Who better to represent all of the greed and gluttony inherent in contemporary (and ancient, for that matter) Christmas celebrations than Billy Butter, The Fattest Schoolboy On Earth? There’s almost something admirable about his singled minded devotion to making just about everything edible his and his alone, without a second thought to any possible consequences. Because Billy was much more than a magnificent glutton (for him too much was never enough); he was also an exemplar of stupid determination in the face of insurmountable odds. He never achieved his goals (accept on special occasions like this) but never gave up.

We return with another Michael Woolf cartoon — Only a Dream — from the December 1899 Waifs issue of Judge’s Library.

Click on the above cartoon, to view a larger version.

To find previous posts involving Christmas Comics, click here.

Doug Wheeler

Christmas Comics WaifComics JudgeMag

Years before I actually started reading British comics I had heard of Kelly’s Eye, The Spider and Robot Archie, but had never heard of Spellbinder by Geoff Champion. It started out as a fairly standard “runaway kid discovers ancestral home and bonds with a magical mentor” type strip but it got wilder and wilder as it went along until finally there were trips not just through time but alternative timelines (pretty heady stuff for a British kids comic in the early 70’s). Just see what the strip does with the conventional “entertaining a bunch of orphans over Christmas” plot.

I’ve mentioned this one before; in the middle of the regular installment of an ongoing Robot Archie serial the action stops cold so the editors can with absolutely no explanation deliver to our heroes a piping hot Christmas dinner with all the trimmings. It’s very weird.

And finally, here’s a Christmas adventure with The Phantom Viking.

Above, I break from my norm of presenting 80+ year old cartoons, to hilight the cover of the December 19th, 1994 issue of Time magazine, which pictured then-newly risen Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, as Uncle Scrooge (not a reference to the Donald Duck character, but, rather, meant as a merging Uncle Sam with Charles Dickens’ Scrooge). Shown clutching Tiny Tim’s crutch, which Newt assumably snapped in half. This is (hopefully) the one and only year a re-presentation of this cover will be timely.

I recall an interview with the artist of the cover, saying how he was inspired by the old political cartoons of Puck magazine (or something to that effect), and was happy for the opportunity to create a cartoon in that vein. I would have provided a link to that interview (assuming it to have been on NPR), along with the artist’s name, but unfortunately, NPR’s posted archives do not yet go back that far.

To find previous posts involving Christmas Comics, click here.

Doug Wheeler

Christmas Comics ElectionComics

Nothing says Christmas like Carl Barks ducks so let’s start today with a handful of holiday covers and a print featuring Disney’s Donald and Uncle Scrooge.

http://fantasy-ink.blogspot.com/2011/12/carl-barks-christmas.html

Here’s a link to the first three sections of reprints of the 1972 Disney/NEA Christmas comic strip, Santa’s Magic Christmas.

http://strippersguide.blogspot.com/2011_12_18_archive.html

Here we have a fun Italian blog with lots of seventies and eighties ads, toys, comics and other nostalgic ephemera.

http://blog.libero.it/tutto8o/view.php?reset=1&id=tutto8o

Finally today, what’s this? A heretofore secret brand new Yoe Book is announced at The Ditko Cultist!

http://ditkocultist.com/2011/12/22/ditkocultist-com-exclusive-the-creativity-of-ditko-yoebooks-announced/

There was always something wonderfully old fashioned, even in the 1940′s, about Novelty Press’ Blue Bolt Comics, as the stories from this special Christmas themed issue indicate. Once it had shorn itself of it’s more fantastic elements and superhero characters it seemed to intentionally become an aggressively wholesome comic, the kind parents and grandparents would instinctively choose from a random pile of Golden Age funny books as suitable reading material for their little darlings.

Take, for example, it’s headliner Dick Cole. Technically it’s namesake character Blue Bolt was the lead, but after it was stripped of it’s superheroic trappings it evolved into a desperately dull aviation adventure feature called Blue Bolt, All-American. Dick Cole also started out sort of super, one of those “apex of human development mental and physical supermen” raised by a scientist types, but instead of immediately rushing out and fighting crime he became a military cadet. At Farr Military Academy he had his share of wild adventures (the guy fought a dinosaur), but he quickly became a standard issue Frank Merriwell Olympic level student/athlete. Like Frank Dick fought the usual assortment of gangsters and convenient foreign spies and was an exemplar of promoting good moral values through sports. His stories were drawn in an art style that’s suggestive of an earlier decade.

And take Fearless Fellers, a low key kid’s gang strip that had more in common with the Our Gang shorts than either The Dead End Kids or Simon & Kirby’s Newsboy Legion. The most interesting thing about the Fellers; they had a black member who was drawn mostly as a real human being rather than a grotesque racist stereotype.

Unlike The Spectre and Mr. Justice Sergeant Spook was a street-level crime fighting ghost who, after some fairly dull early adventures that had him acting as a beat cop in something called “Ghost Town” he teamed-up with a psychic kid named Jerry (the only one who could see or hear him). His stories became like smart, sentimental and frequently funny efficient little b-movies.

And finally there was Edison Bell. He started out as a standard issue comic book boy inventor who created all sorts of fantastic inventions (like a working robot named “Frankie”). But clearly the editors thought all this imaginative stuff was too much for their audience because he soon became a “real world” boy inventor, creating things that any kind could make from stuff found around the home (check out the page describing how the kids could make their very own “Xmas Victory Tree”).

I’m on record as saying MLJ made some of the best superhero comics of the forties before that damn redheaded kid chased ‘em all out of town. Here’s one now!

http://pappysgoldenage.blogspot.com/2011/12/number-1074-man-of-steel-yesterday-we.html

Here we have some absolutely gorgeous Bernie Wrightson art in a Bruce Jones holiday horror tale from a 1975 issue of Creepy.

http://diversionsofthegroovykind.blogspot.com/2011/12/groovy-christmases-past-black-and-white.html

Timely-Atlas Comics has up a lovely dual tribute to the recently deceased Jerry Robinson and Joe Simon, illustrated with many recent photos of these pioneers.

http://timely-atlas-comics.blogspot.com/2011/12/jerry-robinson-joe-simon.html

Finally today, have you checked out the brand-spanking new Yoe Books website yet? What??!! Why not! Go. Now! We’re making history here!

http://yoebooks.com/

This week, a couple cartoons appropriate to the spirit of the Christmas season. Above, the centerspread of the September 11th, 1878 issue of Puck magazine, titled The Abuse of Wealth Which Creates Communists Among Us, by Puck‘s founder, Joseph Keppler, Sr. The point being how the excesses and greed of the wealthy in ignoring the plight of the poor, could push the poor majority towards political extremes. Shown is Henry Hilton, building mansions and marble tombs, while giving little to help American plague victims.

Click on the above & below cartoons, to enlarge them, and read their captions.

Below, Alas! Charity, What Deeds are Done in Thy Name!, by cartoonist Frank Beard. From the 1902-published collection, Blasts from the Ram’s Horn, reprinting cartoons and prose which had appeared in the Chicago-based Christian cartoon weekly, The Ram’s Horn.

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

Doug Wheeler

financial reform NYPuck KepplerSr

I really don’t have all that much to say about this comic except (a) I have a sneaking fondness for these kind of department store giveaway comics (as with all promotional comics there was always the chance that some serious weirdness might have sneaked in under the radar) and (b) in spite of the fact I rarely frequented Woolworth’s when the chain was actually in operation (there was just something creepy about a five and dime having a pet department and a lunch counter; in my darkest imaginings the two were somehow connected) I still felt a strange pang of nostalgia upon this strange artifact. Make no mistake, a Woolworth’s always had a desperate kind of seediness but they always seemed to aspire to being slightly better than they actually were. As opposed to the Deals and Dollar Stores of today that have replaced in which hang their desperate seediness on their sleeves.

But I suppose in the end the difference between a Woolworth’s and a Deal’s is the difference between a Friendly’s and a Steak ‘n Shake – no difference at all, really. And as for the comic well, it was free; you get what you pay for, even at Woolworth’s.

Felix the Cat is back, but this time he’s softer. Softcover, that is!

To celebrate the paperback release of Felix the Cat’s Greatest Comic Book Tails (click the link to order on Amazon), here’s another rare Felix record.

.

This one tells an entire adventure from the TV cartoon, with all the action described for you. Who needs television when you have a record like this?

The original comic book cover art

Click the link below and enjoy “Felix and the Thinking Hat.”

Felix and the Thinking Hat