Comics ads have been around for a while.

“Hey Skinny!  . . . Yer ribs are showing!” “How a 97-lb. weakling became the ‘world’s most perfectly developed man.’” “Tired of being picked on?” “The insult that turned a ‘Chump’ into a ‘Champ.’” “The insult that made a Man out of ‘Mac.’”

Not all the ads for Charles Atlas’s “Dynamic Tension” training were in comics form—but the comics panels that showed a bully kicking sand in the face of a guy at the beach were so well known that they formed the basis of a wide variety of pop culture responses.

Whether it came in “I Can Make You a Man” from the 1973–1975 Rocky Horror Picture Show musical or in Jack Kent’s delightful The Once-Upon-a-Time Dragon (1982) children’s book, audiences knew the reference. (Admittedly, in the case of Jack Kent’s book, it’d be the adult reading to the child who would understand the reference. But I digress.)

Among the reasons for its resonance are that (a) the ads seemed to be everywhere and (b) their pictures were clear and made the saga memorable.

The campaign was a prime example of the power of comic art to convey a message.

Hey, what the heck? In order to sell its Twinkies, Hostess took this Marvel characters ad in Gold Key’s Uncle Scrooge #149 (February 1978). © 2021 Marvel

Comics Ads Grab Customers

According to Wiki, it was in 1929 that Charles Atlas (1892– 1972) involved his Charles Atlas Ltd. with ad man Charles P. Roman. Roman produced those catchy strips that promoted the Atlas bodybuilding course. And Roman wasn’t alone, as an increasing number of advertising designers reached customers via comics. Distinctive comics characters were invented to introduce compelling stories about products for sale.

When media planners decide where and how to place their ad dollars, comics have been part of the mix for quite a while. Those planners have to figure out how to best send their message, and it looks as if comics have paid off for many years.

It’s time for a tip of the Thompson Topper to Woody Gelman (1915– 1978). If you’re not familiar with his name, it may be because you weren’t beginning to get into comics in the 1960s. As Wiki notes, his Nostalgia Press “pioneered the reprinting of vintage comic strips in quality hardcovers and trade paperbacks.” I don’t think most of us knew that his earlier connection to comics included that he’d co-created DC’s “The Dodo and the Frog.”

In any case, Gelman had joined artist Ben Solomon to set up a company that developed ad campaigns that included comics. Comic books packed with their own characters soon contained full-page stories featuring Popsicle Pete. A gum company beckoned, and Solomon became art director and Gelman became creative director of Topps. And Bazooka gum (which began in 1947) soon contained little comic strips themselves, eventually featuring Bazooka Joe. (Heck, eventually Gelman also came up with more, including Mars Attacks! Just saying.)

Comics to Ads

Sometimes, though, it was pre-existing comics characters that became identified by ad agencies as friendly partisans that could spread their messages.

Marjorie Henderson Buell’s Little Lulu first appeared as the concluding cartoon panel every week in The Saturday Evening Post. Not only did she get a translation into full-length story adventures in comic books and animated cartoons—but she also became the spokesgirl for Kleenex tissues.

Popeye promoted spinach and then Instant Quaker Oatmeal.

The animated stars of The Flintstones appeared for both vitamins and (yes, “a Winston break!”) cigarettes.

Hostess hired both DC and Marvel super-characters to let readers know that they’d get “a big delight in every bite” of its treats.

Advertising took to animation eagerly, sometimes with bonus comics. Quisp, Quake, Cap’n Crunch, Cocoa Puffs, Lucky Charms, Trix  . . . You can come up with many more.

And what the heck? Every once in a rare while, a commercial product would get its own comic book!

John Stanley, for example, wrote Choo-Choo Charlie, a one-issue Gold Key title (December 1969) that featured the TV-ad character known for recommending Good & Plenty candy.

And, of course, there were ads for comics—in comics.

Heck, this ad in EC’s Two-Fisted Tales #30 (November–December 1952) not only promoted a promising new series, it also clearly identified some staffers (and taught readers to look for signatures). © 2021 EC Publications, Inc.

Ads Subsidized Comics

The topics of comics economics and distribution can be complex. (As in: Dell was a distribution company that handled its own racking in the 1940s and 1950s, so its costs differed from those of companies that hired other firms to maintain stock in newsstands.) But comic book prices stayed relatively low for years, thanks in part to support from the advertisers that filled many comic book pages.

DC’s Action Comics #1 (June 1938) was made up of 68 pages of which more than 65 (including the cover) were filled with editorial content. It was just getting started, and most of the ads promoted company material, though the back-cover ad was devoted to the ever-intriguing Johnson Smith & Co. catalog.

Eventually, Action Comics settled down to a pretty normal page count of 36 (including the cover), and, dipping in now and then, we find that ads filled a substantial number of them. In 1971, issue 402 was priced at 15¢ for 36 pages, of which roughly a third were ads. In 1976, #456 (25¢) had 44 percent of its 36 pages as ads. And so it went. In 1999, #760 ($1.95) had 36 pages, of which about 30 percent were ads.

Well, Heck . . .

Come to think of it, if you grab The Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide, you’ll find an entire section labeled “Promotional”—meaning that it contains information on giveaway comics that were used to, well, promote things. Which is to say they were ads. Among the long-running comics in the section are Adventures of Big Boy, Buster Brown Comics, Gulf Funny Weekly, and the champ: Western’s March of Comics.

Come to think of yet something else, Maggie’s World #50 was a pretty deep dive into the topic—which involved comics that were ads for themselves—and brought up the matter of Free Comic Book Day. Remember: Every Free Comic Book Day, some releases have functioned as their own giveaway ads for comics soon to be on sale. (Tip: The 20th anniversary of Free Comic Book Day will be in 2022!)

Because even comics ads can be a treat.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the second Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

There I was in Barnes & Noble in August 2021, checking out what comics-adjacent publications might be lurking on the shelves for non-comics-obsessed children. In the newsstand area I saw Highlights and Jack and Jill—but not comics magazines.

It occurred to me that there might be comics in the “Humor” section and—yes!

Then, I saw a kid who looked to be about 5 years old. He was calling the attention of the adult he was with to that “Humor” area. And she said, “No, those are for big people.”

I took another look at what was shelved there, and it was a mix—a mix that, by the way, did include a number of collections of comic books aimed at young readers. Those were collections that the kid had just been told to avoid.

Among them was a paperback I think could be fun for new readers as well as for longtime collectors: The Best of Archie Comics vol. 1, with a cover proclaiming it to be “80th Anniversary Edition.” (Mind you, a closer look made it clear that this was the 70th Anniversary Edition sporting a new cover and copyright page. Nevertheless, it was keen, and I bet the boy would have enjoyed it.)

A Way In

In olden times (which is to say, “When I was a kid”—otherwise known as the late 1940s), I had a weekly allowance of 10¢. With that loot, I could go to the neighborhood newsstand and pick out one comic book: any dime comic book I wanted. I had the power. That comic book was mine to choose, mine to buy, mine to peruse, mine to own.

Ownership conferred proprietary interest and more. I owned the contents and the characters. Because of that, I knew I needed to learn to read to get the full benefit of the contents and characters. That, then, made me care even more about the stories and the characters—and the ability to read.

Learn to read with comic books is just what I did—and, yes, Mom helped with that. Then, seeing what I liked, Mom and Dad enabled that reading even more, buying me subscriptions to some of my favorites. Today’s collectors object to the subscription crease on such issues. As a kid, though, I was thrilled when a comic book came to me—me, personally—in the mail.

As time went on, I continued to look for work by my favorite creators. (The anonymous Carl Barks! The anonymous John Stanley!) And then I came across material aimed at older readers. (Hey! EC artists sign their work! Now I can recognize styles!)

Prices Changed

When comic books were a part of shopping routines (in grocery stores, as well as newsstands), the contents tended to stand on their own. Anthology titles carried a variety of complete short stories. An introductory caption might establish the setup, and the free-standing tale would wrap up within the issue. So that dime gave me a variety of complete adventures and gags. And I savored the beginning, middle, and end of each episode I owned.

DC’s Action Comics was an anthology comic book. It can provide a timeline of the investments involved over the years. (Yes, there were occasional bounces for special editions and oddball page counts. Nevertheless.)

• 1938 10¢
• 1961 12¢
• 1969 15¢
• 1971 25¢
• 1976 30¢
• 1977 35¢
• 1978 40¢
• 1980 50¢
• 1981 60¢
• 1983 75¢
• 1991 $1.00
• 1992 $1.25
• 1993 $1.50
• 1995 $1.95
• 2000 $1.99
• 2000 $2.25
• 2004 $2.50
• 2006 $2.99
• 2011 $3.99
• 2016 $2.99
• 2019 $3.99
• 2021 $4.99

By the way, according to the Internet, 10¢ in 1938 would have inflated to about $1.81 in 2021. So there have clearly been more factors involved in price changes than simple inflation. Advertising support did help keep prices low for some publishers—including DC. Someday, we can consider that (and the difference in what the ads-free Western Printing produced). For the time being, though, consider that, in the midst of all this, the direct market took form, starting with Phil Seuling’s November 1977 announcement of his Sea Gate direct-distribution project.

Phil’s goal was to get all published comic books into individual comics shops (via nonreturnable advance orders). That way, comics collectors could do one-stop shopping, not possible until then. And it worked, though comics collectors tended to focus on established favorites, rather than on entry-level introductions to comic book stories. These favorites became the focus of many comics shops. Which brings us to today.

Now . . .

Let’s consider another memory. Don and I were in a newsstand in 1966 not long after the Adam West Batman series had begun to air. We heard a little boy exclaim with delight, “I didn’t know they had a book about Batman!”

Spread the word. They have books about favorite characters: comics that kids today can own. To make that fact clear to folks who didn’t know, the comics industry itself began to make comics outreach into an event. In August 2001, retailer Joe Field suggested a Free Comic Book Day to introduce folks to comics shops—and the variety of comics they carry. And the next May 4, the idea became a reality.

When I recently paid a bill with a check, the staffer admired the Looney Tunes characters that were in the check design—but then said sadly, “Kids today wouldn’t know who that is.” It was Bugs Bunny.

But there is a Looney Tunes comic book, as well as theatrical and streaming content. There are even some comic-book subscriptions available today. For example, there’s at least one website via which customers can subscribe to such ongoing series as Justice League, Looney Tunes, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?, Suicide Squad, Superman, and Wonder Woman.

But would kids even know about all those titles these days? How can we get comics to kids and kids to comics?

We’re back to that Barnes & Noble moment. Where can kids go these days to find comic books? A couple of opportunities come immediately to mind. Some public libraries—most?—offer books of comics. Some have trained librarians ready to suggest comics choices for young readers. Those readers can develop their interests by borrowing samples of the variety of comics offerings on library shelves.

There’s a bonus for kids lucky enough to have a comic book shop in their neighborhood. August 2021 brought Free Comic Book Day to such shops again. The choices among those treats made it simultaneously clear that not all comic books are for kids and that not all comic books these days carry “Done in One” stories. There’s a wide variety of comics out there, and the quantity can be confusing.

The happy situation, though, is that even kids who didn’t visit a shop in that event will find that comics shop staffers can help them find the fun they will most enjoy.

Because there are still comic books that kids can own. And that’s pretty great.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the second Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

I was 13. Mom used to buy Woman’s Day magazine (7 cents! cheaper than a comic book!) at the grocery store, and at some point I’d read her copy. The June 1956 issue cover-featured Danny Kaye—but there was also a cover notice about a serial starting in the issue: “Part 1 of a new novel: The GREAT DOG ROBBERY.”

I enjoyed the heck out of that first part—and the three that followed. However, when the novel was later published in book form, I noticed that the pictures I’d loved were missing and that the copyright page had this notice: “The Hundred and One Dalmatians appeared in serial form, with different illustrations, as ‘The Great Dog Robbery’ in Woman’s Day.”

What I didn’t know was who that original artist had been or why the art wasn’t in the book.

But when the movie version—One Hundred and One Dalmatians—came out four and a half years later, I realized that the villain’s design was the one I’d seen in the magazine in 1956.

And I’d wondered about the identity of that original artist ever since.

Now …

My curiosity finally demanded satisfaction. I tracked down a copy of that 65-year-old magazine for sale online—and was stunned.

Because, although I’d admired that artist’s work for decades, I’d never seen him credited for this specific pop culture contribution.

William Pène du Bois (May 9, 1916–February 5, 1993) had won the 1948 Newbery Medal (as author of the most distinguished contribution of the year to American literature for children) for The Twenty-One Balloons and was a runner-up for the Caldecott Medal (as artist of the most distinguished American picture book of the year for children) for Bear Party in 1952 and for Lion in 1957. But I don’t think there are many these days who are familiar with the art he had provided for that original four-part serial.

Here’s the description that du Bois had been given: “. . . a tall woman came out onto the front steps. She was wearing a tight-fitting emerald satin dress, several ropes of rubies, and an absolutely simple white mink cloak, which reached to the high heels of her ruby-red shoes. She had a dark skin, black eyes with a tinge of red in them, and a very pointed nose. Her hair was parted severely down the middle, and one half of it was black and the other white—rather unusual.”

That’s it. Her hair could have been braided. Could have been in a bun—or two buns. Could have been in a pixie cut. Could have been in two ponytails. But du Bois chose his own “rather unusual” style: the style that was used—with one change—in the film.

Raggedys

Writer/artist Johnny Gruelle (December 24, 1880–January 9, 1938) introduced Raggedy Ann as an actual doll, which he patented in 1915. Her first book appearance came in his Raggedy Ann Stories in 1918, and Gruelle went on to expand his cast and output.

In comic books, Ann and her brother, Raggedy Andy, were the stars of Dell’s Four Color #5 (1942), which was ©1942 Johnny Gruelle Company. And the copyright was the same for #23 (1943), #45 (1944), and #72 (1945), before they got their own series.

Raggedy Ann + Andy #1 was dated June 1946, and it was an anthology comic book series that included the first installment of Walt Kelly’s “Animal Mother Goose” feature, which Kelly wrote, drew, and signed. Who didn’t sign? The one/s who wrote and drew the story credited to Gruelle, who had died eight years earlier. While that art has been pretty much agreed upon as being the work of George Kerr (March 13, 1870­–October 21, 1953)—and, some have suggested, Lea Bing—the scripts of the Raggedys stories have remained uncredited.

Since Gruelle was a cartoonist and children’s books author, my mother (who was supporting my comics obsession at the time) took it for granted in the 1940s that he had written and drawn the comics that bore his name. Over the years, she learned that the stories had been by other creators, and, when she began work in 1982 on an article about those comics, she tried to find out more about them. The Bobbs-Merrill Company was publishing Raggedys material by then, and she wrote to its Character Licensing Division. She outlined what she’d been able to find by that point (most specifically, a 1977 New York Times article) but added that even that “gave me no clues about who were ‘doing’ the ‘Raggedy’ strips in the 1940s, mentioning only ‘by then [mid 1920s] his son, Worth, and a brother, Justin, had joined Gruelle in writing and illustrating the books.’”

The Bobbs-Merrill marketing manager responded that the company needed to know more about her article and the magazine in which it was to appear, adding, “Any material for publication must be submitted for approval to our office prior to publication.” By then, the intended publication was no longer involved with the project, so Mom’s questions remained unanswered then—and now.

Secrets

On the other hand, there were a few sources of information about comic book credits for the lucky few who could find them.

Among those was Secrets behind the Comics by Stan Lee, which he produced in 1947. In the course of the booklet, he not only discussed the process of producing comic book content, but he also identified a few of the creators.

On the title page, Stan wrote, “Illustrated by Ken Bald” and “Lettered by M. Acquaviva.” Then, the credits began in the midst of samples: Managing Editor and Timely Comics Inc. Art Director was Stan Lee. Artists discussed (with their work) were Ed Winiarski, Vic Dowd, Frank Carin, Ken Bald, Syd Shores, Morris Weiss, and Basil Wolverton. Specified as pencillers were Kin Platt and Mike Sekowsky—and as an inker, Violet Barclay. Credited writers were Stan Lee, Ken Bald, Ed Jurist, Morris Weiss, and Basil Wolverton. There were entries for letterer Mario Acquaviva, writer and editor Alan Sulman, and publisher Martin Goodman.

On the other hand, according to his files, William Woolfolk (June 25, 1917–July 20, 2003) wrote stories for Marvel’s Blonde Phantom #19, dated only one year after Secrets behind the Comics (in which he hadn’t been one of the creators discussed). But there was no credit for him in that issue—or for any of the other contributors to #19.

So it was that many secrets remained secrets until fans became obsessed with trying to make them public.

By the way …

Did you spot the design change between Cruella in The Great Dog Robbery (1956) and Cruella in One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961)? You did—right? Or, putting it another way, the right side! (The du Bois art showed Cruella’s white hair on the same side as her right hand; the films showed it on the same side as her left.)

And now you know a secret behind some comic art, too.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the second Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

A look at comic-book price guides provides vivid evidence of the importance to collectors of the preservation of four-color treasures. I keep an eye out for beat-up copies of items on my want list, because they can be the most economical way to read the originals. Why? Because the comics to which we used to refer as “Newsstand Mint” can come at a cost many times higher than the tattered versions of those same editions.

I long ago gave up the idea of buying even the most damaged copy of Amazing Fantasy #15, but, if I were looking for one, I would probably have to pay a twentieth of what a near-perfect copy might bring. (One of those near-perfects sold at Heritage Auctions last year for $795,000, so … As I say, I gave up that idea long ago.)

Memories

Look at photos of people young and old (but mostly young) reading comics in the Golden Age. [“Golden Age” is a term that some seem to be discarding now, but we know what I mean, right? Mind you, we used to say, “The Golden Age is 12”—which is to say that adults in the 1960s looked back at the comics they loved when they were 12 (in the 1940s and early 1950s) and deemed them precious.]

When I began to collect comics in the mid-1940s, I was 3 years old, and Mom and Dad encouraged me. But keeping those comics in good shape was tricky, because (as we know only too well) comics disintegrate on their own and are fragile. I don’t think most of us realized it then, though. We tended to treat them casually, not knowing that, for example, the paper had a high sulfur content. That meant that exposure to heat, moisture, and light led to chemical reactions that, in effect, made comic book newsprint burn itself. The best way to preserve a comic book was to keep it cold, dry, and in the dark. Oh—and, by the way, to avoid handling it as much as possible. Which—yeah.

I do have a few comics that I bought (for a dime!), when I was 5 or younger.

But “bag and board them”? Hardly.

But do consider this, before you judge the comics collectors of the 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s harshly:

When I was learning to read via my comic books in the 1940s, Mom and Dad wouldn’t have had plastic bags in the kitchen that I could have appropriated to protect my four-color treasures. (I’m still trying to nail down a definitive date for when the first food-storage bags hit grocery-store shelves, but I’m thinking they were Baggies in the late 1950s.)

A couple of decades later, Don and I attended Jerry Bails’ “Alley Tally” party in Detroit, where we were intrigued by Jerry’s device of storing comics in some sort of hanging plastic bag arrangement. Nope! I don’t remember more about it. But I do know we were still trying to figure out how best to keep our comics safe. We weren’t bagging them; we maintained our back issues in boxes and piles, and I think one challenge was identifying which of us had read which copies.

A bagging footnote: In 1970, Bob Overstreet’s first price guide had ads—but they weren’t for comics bags. By his second price guide (1972), though, there were two, one specifying “Marvel comic bags” and adding “larger bags for Golden Age comics also available at the same price.”

What could go wrong?

One way to identify the threats to the comics we owned is to consider a list of defects (and we always used to look for the best copy among those on sale).

Defects from the provider include off-register color, poor trim, subscription crease, arrival stamp, or other notations.

Defects from the owner include brittleness, stains, creases, missing parts (cover, contents, both), rounded corners, defaced covers and/or pages, water damage, rolled spine, split or ragged spine, missing staples, faded inks, and missing coupons or other portions.

But yikes!

An added acknowledged defect these days is one or more amateur attempts at repairs.

How many 1940s comic books do I have that had their staples augmented (or replaced) by staples applied in from the spine an eighth of an inch or so?How many split spines were “repaired” by tape? (The worst in that regard was the so-called “Magic Tape.” At least the non-“Magic” varieties tended to fall off with age.)

Did someone think a “color touch” would be an appropriate fix for a slight chip or tear?

Those are things to consider, if you only collect the best of the best. In which case, you may be one of those who will be most reassured by buying comics that have been graded by a third-party service that finds and reports the flaws. It lets buyers know what they’re buying. The advantage: These services began in the numismatic field, where both sides of coins and banknotes are visible and in which counterfeits are a real possibility. The services were then extended to varieties of trading cards, both sides of which are visible. The disadvantage: If you want to read a comic book that has been similarly encased, you’ll need to unencase it.

And one other, by the way: A plastic shell may not protect a printed item from eventual fading from too much sun exposure. Continue to care for what you have. We are only temporary custodians of our treasures.

An action plan!

In the Golden Age, some comic book owners resorted to binding what they had.

These days, it’s not as complicated as binding used to be, thanks to bags, although there are still tricks. If, like me, you enjoy the economies of looking for beat-up old comics, for example, don’t forget to check for a missing centerfold. Dealers used to note “CFO,” which meant “Center Fold Out.” It meant there were middle pages missing. If you don’t know how many pages should be in the issue, you can check the online Grand Comics Database for that issue. For example, consider Animal Comics #30. It’s clear from a look at the center spread that the story page on the right immediately follows the story page on the left. So whew! And the GCD says it has 52 pages. So you could simply count the pages—at which point you’ll realize that the GCD is counting the covers of the issue as four of the 52 pages.

And, once you’ve bought a back issue, you might want to bag it, when you can. (Note: you can actually use food-storage bags and protect several copies at a time, if necessary.)

Decades ago, I was involved in sending some Golden Age comics to a friend of a friend. I apologized for the condition—but the recipient responded that he thought the wear and tear had made the comics more precious. He said the repeated readings of which the damage was a symptom made it clear that the comics had been loved.

Aw.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the second Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

In this 90th “Maggie’s World,” it seems appropriate to look at milestones. And hey! April 2021 is a pop culture anniversary of sorts.

Thanks to Comic-Con’s archive of “Maggie’s World” columns, readers can visit my earlier comments on the history of the world of comics collecting. The #32 (September 2015) outing was titled “55 Years and Counting,” And #39 (April 2016) was “2016 Fanniversary 55.”

And now it’s April 2021: time to celebrate a milestone again—and remember more.

Six decades ago

In #32, I summed up some of what it had been like for comics lovers when comics fandom got under way. “What was the meaning of Billy Batson’s magic word? Didn’t Mary Marvel have a different meaning for the same magic word? … The public had forgotten. Just … Forgotten. … Although we’d been able to buy copies from newsstands less than a decade earlier, by September 1960, such treasures could be found only in second-hand shops.”

In #39, I paid tribute to the anniversary of the first comics fanzines (released in spring 1961) that were soon joined by many, many others: an environment that would grow into a continuing, influential world of publications focused on the artform. (And, by the way, the spring of 1961 itself was the 35th anniversary of Hugo Gernsback’s science fiction magazine Amazing Stories, in which were published names and full addresses of science fiction enthusiasts. That quickly united a national community of sf fans—including Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, who would go on to co-create Superman.)

So consider the extent to how much we didn’t know in early 1961.

To begin with, we had had almost no reference material to consult for the facts. A few library books were available (if the local library collection happened to include them). I bet I’ve listed them before, and their primary focus was on comic strips, but in any case:

1942 Martin Sheridan, Comics and Their Creators (Ralph T. Hale): strips, one chapter on Superman, one chapter on animated cartoons

1943 Thomas Craven, Cartoon Cavalcade (Simon & Schuster): cartoons and strips

1947 Coulton Waugh, The Comics (Macmillan): strips, one chapter on comic books

1959 Stephen Becker, Comic Art in America (Simon & Schuster): strips, one chapter on comic books

Oh, there was one book that focused on comic books, but it was not in admiration:

1954 Fredric Wertham, Seduction of the Innocent (Rinehart)

In fact, it was part of the reason that nostalgia played such a large part in activating comic book collectors a few years later. Because it changed the types of comic books that were on newsstands.

With that as a foundation …

In 1961, we had nostalgia and a few dealers specializing in back-issue books and magazines. That’s what Dick and Pat Lupoff had started with in 1960 in their science fiction fanzine Xero #1, which contained the first installment of the comics-focused series All in Color for a Dime.

What we had as reference material was what we’d hung onto through the years and what was currently on the nation’s newsstands.

Comics that were cover-dated April 1961 came from these publishers with roughly this many titles:

• 2 American Comics Group
• 2 Prize
• 9 Archie
• 11 Marvel
• 15 Harvey
• 27 Charlton
• 28 DC
• 28 Dell

Added to those were George A. Pflaum’s Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact and Gilberton’s releases of its Classics Illustrated and Classics Illustrated Junior titles with their own distribution channels.

Figuring that there were 124 or so titles out there—with the contributor credits on many (most?) hidden—there were a lot of questions to be answered and—with newsstand comic books having begun a little over a quarter-century earlier (in 1934)—a lot of history to be explored.

One information source for fannish researchers was the Statement of Ownership that periodicals circulated via second-class mail were required to post. For 1961, we could eventually see such figures for average paid circulation per issue as:

• Forbidden Worlds 178,600
• Richie Rich 220,000
• Showcase 240,000
• The Brave and the Bold 245,000
• Archie 458,039
• Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan 509,355

And (though new to the game) we could guess at which companies were approximating their figures. And which titles were doing well. And, yes, analyses could be tricky. For example, Uncle Scrooge #33 [March-May] had an average circulation that topped the field at 853,928 per issue, according to today’s Comichron website. Comichron (from which I grabbed this data) points out that Uncle Scrooge’s circulation was highest—but it was a quarterly. More time on the newsstand meant more time to find and buy a copy.

Also of note regarding sales that year: Comichron’s John Jackson Miller says, “The average [mean] circulation of all titles publishing Statements was above 300,000 copies for the last time in 1961.”

Mind you, the Silver Age is generally considered to have begun years before, with DC’s Showcase #4 (September-October 1956). But—look at its name—it just provided trial balloons. Happily for superhero comics fans, though, that experimental balloon lifted the industry to new levels of reader involvement.

In the June-July 1961 issue of DC’s The Brave and the Bold (#36), Editor Julius Schwartz involved fans directly, printing names and addresses of letter writers—and including contributor credits (Gardner Fox and Joe Kubert) for the stories in the issue. The curtain hiding information and history was being pulled back.

By the autumn of 1961, DC editors were reaching out even more to nostalgic fans, with “Flash of Two Worlds” combining Silver and Golden Age Flashes in The Flash #123, Showcase #34 introducing the Silver Age version of The Atom, and Marvel joining in, with Fantastic Four #1 (November 1961) kicking off Silver Age versions of Plastic Man, Invisible Girl, and Human Torch. What a year!

Details, details

Mind you, we were still figuring out how to build and care for our collections.

We’d piled our comics in stacks, put them in drawers, whatever. Had we figured out plastic bags at that point? And why were old comics pages turning brown? And was “Magic Tape” really a good idea?

I think we’d figured that one out at the time, actually. And we’ve learned quite a bit more in the last 60 years.

It seems to be a pretty good time for long-time fans and new readers alike to celebrate this 60th Anniversary together.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the second Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

One of our favorite forms of entertainment has been called “comics” for a long time, emerging from the 1700s usage that meant “funny.”

Standing Alone

Frequently, as the comics artform developed, one of its most popular—and challenging—formats was the single-panel gag.

It may have survived to greatest effect in stand-alone political cartoons, but such ongoing syndicated panels as Dennis the Menace and The Far Side have, of course, been popular enough to merit book collections over the years.

Among the challenges is that the background of the stand-alone gag often has to be understood without elaboration. Whether the reader sees it as a stereotype or a meme, there’s a commonality to the setup: Do you see a cannibal pot? Two people on a desert island? Or behind bars? Is there a St. Bernard? Someone emerging from Asia via a deep hole? Someone pounding on the wall to complain about noise from another apartment? A thought balloon? You get the idea. (The wonderful collection paying tribute to cartoonist Sam Cobean, The Cartoons of Cobean, featured a combination of these on the jacket: A man and woman stand on a traffic island in the city, surrounded by cars. The man’s wistful thought balloon, as he admires the woman, is of them stranded alone on a desert island.)

Magazines and newspapers featured countless gag cartoons over the decades, and the evolution to ongoing serial adventures of humorous characters really took off with newspaper syndication. Then, newsstand-distributed comic books emerged in the 1930s, initially supplied with content collected from what had been syndicated.

(Note: While a hefty percentage of comic book material was funny, a lot of it was not—and wasn’t intended to be. There quickly emerged discussions in which some griped that “funnybooks aren’t funny,” “comic books aren’t comic,” and the like. But, even as action-adventure became a major genre of comics in newspapers and on magazine racks, gags and imaginative humor still maintained their presence.)

The Golden Age

A look at the evolution of comic book magazines (as opposed to reprint collections of earlier gags in book form) shows that early outings were filled with reprints of what had already appeared in newspapers. Eastman Color’s Famous Funnies #2 (July 1934) was the first second issue of any U.S. comic book, and it had a mix of action and humorous content. New Fun Comics (February 1935) from what would become DC contained original content and included funny animals. Dell kicked off Popular Comics in February 1936, and by the time of comic books dated January 1937 (on sale at the end of 1936), the comic book racks were beginning to fill. Centaur had Detective Picture Stories #2 and Funny Picture Stories #3. David McKay had King Comics #10. DC had More Fun #17, New Book of Comics #1, and New Comics #12. Dell had Funnies #4 and Popular Comics #12. Eastern Color had Famous Funnies #30. And United Features had Tip Top Comics #9. Most of the gag content seemed to come from strip reprints at that point; there weren’t a lot of new laughs.

A decade after the scant pickings dated January 1937, there were a few more titles on the newsstand (about 105). And a number of those were aimed at readers young and old in search of a laugh. Many of those comics were licensed and had fresh material, often created by people working anonymously (Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, New Funnies, Our Gang Comics, Disney titles, and much of the content of Animal Comics, for example).

While the Golden Age was often termed such in retrospect by fans of costumed heroes, it was also a Golden Age of humor. Such creators as Carl Barks, George Carlson, Walt Kelly, and John Stanley produced classics, even when some of them couldn’t sign their names to their work, thanks to licensing restrictions. The humor in early comic books can be generalized as farce. But there are other forms of humor, and a detour into parody even emerged in the Golden Age. Will Eisner’s action-adventure feature The Spirit was often satiric—and some installments even made fun of Will Eisner’s own storytelling. (I call your attention to last month’s Maggie’s World installment.)

Writer-artist-editor Harvey Kurtzman took such material to the next level in MAD (the first issue dated October-November 1952), mocking horror, crime, and western comics. In less than three years, there were a dozen such series on newsstands. (In fact, one of the earliest comics fan groups comprised people devoted to that sort of publication.)

But, of course, those weren’t the only humorous avenues for gags in comic books. So-called “funny animals” had become commonplace for creators who looked for slapstick at a slight remove from human hilarities. And the humorous comics did well.

Silver Age Silliness

In fact, if the Silver Age is agreed upon as having begun with DC’s Showcase #4 (September-October 1956, featuring The Flash), it’s easy to forget that—whereas many superheroic titles had been languishing until then—the funny comics had been chugging right along. That month’s newsstand series featured more than 50 gag-oriented releases, including Abbott and Costello #40, Archie #82, Casper the Friendly Ghost #48, Dagwood #69, Dennis the Menace #18, Fox and the Crow #35, Fritzi Ritz #46, Katy Keene #30, Leave It to Binky #56, Little Lulu #99, Nancy and Sluggo #136, Sad Sack #62, Three Mouseketeers #4, Tweety and Sylvester #14, Uncle Scrooge #15, and Wilbur #68.

As superheroes began to take increasing space on comics racks, that didn’t mean the fun had left the field.

These Days …

What’s old and funny can be current and funny (or even hit close to home), thanks to reprint accessibility. Moreover, our existing collections on bookshelves and in comics boxes can bring us laughs—and so can delights from current newspapers and comics shops. Even the satire of times past turns out to have things to say about today, including such nods to our field as the behavior of The Simpsons’ Comic Book Guy.

A look at Stephen Becker’s history of comics in Comic Art in America (1959) demonstrated that what was old can be new again. A random page turns up a 1959 George Lichty panel cartoon of Civil Defense Headquarters: “… and it’s gratifying to note that public cooperation in the test evacuation of this city was 100% … They had traffic hopelessly snarled within minutes!”

Yep. And ouch.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the second Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

When the play R.U.R. by Karl Čapek had its premiere on January 25, 1921, Rossum’s Universal Robots introduced the word “robot” to the world. Čapek later credited his brother Josef with creation of the word: the Czech word “robota” meaning serfs’ forced labor, was based on “rab,” which meant “slave.”

I grew up familiar with robots. Mom (Betsy Curtis) wrote science fiction, and her fifth sale was “A Peculiar People” (F&SF for August 1951). It was reprinted in The Best Science Fiction Stories (1952), then in New Eves (1994), Sci-Fi Womanthology (2003), and (mistitled as “The Peculiar People”) in Lost Stars (2003). [The story’s title referred to I Peter 2:9: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”]

And I read and reread Ed Hamilton’s “Captain Future” tales in Startling Stories (which started in January 1950). A bunch of guys had been involved in creating the mythos of the Captain Future pulp magazine universe that started publication in 1940. Those participants were Mort Weisinger, Leo Margulies, and Edmond Hamilton (who wrote the stories). Captain Future’s team included the robot Grag, the android Otho, and the brain-in-a-box Simon.

And that’s where I became acquainted with the differences between cyborgs, androids, and (yes) robots.

Definitions

As we celebrate a century of robots, we can consider comics based on the concept: A non-human intelligence of some sort being put to a variety of uses. Heck, around 700 B.C., Hesiod wrote about myths of automata created by Hephaestus: Those included Talos (powered by ichor) protecting Crete. Automata are “self-acting,” self-propelled computing devices.

A.I.—for “artificial intelligence”— is a term coined by John McCarthy in 1956. It’s a general description for a variety of forms of artificial intelligence.

Cyborgs are “cybernetic organisms” containing both organic and mechanical parts. The term was coined by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline in 1960. It’s the title of the Martin Caidin novel on which the TV show Six Million Dollar Man was based. Basically, they are human beings with a variety of implants and/or life supports. (Simon, for example, was a human brain in a life-support box.) But they’re clearly not A.I. It’s the body parts that are artificial, not the intelligence. Captain Future’s brain-in-a-box Simon was a human brain; even the comics characters called “Robotman” were more man than robot. In any case …

Androids are non-human, self-acting, organic but artificial creations (such as Otho).

Robots are mechanical creations such as Grag: machines that can carry out self-directed complex actions automatically.

In fact, while each of the three is frequently depicted in humanoid form, some are not built to look like people. (Think of K.I.T.T. in the 1982 TV series Knight Rider.)

Pop Culture

I’m not counting magical A.I. characters whose creation comes from a variety of fantastic origins, but there were automata in pop culture even before R.U.R. For example, in L. Frank Baum’s first novel, The Surprising Adventures of the Magical Monarch of Mo and His People (1896), he introduced The Cast-Iron Man. In Baum’s third Oz novel, Ozma of Oz (1907) Tik-Tok runs via clockwork that needs to be wound for thought, movement, and speech.

Automata also appeared in early films. Ah, think of the tales, once robots entered popular entertainment! (Consider, for example, the classic image of the Metropolis (1927) Machine-Person.)

Some robot tales preceded such later popularizations as Isaac Asimov’s short stories (collected in I, Robot). But it was Asimov who introduced Three Laws of Robotics in “Runaround” in Astounding Science Fiction (March 1942), edited by John Campbell, with whom Asimov credited the idea:

First Law: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

Second Law: A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

Third Law: A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.

A List

Who’s who (and what’s what) in A.I. comics? Let’s see whether I can avoid messing up the lists (the way I forgot that Daredevil’s mask wouldn’t protect him and his friends in Maggie’s World #082). I should also note that, before final trimming, this Maggie’s World was a third longer than this. I’ve left out many details, omitted too many characters to count, and simply provided preliminary lists in chronological order.

Cyborgs

• April 1942: Robotman in Star Spangled Comics #7
• March 1963: Iron Man in Tales of Suspense #39
• June 1963: Robotman in My Greatest Adventure #80
• March 1964: The Brain in The Doom Patrol #86
• January 1967: Tharok in Adventure Comics #352
• October 1980: Cyborg in DC Comics Presents #26
• September 1988: Tailgunner Jo in Tailgunner Jo #1
• May 1990: Cyborg Superman in Adventures of Superman #466

Androids

• October 1939: Human Torch in Marvel Comics #1
• August 1968: Red Tornado in Justice League of America #64

Robots

• January 1939: Adam Link (in a short story eventually adapted for comic books in Weird Science-Fantasy #27 (January-February 1955)
• March 1940: Flexo the Rubber Man in Mystic Comics #1
• May 1954: M-11/M11 in Menace #11
• September 1956: Gyro Gearloose’s “Little Helper” in Uncle Scrooge #15
• March-April 1962: Metal Men Gold, Iron, Lead, Mercury, Tin, and Platinum in Showcase #37
• July-August 1968: Ultron in The Avengers #54-55
• July 1977: Machine Man (also known as X-51 and Mister Machine) in 2001: A Space Odyssey #8
• December 1977: Red Ronin in Godzilla #5
• November 1997: Hourman III in JLA #12
• September 1998: Baymax in Sunfire & Big Hero Six #1
• 2000: Boilerplate in a Paul Guinan website
• October 2007: Atomic Robo in Atomic Robo #1

More Pop Culture

And things can get complex. Hourman III is called an android but it’s an intelligent machine colony—so it’s a robot. 1978’s radio series Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy called Marvin a “paranoid android,” but the rest of the information identified him as a robot, and he and Eddie the Shipboard Computer were introduced to comics in DC’s 1993 three-issue adaptation.

These days, there are just so many robotic crossovers among media, folks are used to cyborgs and A.I. characters. With the original Star Wars film trilogy kicking off in 1977, the robots (not androids, just saying) were quickly featured in comic books. And so it went.

Let’s face it: The field is so vast that, after weeks of mulling the topic, it wasn’t until it came time to wrap things up that such robot-focused entertainment as Magnus Robot Fighter and Osamu Tezuka’s Tetsuwan Atomu even occurred to me. Which is to say, there’s much more to say about robots. But danger, Will Robinson, danger! We’re out of space, even as readers quickly come up with other characters that should have been mentioned.

In the meantime, it’s time for us all to pay tribute to Karl Čapek for giving us the name. Maybe it’s even time to hunt down a copy of the script for—or a performance of—R.U.R.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the first Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

Now and then, I’ve been known to launch into a “that reminds me” anecdote—and people have occasionally responded with a “you should write that down.”

Now and then, I check a variety of dictionaries for spellings and definitions, and I recently looked up “dotage” in my favorite, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. And I quote: “Second childhood; senility.”

While not (I hope) quite at the point of senility, I do cherish memories of childhood and the past in general. So here’s an installment of “Maggie’s Anecdotage.”

Early Fandom Days

When Don Thompson and I were beginning to reach out to others who might be interested in the world of comic art, we were often met with skepticism. How did we react?

Well, Don was born 85 years ago. A little over a quarter of a century later, in Comic Art #2, he wrote, “When judging comic books, they should be subject to judging in relation to other comic books, not compared to War and Peace, Crime and Punishment or Huckleberry Finn. Frequently, in the case of the EC comic line, they are equal to or superior to magazine fiction and occasionally anthology material. But many, in fact most, of the EC stories were just a little bit better than the average for comics—and that average was and is pretty low—and some were simply trash. I’m sure many of the readers who wrote enthusiastic letters praising “classic” EC stories would be very embarrassed to read their words now. I know I’m embarrassed by a letter of mine in Vault of Horror (of course, EC applied my comments on Bradbury’s ‘The Coffin’ to his ‘Let’s Play “Poison”’ and added exclamation points, but I was still extreme).”

Among reactions I have these days (aside from the desire to change punctuation) is that, when Don wrote that, he didn’t have the comic books at hand so as to be able to cite details. These days, they’re easy to find. For that matter, he wrapped up that editorial with a plea for identifications for Dell Four-Color issues: a project that took us years to complete.

Then-current Comics

But, hey, how about the early days of the Silver Age? What was our take on what was being published then? In Comic Art #3, Don wrote, “Jack Kirby … has teamed up with Stan Lee to produce some singularly uninspired comic books dealing with trite monsters with ridiculous names such as Krag, Gorm and (so help me) Fin Fang Foom. Jumping on the bandwagon, they have created two comics dealing with super-heroes. The first, The Fantastic Four was panned here last issue. The panning is reaffirmed, albeit more mildly. Despite the fact that two of the four title characters (Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Girl) are less than useless, a sharp improvement in the characterizations of The Thing and the Human Torch brings the book to the fringe of readability. Bringing back the Sub-Mariner helped, too. Unfortunately, The Hulk, newest from Kirby and Lee, isn’t worthy of such faint praise as that. It stinks. A comic-book-length rendition of one of their hack monster stories with a continuing character modeled more or less on the Thing.”

Yikes. Good thing Stan and Jack reacted by giving up on those losers immediately, right?

Time to Learn

If you weren’t there, you may not be able to grasp just how little any of us knew then about comic books, comic strips, animated cartoons, magazine cartoons, and the like. Or about the creators of that pop culture comic art. We had mighty few reference books or ways to look at material from years earlier. (Note: While I was attending Oberlin College, Don and I did spend time in the library stacks reading the comic strips lurking in bound volumes of newspapers. So we did do that.)

In general, we depended on our friends to share their favorites—and Hal Lynch (with whom we’d first discussed producing our own comics fanzine) and Vern Coriell volunteered to write about a classic comic strip: Minute Movies by Ed Wheelan. These days, fans can Google for background and see that it ran in newspapers in the 1920s and for a bit thereafter; comic book fans may recall the comic book-page versions of the strip; and some will know his work best from the 1947-1948 EC Fat and Slat issues. But we didn’t know him or his work at all.

Cue Comic Art #4 (with an editorial written November 30, 1962. [In it, by the way, Don opined, “The Fantastic Four, Journey into Mystery (“Thor”) and The Hulk (in that order) are extremely worthwhile now, after some bad moments in the early issues.” Whew!]

Hal and Vern had called our attention to Wheelan and his wonderful strip but, when they contacted him about writing the article, he responded with hostility out of years of frustration at treatment by professionals and fans who wanted things from him. We wrote to assure him that all we wanted was to share information about the strip that had ended a couple of decades earlier—and we were lucky enough to get permission.

Hal and Vern wrote about the concept, “Wheelan was quick to grasp the fascination movie stars had for people and he created a stock company of ‘actors’ of his own.” We asked Ed where he got the inspiration for his “stars.” “Mary Pickford, when she wore long curls was the one Hazel Dearie was patterned after, although at the time there was Grace Darling, Arline Pretty, Hazel Dawn, Louise Lovely, Bessie Love and points west. Dick Dare was a combination of Francis X. Bushman and Wallace Reid, both blonds. Ralph McSneer was quite a composite of Lew Cody, Stuart Holmes, Lon Chaney, etc. Blanche Rouge was, of course, inspired by Theda Bara, with a touch of Carmel Meyers. Fuller Phun was named during a corny era when such names as Fuller Bull, Fuller Pep, etc. were supposed to be screamingly funny; of course, Fatty Arbuckle was the model. Child star Herbert Honey was taken from Jackie Coogan when he was with Charlie Chaplin in The Kid.” And so on.

Long story short: Ed befriended us, we were treated to a classic strip, and he finally received recognition for a marvelous creation. (Note: There have been a few reprints, but it’d be great for his work to get new attention a century after it originally appeared.)

Fans and pros interacting: It can be pretty fun.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the first Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

The 37th Maggie’s World focused on evildoers and their motivations and challenges.

The motivations were summarized as: Hunger. Control. Insanity. Vengeance. Occupation. Plot Necessity.

But, even while the funny-animal villain Big Bad Wolf was mentioned, most of the ones discussed in 2016 were memorably menacing. Recently, though, I came across an article that my late husband, Don, and I wrote in 1982 for LOC magazine #5. We began, “A man may be judged by the company he keeps, but a comic book hero or heroine often is judged by the villains he or she fights.

“Consider: Would Spider-Man have become a hit, if, instead of battling Dr. Octopus, The Vulture, and Electro, he had been forced to fight such costumed dregs as Porcupine, Leapfrog, and the Unicorn? Those maladroit malefactors helped hold back Iron Man and Daredevil for years. It’s hard to build a rep by fighting born losers, which these yutzes certainly are.

“Perhaps, just perhaps, the She-Hulk might still have her own comic were she not pitted against villains who were boring (The Word [introduced in The Savage She-Hulk #9]) or simply silly (Man-Elephant [in #17]).”

Mind you, Marvel’s She-Hulk has had a heck of a lot of titles since 1982, with the longest coming years later. (The Sensational She-Hulk ran May 1989 to February 1994, and one of several She-Hulk series ran December 2005 to April 2009.) Nevertheless, consider the point—that a lame opponent can affect the reputation of a hero. (Man-Elephant only appeared in two later stories, though The Word made it to seven.)

Others we mocked in “Dangerous but Inept” more than three decades ago included Scorpio (introduced in Marvel’s Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D #1). And there were a bunch from DC, some with pre-Silver Age debuts: Killer Moth (Batman #63), Tattooed Man (Green Lantern #23), The Turtle (Showcase #4), and Hellgrammite (The Brave and the Bold #80)—and we went on at length about The Ringmaster and his Circus of Crime (originally appearing in Hulk #3). Concerning that last-named, we wrote of “a long, unbroken descent into loserdom that culminated with Howard the Duck pounding the poo out of The Ringmaster.”

The essay ended on a note of hope: “If Chris Claremont can make a good villain out of Magneto, there may still be hope for the Ringmaster and his shopworn Circus of Crime.”

Comedic Cads

Back then, we pointed out that no examination can cover all the instances—and that some seemingly idiotic opponents turned out to be memorable in the years that followed. In fact, some are downright delightful. Heck, fans can even find themselves in sympathy with a few of the sillier scoundrels. Amusingly (to me), I long credited as a forgetful felon the one-shot Pete Puma in Warner Brothers’ Merrie Melodies episode “Rabbit’s Kin” (1952). He was definitely not bright—but research eventually nailed the actual character I’d taken as symbolic my occasional memory losses. It was, simply, The Big Bad Wolf (also a one-shot villain, sharing the spotlight with Sylvester) in Looney Tunes’ “Red Riding Hoodwinked” (1955). (“Now, where was I going? Oh, yeah, Grandma’s house!”)

But, heck, if you try to build a list of such cartoon characters, you’ll quickly lose count because of so many bad guys whose traits includes dimness. That’s partly because the comedy is often aimed at kids who can enjoy such silliness. Maybe it’s Noodles Romanoff or Solenoid Robots causing trouble in the Roger Ramjet series. Maybe it’s—oh, just make your own list.

Mindless Menaces

More intimidating threats can also be seriously impaired. These include The Heap (introduced in Hillman’s Air Fighters #3, then brought back to life by Eclipse), Swamp Thing (DC’s House of Secrets #92 and then morphed in Saga of the Swamp Thing), Solomon Grundy (DC’s All-American Comics #61), Walking Dead (The Walking Dead #1), Man-Thing (Savage Tales #1), and a bevy of other muck monsters. There’s even a vast assortment of animated mummies, “zuvembies,” zombies, and other walking dead. (For years, they were forbidden by the original Comics Code in the 1950s: General Standards Part B 5: “Scenes dealing with, or instruments associated with walking dead, torture, vampires and vampirism, ghouls, cannibalism and werewolfism are prohibited.”)

They shamble, they persist, they endanger folks so as to necessitate the intervention of one or another hero. They’re a danger, even though they lack the intellect of even the aforementioned Big Bad Wolf. Their plodding determination can be scary all by itself.

But …

Do keep Bizarro in mind. Even those who have never read a DC comic book may know the concept expressed in the word “Bizarro.” [It’s even the title of delightful panel cartoons by Dan Piraro.] The concept was milked for hilarity in a plethora of stories (“Breaking mirror will bring me seven years good luck!!”). But the character’s first outing (in DC’s Superboy #68, October 1958) was heartbreaking. And, although Bizarro was resurrected from the tragic origins of that Otto Binder tale to become a humorous tradition, DC occasionally revisits the idea for its tragic possibilities.

That Bizarro introduction took an entire issue. Another powerful dim-bulb menace entered the world in a mere four pages—in Eclipse’s Destroyer Duck #1 in 1982. That short-short story only hinted at the output that was to come, and Groo remains a consistent classic example of a mighty misadventurer. (Wiki summarizes that he stars in “one of the first widely successful creator-owned comics … and one of the longest-running collaborations in comic book history.”) Sergio Aragonés’ team of Mark Evanier, Stan Sakai, Tom Luth, and himself have made a wild success out of a character whose charm comes from causing frequent disasters.

In Any Case …

While I’m dealing with pathetic goofs, is this the time to admit one of my own? In Maggie’s World #82 (“Who Was That Masked Man?”), I managed to mess up, perhaps because of the challenges of compiling lists. If you followed my advice to go for safe cosplay in imitating comics characters who encased their entire heads, well, gosh. My list was Golden Age Sandman (1939), Doctor Fate (1940), Red Tornado (1940), Ghost Rider (1949), Spider-Man (1962), Doctor Doom (1962), Iron Man (1973), Silver Age Daredevil (1964), The Question (1967), Deathstroke (1980), Rorschach (1986), The Mask/Big Head (1987), and Deadpool (1991). Good gravy. Did you spot it then? Now?

Just in case, let me point out that you won’t get into venues that require masking, if you try going as The Man without Fear—because even fearlessness should include polite caution and concern for fellow-shoppers.

Here’s to wise ways, even as we celebrate often-fallible individuals!

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the first Tuesday of every month here on Toucan!

Someone online recently noted that, when Pogo creator Walt Kelly graduated in 1930, he left high school just as the realities of the Great Depression were taking hold. Creative kids his age had seen the fun and pop culture entertainments of the “Roaring ’20s” turn into the challenge of making their way in what amounted to a new world.

The Great War had ended, and the so-called Spanish Flu had run its course. Everything was going to be “normal.” And then it wasn’t.

1920s Comics

A basic text for many early comics fans was Stephen Becker’s Comic Art in America (1959)—and let’s make it clear: The more closely we look at it, the more elaborations and corrections we want to make. Nevertheless, it can provide perspective to this day.

Becker commented that newspaper comic strips of the 1920s featured: “families and kids, normalcy in its purest form—and we find no gangsters, footballers or (except for Carl Ed’s Harold Teen) pioneer hot-rodders.” In other words, kids who left school then and grew up to be comics pros had, as the basics of their comics education, such strips as Boots and Her Buddies, Ella Cinders, Fritzi Ritz, Gasoline Alley, Little Orphan Annie, Minute Movies, Moon Mullins, Mutt and Jeff, Our Boarding House, Out Our Way, Skippy, Smitty, Thimble Theatre, Tillie the Toiler, and Wash Tubbs.

Then It Was the 1930s

Becker continued: “The comics section … began another period of expansion. … For one thing, the comics were surviving the worst economic tragedy in our history; for another, they were expanding; and for a third, their expansion was not limited to more strips of the already familiar type—the subject matter of comic strips now seemed unlimited. If life was real and earnest, we would have real and earnest comics. If Capone was a national figure, Dick Tracy would shortly be even better known. If the China Clipper could connect America and Asia, so could Milton Caniff.” He wrote, “The adventure strip was the significant development of the 1930s.”

So, if you were entering the work force to look for a job writing or drawing comics in 1930, what could you do?

Some of those who faced the challenge and met it became pretty well known, as in this partial list: Charles Addams, Joe Barbera, C.C. Beck, Charles Biro, Jack Bradbury, Bob Clampett, Jack Cole, Vincent Fago, Lee Falk, Lou Fine, Bill Finger, William Hanna, Syd Hoff, Burne Hogarth, Ollie Johnston, Chuck Jones, Walt Kelly, Jack Kirby, Ward Kimball, Paul Murry, Joe Shuster, Jerry Siegel, Joe Simon, John Stanley, Saul Steinberg, Frank Thomas, and Bill Woggon

Opportunities

As noted, there were already popular newspaper strips. For many budding creators, producing a hit strip might have seemed to be where the big bucks beckoned. It was an understandable goal—but one that could be hard to reach.

How about a fresh storytelling format? The comic-book industry was not (yet) an industry for those kids; it hadn’t even been created in 1930. But in the middle of the year 1933, the giveaway Funnies on Parade was released. By the end of that year, it was joined by Famous Funnies–A Carnival of Comics and Century of Comics. By the end of the year after that, there were Skippy’s Own Book of Comics and Famous Funnies. And 1935? It saw New Fun, The Big Book of Fun Comics, and New Comics. And then it was 1936. Well, howdy. The Comics Magazine, Detective Picture Stories, Funnies, Funny Pages, Funny Picture Stories, King Comics, More Fun, Popular Comics, and Tip Top Comics … Could Detective Comics be that far in the future?

Print publication wasn’t the only possible option early in the 1930s. For example, animation techniques were already established—and so were studios. Max Fleischer had developed the rotoscope and gone on to set up a studio in which more techniques and projects were created. Walt Disney, after having co-created and lost the cartoons produced as work for hire, had also established his own studio and was gearing up to produce an actual feature-length cartoon. In short, animation studios were looking for writers and artists and …

For Example

Even in high school, Walt Kelly had worked at his local newspaper; after graduation, he even drew that paper a comic strip about the life of P.T. Barnum. While he was also hired for a few freelance assignments while living on the East Coast, he wanted to produce a different sort of comic art. Walt Disney Productions was his goal, he applied to work there, and he was hired.

As he worked for Disney on a variety of projects for the next five and a half years, he became friends with several of his fellow writers and artists. Like many other fledgling creators there, he’d eventually go on to work in the new comic book industry.

But wait. We were wrapping up the 1930s. And the 1940s were just ahead.

Well, then—

Oh, you get the idea.

Kelly, for example, had returned to the East Coast, where he began to freelance his comic book stories to Dell Editor Oskar Lebeck. By the time America joined the combat in World War II, magazines, animation, newspapers, and more were featuring a variety of comic art popular culture. These days, fans call some of what was produced then “Golden Age comics.” (Look again at that list of creative kids who were growing up in the early 1930s.)

2020

Now, here we are, nine decades after that Great Depression. We’re on the brink of what will be another huge challenge for young creators. They’re in their teens or twenties and they want to make comic art, while the world endures self-isolation. What are their career options?

And how do they make that career pay?

Mind you, today’s creators have tools of which those 1930s kids could have only dreamed. We’re now way beyond typewriters for scripts, pen or brush and ink for art, and four separate lead plates for printing color. Artists used to maintain swipe files that even included Sears catalogs for valuable basic reference. (Imagine trying to draw a scientific laboratory—or just a microscope—if you didn’t have another image to guide you.)

Today, even self-publishing on the Internet is an option.

And oh! The tools! The social outreach! In-person collaboration is fraught with complications, but kids today can coordinate projects with kids in other towns or states or countries. Reference materials and how-to information are a click away. So is possible piracy of fresh creations.

And. But. And. But. And. But.

What’s next?

Heck if I know. Let’s wait to see what these skilled grads will do.

And let’s wish them well.

---

Maggie’s World by Maggie Thompson appears the first Tuesday of every month on Toucan!