Catch up time! Back last Summer, we were having website issues, and I stopped uploading “new” old material for awhile. Once I did return, it’s been with less frequency of posting than I had been before. One reason, is that I simply burned out on scanning, organizing, and posting Cartoons Magazine material — I thought it would be fun to do a month-by-month Centennial as each issue came out, but I hadn’t realized when I started, how predominant it would become, squeezing out material from other sources. A second reason, is that I actually end up damaging the things as I was pressing them flat against a scanner.

Well, I’m restarting our Cartoons Magazine coverage, this time hopefully without overdoing it. And I just bought a new digital camera, testing first that it can produce high enough definition images for use here on SuperITCH. This posting is the first one (from me) making use of photographed instead of scanned pages. So, on with it!…

It’s been July since we’ve done a “Focus on Cartoonists” feature, presenting pages from Cartoons Magazine that focused on the cartooning itself. I plan to run a couple of these each month, until we catch up with a truly “Centennial” schedule again. Above if the front cover of the August 1913 issue (my copy of September is coverless, so, can’t show it to you). The subject of this cover by cartoonist Fred Morgan, is Summer Heat/Humidity (perfect timing for those of us who experienced the recent “Polar Vortex”). Immediately below — also from the August issue — are two quick bios on cartoonists James H. Shonkwiler and H. Robert Manz.

Click on the above & below pictures, to view the cartoons in detail, and read the text.

Above, an ad for bound sets of the first three volumes of Cartoons Magazine (almost certainly made from returned/unsold copies — these bound volumes typically are missing the covers and advertising pages, as it was general policy for magazine stands to tear off at least part of the cover, as proof of the copies they had failed to sell.)

Beneath, from August, a three-page article by artist James E. Murphy, accompanied with some of his cartoons (the last one created for this article).

Above & below, from the September 1913 issue, short bios of cartoonists Gaar Williams and Terry Gilkison.

Finally, below, an ad for the Landon School for cartoonists, from the rear cover of the August 1913 issue. (The September issue also had a (different) Landon School ad, but again, I don’t have that cover.)

Doug Wheeler

H.R. Manz