and FF Ser.1 were the proto-types, the dry runs that showed that they were on to something, but FF#1 and the following dozen or so issues that eventually started to turn a profit are what really started the modern comicbook industry.

 

Not the promo giveaways prior to the newws stand intro of Famous Funnies, a comics magazine eastern and Dell were in partnership with till #7 -just like they were partnered up by late 1928 thru 1930 with the earlier THE FUNNIES original material experiment - also an important foot note to comics history

 

American News Company, a distribution network which came together to get reading material to Civil War soldiers in the 1860s, which, by the 1890-s was a virtual monopoly, which had begun distributing George Delacorte's Dell output by 1921, distributed Famous Funnies news stand version as well as many of the earliest "modern" comicbook companies - it was pretty much the only show in town, er, the country, owning 90,000 outlets to everybody else with approx 25,000 outlets by the 1930s

 

Comic Cuts (British comics rerpints) which morphed into New Fun (USA original news paper strip wanna-be rejects), were put into the marketplace first by S-M News, major NYC area distributor, an independent, and then went into Donenfeld and Sampliner hands with their Independent News - arch enemy of American News aka ANC

 

Of course success breed competition and mimicking something is the sinceresy form of flattery

 

The early Stokes, Hearst large size oblongs began as 88 page behemoths for 50 to 60 cents

 

The C&L B&W reprints of the then-new daily strip phenom were 48 pages for 25 cents

 

with the deflation of the 1930s, 64 pages for a dime was all people could pay

 

America has not experienced deflation since then - not on the scale of the pre World War TWo days

 

I know you were not complaining about the earlier sections - the comic strips the guys in Timonium chose to run were not something i had a thing to do with, but that is another story

 

David McKay published the final C&L size 10x10 comic books in 1935. having started doing with with an annual Mickey Mouse by 1931 with the #3 being a color job - their last ones were 1935 Popeye comic books

 

They then switched to the bargain format of a dme for all those color pages - no one could compete with the new format and survive

 

The earliest Eastern stuf fgets so much play cuz they are in the modern format - but i see the comics business in America as 164 years old now - with a multitude of varied formats in books, magazines and whatever else you want to call them

 

One long evolutionary progression

 

I certainly don't disagree with that last point, but even in an evolutionary process you have occassional key mutations that can suddenly accelerate that process.

 

The development of the modern format is one these key "mutations" and it's significance should not be understated. We look back on these books from a late 20th/early 21st century perspective and we see little difference between, for example, an issue of the Funnies tabloid and an early issue of Famous Funnies. Slight differences in binding - one has staples, one is a little larger than the other, etc. but the content is basically same (except FF was reprints) and it's easy to blur the distinction between the two. But put yourself back in the late 20's/early 30's and think about it from the POV of a newstand customer from the period. A tabloid is not just bigger, it is a basically a small newspaper - exactly like the Sunday comics section that you were getting for free every week. Nobody was going to pay for something they got for free already, even if it it's original material, which was why The Funnies didn't make it. But take that same newspaper tabloid and 'dress it up' -- fold it in half, staple it, put a slick cover on it so it looks like a real magazine like Harper's or Life and stick it up on the rack with other "real" magazines and now you have something that might get someone to part with their hard-earned Depression era dime. It was brilliant marketing gimmick, nothing more, but it worked. You can't downplay the significance of this event. Yes, there were earlier books that had similar or even almost identical content to those early Eastern books with the only difference being they way they were packaged -- but that packaging was everything!

 

As an aside, New Fun and the Humor books weren't tabloids - they were "tabloid-size" magazines - my opinion on the importance that distinction should be evident from the previous paragraph - and of course it didn't take long for New Fun to shrink down to the same size as Famous Funnies and for books with paper covers to add slick ones as soon as they could afford it. The new Eastern format was the clearly the way to go.

 

We've been drifting off-topic here a little bit I guess, but this is the period I'm most fascinated by and most interested in learning more about and I'm very grateful to have the opportunity to pick your brain. At any rate my point has been to try and show that FoP and the other early Eastern books are not just "footnotes." There is no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater everytime some new obscure early book is uncovered.

 

To go back to your original question - i.e. why are people so against the inclusion of the early sections in the OPG - I think that most people would not care if they were there or not if it weren't for the fact that they are dropping other features in order to make room for them. Personally, I don't mind the Platinum section as that illustrates the context in which the modern comic book came into being. The Pioneer Section would have made an interesting one-time feature article, but to include it every year is absurd (I don't think you would disagree with that, right?). There may or may not be enough Victorian and BLB collectors to justify their inclusion, but why not just alternate them every other year. Are you still unearthing enough new info to justify updating your Victorian section every year? Wouldn't every other year suffice? If they would do this and drop the Pioneer section all together they would free up about 30 pages every year. Think about what that could used for - an extra feature article, bringing back important features that have been dropped like the grading definitions(!!!), expanding the general listings to include so-called "underground" comix, etc. The list goes on and on. So many people are upset because because they feel that that space could be put to better use and I have to agree with that. For me (and I suspect others) that silly comicstrip berating me for not hailing OO as the true messiah was just salt in the wounds.

 

BTW, please remember that just because I or others disagree with some of the conclusions you've draw from your research doesn't mean that we don't respect that research or that we are attacking you personally (although there has been plenty of that in this thread - it's a passionate topic for many). For most of my life I've been both a comic book collector (primarily SA/BA) and a historian (both avocationaly and vocationaly), but it is only in the last few years that I have put those two interests together and discovered "comic history." I began collecting GA for the first time, becoming so hooked that I now have almost no interest in anything later than the mid-50s. This new interest in learning more about the origins of modern comics was due in no small part to your articles in OPG. But comics history can never be real scholarship until there is some sort of peer review process and that requires open and healthy debate. That is what we've been doing here, despite the fact that the anonymity of the internet makes it easier to descend into ad hominim attacks. Jumping on the lastest bandwagon is not scholarship and I think many people have the perception that OPG and Victorian collectors, dealers, and scholars like yourself are doing just that - jumping on a bandwagon. I suspect that this is not the case and that quite a bit of "peer review" has been going on on your mailing list (I look to forward to perusing some the archives) and elsewhere, but that is not the perception that is being created by OPG with their sensationalist promotion of these "newly discovered" Victorian "comic books" at the expense of the early modern comics like the Eastern books.

[Theagenes]

2 out of 3 ain't bad....how about:

 

1. Obadiah Oldbuck ( 1st comic book )

2. Yellow Kid in McFadden's Flats ( square bound, but can't be ignored- 1st comic book feauturing a key character )

3. Action 1 (1st key superhero appearance/comic book)

 

These 3 were chosen as they form a logical progression of developements leading to our world today as we know it. I would call these the main 3 events that set the stage for the superhero explosion. 1st you have to have a comic book, then it has to be popular due to it featuring a key, well known charcter, and then you have the key character wear a cape and have super-human powers.....magic formula for success !!!

 

Just out of curiosity Bob, why do you think Zap is one of the top 3 most important comic books? I would put about 50 books ahead of that one, such as ( not in any particluar order ):

 

 

Funnies on Parade

Comic Monthly #1

Famous Funnies #1

Funny Pages V2 #10

Detecetive Dan

More Fun #14

Detective #27

Marvel #1

Batman #1

Superman #1

AF15

Motion Picture Funnies Weekly #1

Showcase-4 ( no pun intended )

All Star #3

Detective #1

 

 

While I wouldn't rank it as high as Bob, Zap was responsible for ushering in the boom of independent comics in the 70s and 80s and the creation of the direct sales market. It is definately a book whose the importance is often underrated.

 

For me, if I were to rank the most important events in comic history (and not just individual books) it would be:

 

1. Action 1 - we wouldn't be here talking about this if not for Superman. Nuff said.

 

2. The debut of the Eastern Color comic books/magazines that popularized what would become the dominant format from then on.

 

3. The revival of the superhero genre with the SA, which saved the industry and turned comic collecting from an obscure esoteric pasttime for a small number of people into one the biggest collecting hobbies out there alongside stamps, coins and cards.

 

4. The appearance of Yellowkid, which made the comic strip such a popular entertainment medium.

 

5. The appearance of the Tarzan and Buck Rogers newspaper strips on the same Sunday in 1929, introducing on a wide scale for the first time non-funny adventure comic strips and paving the way for Superman.

 

(Edited for typos)

[Theagenes]

Also, I'd be remiss if I didn't add:

 

6. EC's New Trend, which had such an influence not only on comics, but also on numerous other popular media such novels, film and television and possibly, IMO, had more influence than is suspected on the consciouness of the generation that was responsible for the counter-culture revolution of the 60's.

[showcase4]

For me, if I were to rank the most important events in comic history (and not just individual books) it would be:

 

1. Action 1 - we wouldn't be here talking about this if not for Superman. Nuff said.

 

2. The debut of the Eastern Color comic books/magazines that popularized what would become the dominant format from then on.

 

3. The revival of the superhero genre with the SA, which saved the industry and turned comic collecting from an obscure esoteric pasttime for a small number of people into one the biggest collecting hobbies out there alongside stamps, coins and cards.

 

4. The appearance of Yellowkid, which made the comic strip such a popular entertainment medium.

 

5. The appearance of the Tarzan and Buck Rogers newspaper strips on the same Sunday in 1929, introducing on a wide scale for the first time non-funny adventure comic strips and paving the way for Superman.

(Edited for typos)

 

 

all these are truly important events....but none would have happened without another event that is missing from your list....the intro of the 1st comic book. Without that, there's not much to build on

[BLBcomics-migration]

I listed:

 

1) Obadiah Oldbuck 1842

2) Action #1 1938

3) ZAP #1 1968

 

as the first three most important comic books in that order because of what each "ushered" into this art field we collect. In historico-chronological order as it were. I already mentioned why ZAP is so important, which may be my way of explaining why i have a Plymell ZAP pictured in my "modern" comics origin essay the last few years.

 

All other comic books are "important footnotes" in the comics history, of which there are many 100s of same - all part of a 160+ year evolution of the comics business.

 

and all of this discussion is "on topic" as far as I am concerned, as this 160+ year history of comic strip books in America is one long time line to me. I come to this conclusion based on the tens of thousands of comic strips i have read - hundreds of thousands? - a lot, to be sure.

 

Crumb's seminal ZAP #1 ushered in a seminal "New Direction" in the way comic books could be created and distributed - and focusing on royalties being paid, the creator of comic books owning his own work, being able to take it from publisher to publisher.

 

Each of the above three books, boiling away everything else, mark seminal events in comics history. What constitutes #4, #5, etc in importance, i leave to others right now to fill in the blanks on. All the artifacts previously mentioned by others are also "important" - there have been quite a few attempts at making lists of "100 most important comic books of all time" and those lists vary.

 

Obviously, the above, and previous posts for that matter, are just my opines, and i welcome peer review in this fascinating realm of comics archeology. I would not have it any other way.

 

The Victorian and Plat sections plus the "modern" comics origin story is holding so far at 66 pages. There has been a constant steady flow each year of new information coming into each of the sub-sections of what i compile for OPG. So far i have been able to squeeze in new data by shrinking the size of certain visual aid in heach history essay lesson - down side is one cannot read the strips, and i can only hope the art comes thru - maybe one day i will be able to get my comics hsitory tome publsihed - large size, in color, and much of the stuff i have studied can breathe larger size for others to able to read also.

 

The Pioneer essay i find to be not centered on the origins of sequential comic strips in America - which is the focus of the Victorian history lesson - very little there is discussed outside that narrow parameter of what is "comic art" as in we do nto go into editorial political signel panel cartoons and stuff that while interesting does not fit the criteria of what a body of comics scholars these days feel is a comic strip - ie movement of a graphic story thru time between the panels which encompasses pantomime, words below the art and speech ballons inserted into the panels - all have claim to being comic strips.

 

I think the reason the grading section was not included this year is because there might be a marketing ploy in motion here to get people to buy the separate gradiing guide coming out soon.

 

I did not jump on a Victorian band wagon - my co-authors and I did a lot of serious comics archeology before evolving and spinning off the Victorian section from inside the Plat section. We kept discovering more and more material and the realization slowly sunk in there was way more stuff out there than previously thought - another epiphany,

 

All kinds of peer review has been ongoing on the Plat list i started on yahoogroups back in Dec 1999 - be assured, if something was not proper, comics authorities of all stripes and countries voiced their opinions and we collectively discussed what was real or not. I welcome every one here who is interested to join this merry band of comics archeologists - a list where stuff past 1938 or so is mainly considered off topic.

[showcase4]

Hello Bob,

this is a cut and paste from a website referencing the most historically important US comic books....all 3 of your picks made it:

 

 

The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck

Famous Funnies

Action Comics

Donald Duck

Tales from the Crypt (and other EC titles)

MAD

Fantastic Four

Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

Zap Comix

[BLBcomics-migration]

Oh, there are 100s upon100s of historically important comic books - that is not the issue

 

My opinion, and this is ultimately my opine, is the three books i listed are the three most important comic books for the forces they unleashed in the comics world

 

YellowKid In McFaddens Flats, as just one example, is important, sure it is, a key book, in fact, but did not unleash a force in the comics world which changed all that came after it

 

- nor did Famous Funnies. That was accomplished with Superman appearing in Action #1

 

ZAP #1 also unleashed forces in the comics world which reverberated throughout the entire comics world when it came out 38 years ago - the landscape was changed forever

 

Obadiah One

Action One

Zap One

 

the three most key books in the pantheon of American comic book evolution

[ciorac]

I listed:

 

1) Obadiah Oldbuck 1842

2) Action #1 1938

3) ZAP #1 1968

 

as the first three most important comic books in that order because of what each "ushered" into this art field we collect. In historico-chronological order as it were. I already mentioned why ZAP is so important, which may be my way of explaining why i have a Plymell ZAP pictured in my "modern" comics origin essay the last few years.

 

All other comic books are "important footnotes" in the comics history, of which there are many 100s of same - all part of a 160+ year evolution of the comics business.

 

and all of this discussion is "on topic" as far as I am concerned, as this 160+ year history of comic strip books in America is one long time line to me. I come to this conclusion based on the tens of thousands of comic strips i have read - hundreds of thousands? - a lot, to be sure.

 

Crumb's seminal ZAP #1 ushered in a seminal "New Direction" in the way comic books could be created and distributed - and focusing on royalties being paid, the creator of comic books owning his own work, being able to take it from publisher to publisher.

 

Each of the above three books, boiling away everything else, mark seminal events in comics history. What constitutes #4, #5, etc in importance, i leave to others right now to fill in the blanks on. All the artifacts previously mentioned by others are also "important" - there have been quite a few attempts at making lists of "100 most important comic books of all time" and those lists vary.

 

Obviously, the above, and previous posts for that matter, are just my opines, and i welcome peer review in this fascinating realm of comics archeology. I would not have it any other way.

 

The Victorian and Plat sections plus the "modern" comics origin story is holding so far at 66 pages. There has been a constant steady flow each year of new information coming into each of the sub-sections of what i compile for OPG. So far i have been able to squeeze in new data by shrinking the size of certain visual aid in heach history essay lesson - down side is one cannot read the strips, and i can only hope the art comes thru - maybe one day i will be able to get my comics hsitory tome publsihed - large size, in color, and much of the stuff i have studied can breathe larger size for others to able to read also.

 

The Pioneer essay i find to be not centered on the origins of sequential comic strips in America - which is the focus of the Victorian history lesson - very little there is discussed outside that narrow parameter of what is "comic art" as in we do nto go into editorial political signel panel cartoons and stuff that while interesting does not fit the criteria of what a body of comics scholars these days feel is a comic strip - ie movement of a graphic story thru time between the panels which encompasses pantomime, words below the art and speech ballons inserted into the panels - all have claim to being comic strips.

 

I think the reason the grading section was not included this year is because there might be a marketing ploy in motion here to get people to buy the separate gradiing guide coming out soon.

 

I did not jump on a Victorian band wagon - my co-authors and I did a lot of serious comics archeology before evolving and spinning off the Victorian section from inside the Plat section. We kept discovering more and more material and the realization slowly sunk in there was way more stuff out there than previously thought - another epiphany,

 

All kinds of peer review has been ongoing on the Plat list i started on yahoogroups back in Dec 1999 - be assured, if something was not proper, comics authorities of all stripes and countries voiced their opinions and we collectively discussed what was real or not. I welcome every one here who is interested to join this merry band of comics archeologists - a list where stuff past 1938 or so is mainly considered off topic.

 

Come on Bob! Obadiah in the number one spot??? Stop it. I've known you for many, many years, and I know you can't possible believe that.

 

Almost a hundred years before your next most significant event? Tough logic to follow. I've never even heard of Obadiah until this thread, and I've been doing this nearly as long as you.

 

Comics, in my opinion were insignificant until Action #1, and would have remained a footnote in history had he not came along. So, putting any other book in the conversation with Action #1 is silly. In my top ten most significant comics the first the top four are superhero, #5 is a plat (and it varies on which one).

[Aman619]

I agree with you, but I assume Bob listed them in chronological order.

 

 

at least I HOPE so!

[BLBcomics-migration]

 

Come on Bob! Obadiah in the number one spot??? Stop it. I've known you for many, many years, and I know you can't possible believe that.

 

Almost a hundred years before your next most significant event? Tough logic to follow. I've never even heard of Obadiah until this thread, and I've been doing this nearly as long as you.

 

Comics, in my opinion were insignificant until Action #1, and would have remained a footnote in history had he not came along. So, putting any other book in the conversation with Action #1 is silly. In my top ten most significant comics the first the top four are superhero, #5 is a plat (and it varies on which one).

 

Again, another person who remains anon who claims to know me

- tis OK, it's like talking to a wall at times

 

Comic strips in news papers prior to WW2 were one of the main forms of entertainment until TV began knocking them off a perch. Blondie was being read by 100 million persons a DAY, as just one example. So was Bringing Up Father. Superman in the news paper strip version was being read by 20 million people a day

 

-readership of comic BOOKS was like a pimple on someone's a____

 

It is only comic book people who have not studied this art form who seem to think that super hero comic BOOKS are the be-all end-all of the comics business.

 

That is patently silly in and of itself to think that way.

 

What i am talking about when i made my little list of three are the three most important comic books - if all you could do is talk about three.

 

One has to think outside the box of myth and think in terms of the 160+ year history of the comic book business in America.

 

Walt Disney's Comics & Stories was selling 4+ million an issue in its prime

- Looney Tunes are doing 3+ million per ish in its prime - month in, month out

Tarzan was doing 1.5 million - outselling any one issue of Superman

 

have you ever figured out why Dells are so damn common?

 

Many of the Cupples & Leon comic book 10x10s sold over a million copies as well

 

Get outside your generational super hero outlook on comics in America

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My friend Michel Kempeneers posted these links on my Plat site for those of you still seeking to track down COMIC ART #3 with its look-see "Töpffer in America":

 

The 3rd issue of "Comic Art Magazine" also provides a fine overview --- in

which Beerbohm, Wheeler, and another list co-moderator, Leonardo De Sá,

joined forces --- of the current state of Töpffer's comics in English:

http://www.comicartmagazine.com/archive-issue3.php

http://www.comicartmagazine.com/archive-issue3sect3.php

That's sold out, unfortunately.

 

You may also want to check out the same Leonardo De Sá's Töpffer synopsis:

http://leonardodesa.interdinamica.net/comics/lds/vb/VieuxBois00.asp?p=Intro

http://leonardodesa.interdinamica.net/comics/lds/vb/VieuxBoisSynopsis.asp?p=

Synopsis

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I agree with you, but I assume Bob listed them in chronological order.

 

 

at least I HOPE so!

 

well, chrono-order is how it worked out, to be sure

 

I was simply boiling down all the comic books of America into what were the three most important

 

bob beerbohm

[showcase4]

I

 

Almost a hundred years before your next most significant event? Tough logic to follow. I've never even heard of Obadiah until this thread, and I've been doing this nearly as long as you.

 

 

Respectfully, if you never heard Obadiah Oldbuck until this thread, then you must have been doing this very part time.

 

As for the 100 year gap between signifigant events...it does sound suspicious at first, but it's actually not, and here's why. Imagine the funnel cloud of a tornado.....the Victorian and Platinum Age would be the skinny part near the bottom, and the Golden Age would be the wide part at the top. At the skinny part, there is not much debris...things ( comics ) are swirling around, but there is not much debth or thickness. Slowly, as the funnel gets wider, there is more substance, more girth, more "comic books", and as the number of different books and publishers increase, so does the number of changes and advances. At the top of the tornado...let's call it the 1930's/1940's, there is great mass, circulation, structure, diversity of debris, and motion...things are really happening, and quickly at the top of the funnel cloud. So my point is, at the tip of the tornado ( Obadiah Oldbuck 1842 ), the addition of other books and changes/advances happened very slowly, as the industry was very new and still forming and finding its stride. Developement was slow and uncertain, as publishers were in uncharted territory, and didn't have the confidence of success they did in later years to go and print millions of a single book. The leap from 1st comic book to 1st superhero in a comic book did take, believe it or not, about 100 years. 1842 to 1938.