Golden Age Collection 22 22

[BB-Gun]

 

 

The Junkers Ju 86 bomber is also pictured on this cover of Flying Aces.

 

Artwork is by August Schomburg.

 

December 1939

 

August knew every plane of WWII it seems.

 

However, I don't think a Spitfire would have to ram a Junker. They could blow them out of the sky due to their superior performance especially at high altitudes. The Rolls Royce engine was so superior to anything else made during the war, it was also used in the Mustang P-51 and made in the USA based on Rolls Royce specifications.

Edited April 11, 2011 by BB-Gun

[Flex Mentallo]

Ah! Planes! More Flying Aces please BZ!!

 

My father threw this digest in the fire when I wouldnt stop reading it. Took me 30 years to find another copy:

 

 

It was one of a factual series with excellent pictures and descriptions:

 

 

 

 

 

Air Ace was a long running digest sized black and white comic featuring adult-readable stories:

 

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

Some of the better covers:

 

 

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

The printing quality did little justice to the originals. This was the cover for an issue entitled "Whirlwind in the sky" The artist was an italian, Giorgio De Gaspari

 

 

Edited April 11, 2011 by alanna

[Flex Mentallo]

I believe you've got it this time :hail:

 

[sacentaur]

The printing quality did little justice to the originals. This was the cover for an issue entitled "Whirlwind in the sky" The artist was an italian, Giorgio De Gaspari

 

 

 

Very cool!

[BangZoom]

Air Ace was a long running digest sized black and white comic featuring adult-readable stories:

 

 

 

Great looking covers.

 

Is each issue a stand alone story with characters that are never heard from again or do they have a continuing cast of characters throughout the series?

[BangZoom]

I believe you've got it this time :hail:

 

 

Here are some more images of the Junkers Ju-86K bomber.

 

Air Trails (August 1938)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

Each one is a stand alone story. The first title was War Picture library. Wikipedia:

 

. . . cowards and glory seekers could be found in some episodes; spies and traitors rubbed shoulders with our staunchly loyal heroes in others. Neither were all of the stories purely about killing the enemy; some of them were dedicated to saving lives even in the midst of the carnage of war

 

Artists included Solano Lopez and Hugo Pratt.

 

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

I have the first 72 issues of Air Ace and the first 200 WPL.

 

This one is rare:

 

 

 

There was also a War at Sea library, which only ran for about 35 issues. I have most of those.

 

Here is a linky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Picture_Library

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

 

[Flex Mentallo]

 

[Flex Mentallo]

 

Edited April 11, 2011 by alanna

[Flex Mentallo]

[BangZoom]

I have the first 72 issues of Air Ace and the first 200 WPL.

 

This one is rare:

 

 

 

There was also a War at Sea library, which only ran for about 35 issues. I have most of those.

 

Here is a linky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Picture_Library

 

 

I love the covers.

 

Do you have any scans of the interiors you can post?

 

 

[BangZoom]

 

Some Extracts From Wikipedia

 

 

War Picture Library

 

War Picture Library was a British 64-page Pocket library war comic title published by Amalgamated Press/Fleetway (now owned by IPC Magazines) for 2103 issues. Each issue featured a complete story, beginning in 1 September 1958 with "Fight Back to Dunkirk" and finishing 26 years later with "Wings of the Fleet" (3 December 1984).[1]

 

Companion titles Air Ace Picture Library

 

Publication history

 

Launched in September, 1958, the Amalgamated Press/Fleetway title War Picture Library was one of the earliest (arguably the earliest[2]) "pocket library" titles, and in particular one of the first to feature stories set during World War II. Comprising 64-pages, the tales were, according to Steve Holland "page turner of the first order, a shilling shocker that grabbed [the] attention" of a — primarily — young audience.[3] Written and illustrated, at least in early years, "by creators who had lived through the war themselves, many on the front line," War Picture Library was able to show clearly to its target audience "what [the reader's] fathers and uncles had been through in combat."[3] War Picture Library brought the Second World War to life "n all its grim glory," according to writer and editor Steve Holland.[2]

 

The stories were not limited to tales of combat, some set in "the bomb-torn streets of London during the blitz," although the bulk of the stories released several times a month[4] for over two thousand issues were set in all fields of combat.[3] Crucially, reflecting the cultural shifts in popular fiction, the war stories did not always feature "a heroic journey," nor yet were all characters automatically "gung-ho" stereotypes: "[a] diversity of characters," human emotion and even some considerable sympathy for 'the enemy' was not out-of-place in some tales.[3]

 

“ . . . cowards and glory seekers could be found in some episodes; spies and traitors rubbed shoulders with our staunchly loyal heroes in others. Neither were all of the stories purely about killing the enemy; some of them were dedicated to saving lives even in the midst of the carnage of war.[3] ”

 

Running until late 1984, "War Picture Library was a monthly window into a six-year global storm that affected every family in Britain."[3] The first-hand knowledge of many of its creators also enabled the stories to ring true, and disclose - in sometimes simplified, and always fictionalised terms - the truth behind the stories told in history books.

 

“ "[The stories] helped the two generations of children that grew up following VE Day make sense of the catastrophic consequences of war and the sacrifices that were made."[3]

 

Creators

 

Uncredited from the start, as were the vast majority of comic books written and drawn in the late 1950s and early 1960s, War Picture Library continued the trend of UK-based comics publishers such as D. C. Thomson and publisher Fleetway in continuing not to credit on-page the names of its creators.

 

Many names - and before them, styles - became familiar to UK comics readers, however, and still more names have been documented over recent years. Contributors to War Picture Library included artists such as Giorgio Trevisan, Harry Farrugia, George Heath, Nevio Zeccara, Annibale Casabianca, F. Solano López, Juan Gonzalez Alacreu, Jose Ortiz, Ramon de la Fuente, Jorge Moliterni, Renzo Calegari, Luis Ramos, Gino D'Antonio and Hugo Pratt.[2][5]

 

Writers are often harder to identify, but among those identified by Steve Holland (et al.) are Donne Avenell, Ian Kellie, Douglas Leach, Willie Patterson, Alf Wallace, David Satherley, Roger P. Clegg, A. Carney Allen and S & J Thomas

 

Hallmarks

 

War Picture Library was among the first war comic to use real dates, places, settings, battles and (occasionally) battalions to more accurately place the stories in the historical action, even if the stories themselves were fictional. This came about largely because so many of the (early) writers and artists had actually fought in the battles they wrote about and drew. Steve Holland cites the example of G. R. Parvin, a "relatively minor contributor to the war libraries," who "was captured [during WWII] and made a P.O.W. by the Japanese."[6] Parvin's story is told in the autobiographical Yasumai! (Digit Books, 1958), and "[a]t least one[7]" of his contributions to War Picture Library (as well as Battle Picture Library) "was set around the Railroad of Death in Burma."[6]

 

As with most war picture libraries, the equipment was accurately depicted in addition to the settings, although unlike some, War Picture Library was not averse to making central characters out of individuals usually associated with relatively minor overall roles. The often-realistic writing even downplayed the differences between the sides, treating some German frontline soldiers as - like the British - discrete individuals caught up in their wartime role, who were not wholly evil and did not always wish to fight, as wartime propaganda so often suggested.[8] Nevertheless, due in part to the ultimately patriotic nature of many of the stories, and the time in which some were created, some racist steretyping occasionally crept in.

 

Stories of self-sacrifice, such as that of Captain John Locke in "The Valley of Death" (War Picture Library #120 (Nov 1961), art by Jose Ortiz) were not uncommon, and were frequently depicted as serving a greater good and having a large, wider impact on the course of the war (in Locke's case, Operation Broadway).[9] Some tales would also provide a certain amount of levity, and even slapstick comedy, such as the mildly farcical tale of Corporal Tagg in the Donne Avenell-penned "Snarl of Battle" (War Picture Library #162 (Sep 1962), art by Ramon de la Fuente), which also highlighted very serious issues including the often stark discrepancies between the men who engaged in action and those who took (or were given) the credit.[8]

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

Ian Kennedy:

 

 

 

 

 

[Flex Mentallo]

Kennedy again:

 

[BB-Gun]

The printing quality did little justice to the originals. This was the cover for an issue entitled "Whirlwind in the sky" The artist was an italian, Giorgio De Gaspari

 

 

 

I think those are Westland Whirlwinds on the prowl. A nifty looking plane which reminds me of the speedy Mosquito that was made out of plywood. The Germans made the "flying pencil" out of aluminum which should be light but I don't think it moved as fast as the Mosquito. Jets were pretty fast but entered too late to make a difference. Most of that war was was fought with technology that was developed in the thirties. The Rolls Royce Merlin engine was designed in 1933, improved with a two stage supercharger and placed in every type of plane possible.

Edited April 11, 2011 by BB-Gun

[Flex Mentallo]

 

Dont have this anymore but The Silver-plated Luger was my most-fondly remembered individual story- everyone who owned the silver luger was fated to die!