"Stand By Me!"

Just 'cause everybody needs to see/hear this.

Everybody needs somebody to stand by them.  You won't find that somebody with a new Pope or some invisible giant in the sky...look to the person next to you.

Talk to you soon

Atlas "2-Gun Western" - Tuesday is new/old comic book day!

Getcher dimes and head on down to the drug store, it's comic book day, kids!!!

Yup, there was a time (just before my time) when for a pocket full of dimes, you could hit the newsstand and buy up ALL kinds of four color goodness!!  For $3 you could pick up 30, count 'em 30 comics (I came along just at the end of the 12 cent era and through the all too brief 15 cent era :-[ )of every description!!  Super-hero, western, romance, horror, mystery, science fiction, funny animal...you name it!!!

That of course wasn't feasible in the economy of the depression and war years, but by the mid 50's on through the late 60's, SOME kids allowance surely amounted to that!

And oooooooooooooooooooooh the treasure you could find in almost ANY genre!!  Case in point, this little gem from Atlas comics in 1956...issue 4? of "2-Gun Western"!

Don't run a-skeered from a little ol' western comic, kiddoes...thar's GOLD in them thar hills!

Even in the days afore the Mighty Marvel banner, Stan Lee was billing himself as the sole writer...and I suppose as always, in the Marvel Manner, he was.  A glorious cover by now forgotten Joe Maneely and a very spry and emotive 1st story drawn by another relatively forgotten but very, very admirable Chuck Miller prod that thin dime outen your hand...

...and then the real fun begins.  Short little 3, 4 and 5 page parables set in the old west and graced with the creative hands of some of comic-doms soon to be giants.

A stalwart of the Mighty Marvel Bullpen, Joltin' Joe Sinnott!!!  p.s. Joe's still around and hard at work at his drawing board.  You can even "like" him and watch weekly videos he makes with his granddaughter here!

You'll be glad you did.

A glorious western turn from my new favorite from my reviews of "Mad:  THE COMIC BOOK!"  John Severin!

Pre-Spider-Man and Doctor Strange...the legendary...the giant amongst men...Steve Ditko.

And a real turn from what I think is his best era, the recently departed "illustrator" Gene Colon!

Some real pre-Marvel Marvelousness that had to be seen to be believed.  

And it didn't even cost you the $3 you would have spent on a new comic.

Tuesdays are awesome!

Talk to you soon!

Daylight Saving Time Rebellion! - Uncle Jeffy's Sketchbook

Our semi annual participation in yet ANOTHER out-moded and archaic concept/tradition!

Celebrating an early 20th century law (which actually made more sense in the 18th and 19th) that has NO bearing on the time I'm living in at all.

I didn't plant any soy beans today.

My electric bill remained the same.

Happy stuck in the mud day everyone.  :)

Talk to you soon.

Irish as a Rainbow

Jest checking to see if I can still color.

Or colour.

:)

Talk to you soon.

Happy Birthday Townes - Too Soon Gone!

 Today would have been the 69th birthday for Townes Van Zandt.  A man about whom the great Steve Earl once said, "Townes Van Zandt is the greatest songwriter in the world, and I'll stand on Bob Dylan's coffee table in my cowboy boots and tell him so!".

69 is not that old for a hard core troubadour, singer and forger of songs to be.  Were he still with us, he would probably be writing the best songs of his career and still traveling and dazzling us with them.

Years of substance abuse took it's toll on his health though, and he fluttered off this mortal coil in 1994 at the RIPE young age of 52.

Am I sad or jealous...I don't know.  

Sing us one Townes, show us how you really feel.  This is the first song he ever wrote.

Guy Clark heard that a a couple others he friend had written and figured that that was all something worth doing.  And then Guy became a great song writer too.  

This, the admiration of friend Steve and a thousand others who were touched by his music and who played his stuff at their weddings is his legacy.

We miss ya Townes.

Talk to you soon.

Early Leprechaun - Uncle Jeffy's Sketchbook

A leprechaun as surprised as I was to see him almost 3 weeks early.  He was still kind enough to pose for this sketch.

I call it "Relaxed Leprechaun sans Hat" or "He probably hasn't got a pot of gold or a window to throw it out, anyway!"

Talk to you soon!

Edison Bell and Novelty Press' DIY Air Raid Tips!

Tuesday is Old/New Comic Book Day!!!

The best things are things which aren't planned, I find.  No one can predict the next big entertainment trend, it's just that suddenly something clicks with the audience and BA-BANG! there's a new thing.  

Which brings us to "Edison Bell": the little DIY comic feature that was.

Novelty Press was a comic book publisher which was active between 1940 and 1949.  They published humor, crime and western comics and of course slam, bang super heroes like "Blue Bolt" and "Target & the Targeteers" during the golden age of such costumed he-men and women.

Hitting their stride (along with any one else who published 64 pages of saddle-stitched, four color goodness of this period, they decided to expand their line-up by doubling the output of some of their more popular features, just as other publishers did with the likes of Superman (Superman, Action, World's Finest), Batman (Batman, Detective, World's Finest), Captain Marvel (Cap. Marvel Adventures, Whiz, Marvel Family) ...and the list goes on and on and on.  For Novelty, it was mounting a quarterly titles "4 Most" with "Dick Cole" from "Blue Bolt" and "Target" from "Target Comics" together with the minor features "Edison Bell" and  "The Cadet".  Issue #1 came out in November 1941.

"Edison Bell" was a boy feature about the inventiveness of young and ambitious minds and holding inventors, scientists and thinkers up as the heroes that I agree they are.  So Ray Gill and Harold DeLay even named they're lead character after two famous scientist/inventors, Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell.  I'm sure if the character came about today, revisionists and re-constructors would name him "Tesla Bell", but that's another story to be told by someone else.

Young Edison and his team of "Junior Air Raid Wardens", after being told that they're too young to participate in their communities emergency preparedness efforts, use stuff found around the vacant lot and do a better job (though mis-guided) than their adult counterparts.

The art is really nice for a third tier comic company.  The faces of the characters especially and the "how-to" drawings show that the artist was not just someone with a pencil who showed up for "the new trend in commercial art", but someone who had studied and emulated newspaper comic strips and was wanting to get into the field long before.

Dig in!...then meet me after the short story for more.

Boy, them kids is swell, AND how!

A funny thing happened on the way to the printing press though.  1 month after this issue hit the news stands, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.  By the second issue, this was the inside front cover editorial for "4 Most" #2...

"Edison Bell" was moved up to the second place in the book (right behind lead feature "Dick Cole") and the feature expanded from 7 pages to a whopping 12!  

Colossal!

An emphasis on how kids could help in their nations efforts and more importantly for an entertainment bent for kids, a relata-ble piece, a place where the reader could really envision themselves taking part in the action.

The new trend in war time entertainment expressed in comics.  Gung Ho propaganda.  With a Do It Yourself spin...Mr. Wizard would be proud.

And DANG that's some good stuff.  How cool to run out in your back yard and try some of this stuff out.

Now wasn't that a much better way to spend new comic book day than pouring over the New 52?

I thought so.

End of the article plug:  This and MANY, MANY other comic book scans from the golden, atomic and even some silver age of comic books which have slipped into neglect over the decades can be found at the "Digital Comics Museum".  All legal and all public domain and yours for the mere asking.  PLEASE click on the "donate" tab when you get there.  These admins are doing the Lord's work of keeping the good stuff alive!

End of the article disclaimer:  There are some remarks and depictions in the above story which by today's standards would be viewed as racist.  This is where the standard remarks about how they should be viewed as a product of their times and remembered to educate ourselves by viewing our mistakes of the past would go.  If you and I are going to keep having conversations, you should already understand this.  It's not my intention to titillate with off-color humor or label this as "banned" or "censored" as a marketing ploy.  This is the way it was.  Get over it.

Talk to you soon.