Some Wacky Humor Titles

I never appreciated the humor artists as a kid, since the super-hero genre was really my bag, until I gave them a long second look as an adult. (If I'm now considered grown up?) Then I discovered the amusing artwork of Bob Oksner on The Adventures of Jerry Lewis. His zany off the wall stories were just wonderful, and I especially loved those Flash, Superman, and Batman cross-over issues, because I was crazy about the characters. They were a real blast, and started my interest in other DC humor titles like the earlier Adventures of Bob Hope, or TV related properties such as The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, which I've seen a few pages of original art surface on eBay recently, but have not yet been lucky enough snag one for my collection. I did have the pleasure of viewing some rare original Shelly Mayor Sugar and Spike pages from a local friend who is also a cartoonist/collector. Until recently these beauties were impossible to find, since Mayer loved doing this comic based on his children. Sheldon kept most of his original artwork, but some pieces have shown up lately in auctions. The blue pencil details under the India ink were really fantastic to behold, giving the pages a cool look, and they had a lot more punch that I'd imagined from just seeing the printed
book.

National Periodical Publications had many fun titles like Fox and Crow, Laurel and Hardy, Stanley and his Monster, Swinging with Scooter, Angel and Ape, Welcome Back Kotter, and a score of others that were often a strange mix of a humor/teen type book in the Archie tradition. Though Archie Comics always had them beat on any of DC's attempts to enter the wacky teen market. I enjoy them all now because of the great art by Scarpelli, Estrada, Severin, Oksner, and others. But still, I was never a real fan of the "big foot" funny animal school that Harvey, Dell, and Charlton, seemed to produce the best product overall. But what I really loved were those spot cartoons by Henry Boltinoff for the Cap's Hobby Hints, that taught us all those neat tricks about model building. Since I was assembling all the Aurora monster and cave man kits at the time, any help on making them look better was information well received. I always enjoyed any of the fact pages that taught me something that were often shoecased in the DC titles. I once saw a bunch of these Cap's Hobby Hints originals and literally drooled all over them, since their simplicity was a marvel of design and clarity. But before I realized I really needed one, they were gone down the art highway to another quick thinking collector. Boltinoff also did some Casey the Cop gag panels and other features, before he moved on to his syndicated park ranger daily, Woody Forest, and his later extremely popular Word Jumble puzzle panels.

Remember those little Sergio Aragones drawings in DC's Plop! comic from the seventies. Another DC experiment that tried to compete with the one and only MAD magazine, which of course never really occurred. But the energy and humor of Aragones little figures running across the Plop! borders or in pages of MAD work just as well today, where they can still be seen in every issue. MAD has also been running some great reprint features on artists Bill Elder and Wally Wood, and the wild cartoons of Basil Woverton's really knocked me out. Though, in my humble opinion, Woverton's art was not as powerful in black and white when compared to those spectacular Plop! covers which are truly goofy comic gems. And what about Sergio Aragones long running Conan spoof from Marvel, Groo the Wanderer, that was also a favorite of mine, and those originals go for some sky high prices. Not Brand Echh, was another wonderful Marvel book from the sixties that poked fun at itself and other publisher with that zippy Marie Severin artwork and all the other solid figure artists from their talented bullpen in every issue, similar to the later What the...?, laugh comic of years later.

But I believe that my all time favorite humor art must be Harvey Kurtzman's Hey Look! strip feature, was first published in Patsy Walker #22, way back in May 1949. It was the first work that Kurtzman had complete control over and and totally defined his abilities in storytelling and style, using just those two simple characters, always really killed me.

Russ Heath's Lone Ranger Rides Again

When Russ Heath was chosen to illustrate the new syndicated Lone Ranger strip in 1981, he soon got a call from Amber creator Doug Wildey. "Any illustrated strip is going to fall behind deadlines, and you will call your artist friends (to help), and stay up working all night," exclaimed Wildey. Heath soon found out how true that was, after only a few short months. Russ later said, "He sure as HELL was right! I called on Doug to help, and I called on others...If you've never had a syndicated strip, you just can't imagine what it entails...I had no time for exercise and put on thirty pounds."This almost forgotten feature that followed on the heels of the movie revival, The Legend of the Lone Ranger, debuted on September 13, 1981. Giving the feature one final strip incarnation of Fran Striker's world famous Western hero, created for a 1933 Detroit radio show. We all know the story right? West Texas in 1880... a group of six Texas Rangers lead by Captain Dan Reid rode towards a gap in the mountains...there Butch Cavendish's Gang launched a surprise ambush...and when the dust settled and the battle was over...all the Rangers were dead except the Captain's brother, John. Nursed back to health by his Indian friend, Tonto, John Reid took on a mask and vowed vengeance against all evildoers. This lone survivor...this Lone Ranger. (Which was actually the biggest misnomer in comics since Tonto was just as important in the strip, not to mention their beloved horses, Silver and Scout!)

The first artist to draw the famous lawman in 1938 was Ed Kressy, which most fans believe looked awkward at best in his adaptation of the material, but it had some great scripts by Striker. It was followed shortly by a brief interim stint illustrated by Jon L. Blummer, whose unigue style I really enjoyed. But the artist most fans remember and recognize today for the Lone Ranger was artist Charles Flanders, and his thirty-three year run on this Western legend. Better than most who drew the feature, it hit its peak in popularity in the mid-forties before slowly sliding down in quality to develop the look of a cheap grade-B Western (with no sets or background atmosphere of any kind). There was a boost in the title when writer Paul Newman and ghost artist Tom Gill did some later Sundays, as there solid teamwork had shown on the popular Dell Lone Ranger comic book. Although the strip seemed to be getting better with time, it still could not stop cancellation by the syndicate in late 1971. But hold on there folks, for the best artist and writer team is yet to come!

After searching for the right talent, the New York Times Special Features Syndicate finally chose comic book artist Russ Heath and longtime DC writer Cary Bates to produce the work. The strip even had a unique opening (breaking with most strip precedent) when the first daily just continued the storyline from their Sunday page the day before. Of the other creators who tried out for the new feature, only Gil Kane (who did the Aurora's 1974 Lone Ranger model kit illustrated comic) was considered a rival to Heath's skill and precision with Western subjects. Some of those rare Kane tryout dailies and Sunday still exist, though most of the Heath/Bates material was discarded by the syndicate making the art harder to obtain. I've had one daily I picked up a few years ago, and can tell you the quality was as good or better than any other Heath art I 've ever seen. I though these originals were difficult to find, until Heath consigned his work to a local auction house, so now some fantastic example have recently surfaced. However, you sometimes have to search for a good piece with the Ranger, since he was disguised in many of the storylines, and then his trusted scout Tonto was wonderfully showcased.

Clearly the best artistic team to ever produce the feature, unfortunetly, the Lone Ranger really never got its due. Published in no more than sixty papers at the height of its all too short two and a half year run, it ended on April 1, 1984. Most of us never even saw this beautiful strip the first time around, unless you lived in larger cities like Seattle or San Francisco. And when you did see the strip, the Sunday format usually lost its top tier splash panels, being cut down for space in many of the papers, so readers just missed out on what Heath was trying to do altogether. You can see that Russ put his heart and soul in the work, spending up to twelve to fourteen hour a day at the drawing board. Yet the high quality of art and writing was as fresh and alive the last day of the strip as the first day they started. Heath had his hand in all aspects of production, working his rich and detailed style on the preliminary sketches, pencil layouts, color proofs, test pages, as well as keeping up the penciling and inking the strip.

If not for Greg Theakston's fantastic Pure Imaginations black and white Lone Ranger reprint from 1993, most of us would never had the pleasure to read these delightful stories, unless you collected dailies or haunted some library newspaper vault. But don't take my word for it, just check out thes panels provided and that last Sunday page as the Lone Ranger and Tonto ride out into a sunset for the final time, with none other than Heath and Bates saying good-bye.

Everybody Loves Raymond

Everybody loves Alex Raymond, or at least I think they should! Who can doubt his impact on the comic art medium and American pop culture. George Lucas credits Flash Gordon as his inspiration for Star Wars; not to mention it kept actors like Larry "Buster" Crabbe and Johnny Weissmuller working for years. Raymond's millions of fans worldwide make him one of the most influential artists of our time. But I dare say his best creation was the "film noir" detective strip, Rip Kirby. But, don't get me wrong, Flash Gordon, Jungle Jim, Secret Agent X-9 and the other projects Raymond produced during his career are undoubtedly some of the greatest comic works of the century. But for all of Raymond's skill and talent, I believe it reached its peak with Rip Kirby. Perhaps its also my favorite strip because I can still afford some examples!

The story goes that when Raymond returned from WWII he was unable to resume Flash Gordon because of King Feature's contract with Austin Briggs. Not wanting to lose Raymond to a rival syndicate, they let him produce a new feature. It's debatable if King Features editor Ward Greene created the character, that was later more fully developed by writer Fred Dickenson. Whether Alex created the character or not, it was his success and name recognition that mattered with his audience. An instant hit for all involved, it even gave Raymond part ownership in the strip. And why not! Rip's not your average private eye. He's a perfect gentleman, who's also a brilliant scientist, athlete, Marine reservist, and sports car buff. Using more brains than brawn was his usual modus operandi in solving mysteries, but he still had time for a slug-out once in a while. It has many of the classic elements of detective fiction, but with a twist -- horn rimmed Buddy Holly glasses and a pipe! Similar in ways to other heroic gumshoes like Margery Allingham's Albert Campion and his side-kick Lugg. And to sweeten the deal, all the supporting cast are just as interesting as Remington, whether they're beauties, gangsters, hoods, con men, or cops.

Who would't want the life of Rip Kirby? A Mr. Lucky that lives in a snazzy New York apartment with his trusted aide, the frail balding butler Desmond. A reformed thief who's as skillful in making a soufflé as using guns or picking a lock. Next, Rip is blessed to have a knockout fashion model for a girlfriend, Honey Dorian, who often travels with him around the world on his exotic cases. We also have some interesting heavies like the charming femme fatale Pagan Lee. She shows up in my favorite storylines to the dismay of Honey since there is this love-hate relationship Pagan has with Rip. The two girls make interesting copy since they are portrayed as total opposites. A dark seductive worldly Pagan "yin" played against a pure sweet heavenly Honey "yang." And who could forget Remington's greatest villains like the Mangler or gambler Fingers Moray.

The strip debuted on March 4, 1946, and quickly introduced many new and innovative techniques to the medium. Raymond constantly searched for different ways to carry the story visually to readers with experimentation in his style. Driven for a clear and direct graphic, he changed the look every six or seven weeks on the daily. Always in firm control of his art and career, King Features offered Raymond $35,000 a year to produce a Sunday Rip Kirby page. Raymond declined citing the extra work the page would impose on his already limited free time.

We know Raymond used models, took reference photographs, and swiped from magazines in his efforts to absorb different approaches. He worked close to deadlines, leaving only three weeks of strips at the time of his death from an auto accident. He was inspired by living and drawing in an illustrator's community with the likes of Stan Drake, Al Parker, Robert Fawcett, Albert Dorne, and others. It gave him fresh ideas on Rip that helped promote the realistic story strip with a fresh contemporary new look. Abandoning the old soap opera approach of a simpler outline style, Raymond brought numerous slick advertising techniques to the daily. Often he used a minute and detailed, close up, “big head” approach on Honey and the other beauties of the feature.

The strip can also be appreciated for its sophisticated use in "spotting" heavy black ink. Early Rip's seem sparse in the placement of blacks, being applied mainly for night scenes. But about three years into the daily, Raymond switched to using a heavy black even when in full sunlight. On one of Raymond's visits to Drake's studio he explained using black areas as “pools of quiet” for pacing. It served as a pause for the viewer, something to the slow the reader's eye across the strip's panels. Later in the run, Alex's simple backgrounds fully develop into a photo realistic approach to the surroundings as well. Also with Stan Drake's influence we see an expanding use of character expressions within the Rip Kirby cast.

Perhaps Rip Kirby was such a success because Alex Raymond was a larger than like character himself that had many of the qualities of the famous detective. More sophisticated and urbane than the average artist, he was a striking figure: matinee-idol handsome, athletic, hugely talented and admired among his peers. Raymond's art influenced many of the talented comic artists of today including Frank Frazetta, Al Williamson, Wayne Boring, Lou Fine and scores of others.

To mention a few of his achievements, Raymond won the coveted Ruben Award in 1949 for Rip Kirby, was a member of the Society of Illustrators, and served as president of the National Cartoonists Society for 1950 and 1951. Even when producing both magazine and book illustration, and his combat paintings displayed in the National Gallery of Washington, DC, Raymond still always championed the comic strip as his preferred art form. He once said, "I decided honestly that comic art work is an art form in itself. It reflects the life and times more accurately and actually is more artistic than magazine illustration -- since it is entirely creative. A comic artist is playwright, director, editor and artist at once."

Oh, Those Seventies Art Prices!

I recently ran across a stack of old Comic Buyers Guide issues that were jam-packed with original comic art ads from the early seventies, and just about had a heart attack! It was good to see some dealers from that time period are still in business today, but a majority of them have gone by the wayside. Oh, but those prices on these pieces will really make your head spin. Like the cover featured here to Avengers #73 by John Buscema was on sale for a mere $45! You might want to sit down as a give a rundown from a few ads from Richard Pryor's Gallery Of Fine Comic Art. As well as that prime piece, Richard had...Covers by Ernie Chan for Detective #461---$75, or Batman #268 for $45, or how about Justice League of America #124 staring the Justice Society for $50, not to mention Freedom Fighters #1 for $50. Would anyone like a Dick Giordano cover for Tomb of Dracula #25 for $75? Or how about a John Romita cover for Captain America #117 (sorry no logo) where Cap meets the Falcon for the grand total of $50! There's also the Ross Andru cover art to some DC war book titled, All-American Men of War, with Indian Ace Johnny Could in aerial action for...$30. Gulp! Good thing those British Planet of the Apes or Spider-Man cover were going for $15, more affordable. Whew.

How about paying some "crazy" money for comic panel pages. Lets start out with a few Craig Russell Killraven pages from Amazing Adventures #27 for $45---nice but I might spring for that Buscema cover first. Paul Gulacy had some fantastic action-packed pages from Master of Kung Fu at $35 each, or you may want to invest in a Wally Wood gem of a splash page from my favorite toy title, Captain Action #1 page 24 for $45. What would you pay today for a nice Barry Smith Conan the Barbarian page from issue #9, well they were running $150 each - WOW - finally some high dollar stuff, or is it? Ever want any Reed Crandell pages from that beautiful Gold Key favorite, Flash Gordon #1 for $35-$40 each? Maybe your money was better spent on Ross Andru's Amazing Spider-Man pages from #129 where Spidey fight this new villain named Punisher for, get this,...$30 each.

Too much to spend you say, you're on a budget and need to save for college. Richard had prices for us poor boys too, so I could spring for the John Buscema Conan #47 pages for $25 each. Ditto for Ditko's Hawk And Dove pages from issue #2, or maybe you like that weird Creeper character @$25. Can he dare go lower than that! Well, to scrape the bottom of the barrel, I guess you would have to pick up some Val Mayerick pages from Marvel's The Living Mummy or Monster of Frankenstein horror titles for $15 a piece. Or there is this guy called Russ Heath whose pages from Our Army at War with Sgt. Rock and Easy Company were selling for $15 a shot, and you can even have pages from his 1950s Battle Comics for that same price! Too bad I didn't start collecting original comic art for another fifteen years.