Let’s start today with a number of EC stories drawn by the prolific but vastly underrated Jack Kamen, the man whose name is usually left out when one rattles off the roll call of EC legends.

http://goldenagecomicbookstories.blogspot.com/2011/11/jack-kamen-1920-2008-misc-ec-stories.html

Speaking of proloific, the great Walt Kelly was just that in his pre-Pogo days. Here we find him with a Fairy Tale Parade story.

http://pappysgoldenage.blogspot.com/2011/11/number-1048-prince-robin-and-dwarfs-its.html

With the new movie out, here’s a rather timely look at DC’s virtually unknown Three Musketeers strip of the 1970′s.

http://diversionsofthegroovykind.blogspot.com/2011/11/if-you-blinked-you-missed-dcs-three.html

Finally today, also in the swashbuckling vein, here’s a look at various reprint editions of Hal Foster’s classic of classics-Prince Valiant.

http://cloud-109.blogspot.com/2011/11/embarrasment-of-reprints-hal-fosters.html

Let’s start with Some sunday Funnies-in this case some 1946 Batman strips with Two-Face courtesy of co-creator Bill Finger and the great Jack Burnley ghosting for Bob Kane.

http://grantbridgestreet.blogspot.com/2011/11/batman-vs-two-face-by-bill-finger-and.html

It’s just like 1966 all over again…sort of…as Pappy follows up our Batman link with a nice selection of The Green Hornet, also.

http://pappysgoldenage.blogspot.com/2011/11/number-1047-green-hornet-and-jolly.html

Always fun to see some good, funny single panel cartoons and here’s a nice selection at The Magid Whistle.

http://themagicwhistle.blogspot.com/2011/11/world-encyclopedia-of-cartoons-g-k.html

Finally today, here’s some Powerhouse Pepper, Basil Wolverton’s signature silly character.

http://cartoonsnap.blogspot.com/2011/10/powerhouse-pepper-by-basil-wolverton.html

Here’s a fun piece, illustrated with plenty of examples, on how Marvel sometimes altered reprints considerably from the originals in the early seventies.

http://martinohearn.blogspot.com/2011/11/change-reprint-to-fit.html

One of the odder points of DC history in the fifties and sixties was the gorilla phenomenon, explored here at Silver Age Comics.

http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2011/11/tracers-ape-cover-limit.html

Here’s a whole bunch of tales of a character I discovered last year-Klaus Nordling’s Pen MIller, Cartoonist Detective.

http://allthingsger.blogspot.com/2011/11/mightier-then-sword-friday-comic-book.html

Finally today, here’s where you’ll find all the details of the latest behind the scenes comics legal issue-Who created Ghost Rider?

http://ohdannyboy.blogspot.com/2011/11/who-created-ghost-rider-not-so-secret.html

WARNING: The below 19th century cartoons contain racist imagery and slurs.

November is Native American History Month. As per last year, we’ll present a posting on this topic, each week this month. This year, we open with a few sample illustrations found in the (Davy) Crockett Almanac series published in the 1830s thru 1850s. These images show how popular media depicted Native Americans to the immigrant white population invading Native lands, both creating and reinforcing the de-humaning view that Native Americans were inferior, uncivilized savages — an attitude necessary for a society bent upon fulfilling its “Manifest Destiny” to make itself powerful by destroying & stealing from the native populations.

Above — Dreadful Massacre of the Whites by Indians!! — from the rear cover of the 1841 Crockett Almanac. Below left, Davy Crockett, on the front cover of the Improved 1842 Crockett Almanac. Below right, Crockett Rescuing a Captive (white) Girl (from an “Injin”), from the Crockett Almanac for 1850.

Above, The Indian, Crockett and the Boa Constrictor, from the rear cover of 1843′s Crockett Almanac. Below, a non-racist (albeit far-fetched) depiction, of An Indian Hunter, Riding on a Tame Buffalo, Attacked by a California Tiger, found on the back cover of an 1852 Crockett Almanac.

Above left, from Crockett Almanac for 1850, The Ungrateful Indian, in which Crockett’s admirers are assured that, “No human ever hated an Injin more than Davy Crockett. I never could bear the pesky red-skins any more than any varmint of the forest.”. In real life, Congressman Crockett committed political suicide in his principled stance opposing the 1830 Indian Removal Act.

A Single Combat, above right, is from the 1848 Crockett Almanac. And below, Adventure with the Indians and Mud Turtles, from 1839′s Crockett Almanac.

To view prior Native American History postings, click here. More, next week.

Doug Wheeler

NativeAmericanHistory

Above, The Flies Got Wise, from the January 22nd, 1913 issue of Puck magazine, proposing a public that has finally got wise to the Wall Street’s traps. Of course, we know this 1913 cover is pure fantasy — the public has since been ripped off, again and again.

Below, a re-presentation of two cartoons from the First Great Depression, demonstrating how speculators never seem to learn their lessons. From the the Des Moines Register, below left, Never Again — Until Next Time, by Jay Norwood “Ding” Darling. And below right from the Columbus, Ohio Dispatch, artist unidentified, Just Like Water Off a Duck’s Back. Both cartoons are taken from their reprintings in the December 1929 issue of American Review of Reviews.

To find prior episodes in this series, click on Wall Street Frauds Make Wonderful Cartoons. And, to find previous posts on financial reforms in general, click here.

Doug Wheeler

financial reform NYPuck

Comics artist and painter Steve Rude has run into some bad luck in the last few days but you can help him out by purchasing some of his wonderful art prints or original art.

http://www.steverudeart.com/New_Steve_Rude_Items_s/112.htm

Here’s a rare chance to look at a Gardner Fox/Julie Schwartz Silver Age Hawkman script and the Joe Kubert-drawn story that resulted from it.

http://pappysgoldenage.blogspot.com/2011/11/number-1045-heretofore-untold-story-now.html

You’ve ordered Craig’s Amazing 3-D book haven’t you? Here’s a look at Jack “King” Kirby’s association with 3-D though the years.

http://ripjaggerdojo.blogspot.com/2011/11/3-d-king.html

Finally, here’s a rare adventure of Superman’s young friend, Tim, from a 1947 issue of the giveaway department store mag, Superman-Tim!

http://fourcolorshadows.blogspot.com/2011/11/superman-tim-from-1947.html

Here’s a fun survey of great sports cartoonists of the past including a brief history and bio on many including Feg Murray, Jack Burnley, Phil Berube and others who crossed over into comic books.

http://www.freewebs.com/vintagebaseballautographs/thecartoonists.htm

Here we see the original appearance of the Canadian character Mr. Monster, later appropriated by Michael T. Gilbert and made into a bizarrely fun series in the eighties.

http://heroheroinehistory.blogspot.com/2011/10/reading-room-not-who-you-think-mr.html

Another leftover Halloween post, here’s the original cowboy Ghost Rider by Dick Ayers.

http://westerncomicsadventures.blogspot.com/2011/10/original-ghost-rider-league-of-living.html

Finally today, here’s a fun look at the ever-popular DC heroine, Black Canary, and how she may be the luckiest comics character ever.

http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2011/11/luckiest-character-ever.html

Apparently one of the prerequisites for a Golden Age comic book publisher was to have an anthology comic featuring their major players under a title which essentially said “Damn, We’re Good”. There was America’s Greatest Comics, America’s Best Comics, World’s Finest Comics, All-Winners and to a somewhat lesser degree, 4 Most, Four Favorites, Jackpot and Big 3. And as the below cover below might suggest, this time I’m going to be writing about America’s Greatest Comics #4 from 1941.

I’ll only be posting one story from it because it’s a fairly lengthy one but I’ll use this comic as an excuse to dump on Fawcett’s pantheon of second-string superheroes who never caught on the way Captain Marvel and his entourage did. Personal tastes vary but frankly I’m n not all that crazy about Spy Smasher, Bulletman, Minute Man, Mr. Scarlet and especially Commando Yank (who may very well be the dowdiest dressed mystery man of the Golden Age). It’s interesting to note that there’s never been a serious attempt at reviving them in the modern age, if you don’t count the reimagined versions of them who appear in the background of Mark Waid and Alex Ross Kingdom Come. And I don’t.

Our feature presentation is a twenty page Captain Marvel story titled “Captain Marvel and the Bumble Brained Bridegroom”. It’s set during the early days of the character when the writers and editors were still figuring out what exactly they wanted to do with him. It’s a little after Bill Batson gave up wearing the shirt with the double B.B. on the chest (like readers couldn’t have picked him out of a line-up even then) and carrying out a miniature radio station on his back. You also know it’s a fairly early Captain Marvel entry because it features an appearance Dr. Sirvana’s beautiful daughter (and that was her one and only defining characteristic) Beautia, and her desperately shallow love for the Big Red Cheese.

It’s also a strange and genuinely funny one featuring guest appearances by the Whiz Comics back-up features Spy Smasher (with his goggles up, revealing his secret identity of Alan Armstrong), Lance O’Casey, Golden Arrow (who apparently arrived via a time machine, as his adventures ordinarily took place during a non-specific period in The Old West) and Ibis the Invincible and Princess Taia (watch that hand, Billy). The story never comes out and exactly says it but it looks as if Billy is acting as the master of ceremonies at a War Relief Benefit showing of episodes of the Spy Smasher serial.

It also features a guest appearance by Professor Edgewise Smith who made reoccurring appearances in Golden Age Captain Marvel comics. In this story he self identifies as a mad scientist but in most of his appearances he was depicted as being your standard garage and/or attic whacky inventor type. When Captain Marvel was revived by DC in the 70’s he became Captain Marvel Jr.’s super scientist in residence.

From The Caricaturist’s Scrap Book, published in London in 1840 by Charles Tilt….Plates 1 & 2 of Demonology & Witchcraft, by artist Henry Heath.

Click on the pictures above and below, to view larger versions.

Demonology & Witchcraft was just one of several 1830′s cartoon scrapbooks (all by Heath), gathered together within The Caricaturist’s Scrap Book. Craig Yoe features some of these Henry Heath drawings, in the Cartoonists Go To Hell section of Craig’s book, Arf Museum.

Doug Wheeler

The ever romantic Sequential Crush revisits the short-lived genre of gothic romance comics with art and commentary including a nice cover by the late Jeffery Catherine Jones.

http://sequentialcrush.blogspot.com/2011/10/to-wed-devil-sinister-house-of-secret.html

Here’s a nifty site I just discovered which attempts to ferret out long-lost and unknown credits of comic book stories of the past…and does a pretty darn good job of doing so!

http://martinohearn.blogspot.com/

Superman, Swamp Thing and Solomon Grundy…written by Steve Englehart and all drawn by Murphy Anderson! In one story, together! Go. Read! Enjoy!

http://mailittoteamup.blogspot.com/2011/10/tales-from-dollar-bin-dc-comics_29.html

Attempting to interpret Legion of Super Heroes continuity is, of course, a losing battle but here’s a look at questions and speculation regarding the Time Trapper.

http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2011/10/curious-case-of-time-trapper.html