Sunday Funnies - a Retrospective, 2 of 5

Week two of Richard Marshall and Bill Blackbeard's "The Sunday Funnies" from 1978, this week celebrating the newspaper comics giants of the 1910's!  

As I tried to express last week, a good part of the fun of this publication was that it was printed FULL size as you would have read it in 1915 as a supplement in your Sunday paper.  Never-the-less, I trust the fun and enjoyment comes through, even in this humble blog.

This week our eyes are treated to the grand works of Winsor McCay ("Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend"), Rube Goldberg ("Boob McNutt"), Carl E. Schultze ("Foxy Grandpa"), Bud Fisher ("Mutt & Jeff"), George McManus ("Their Only Child"), Harold Knerr ("The Katzenjammer Kids"), James Swinnerton ("Little Jimmy") and some lesser-known, under appreciated but no less deserving, Raymond Crawford Ewer "Slim Jim") and Johnny Gruelle ("Mr. Twee Deedle").

Dig in kids.  Sunday is the most nutritious meal of the week.

Newt Sunday:  Those Roaring Twenties you're all heard about.

Talk to you soon!

Sunday Funnies - a Retrospective! part 1 of 5

Never fear, "Li'l Abner" lovers!  My weekly postings of the good folks of Dogpatch will return now that I've resumed full-time blogging again, but I wanted to post this handy dandy nifty keen cool thingy first.

This is something I've been toting around with me since my mom bought it for me wayyyyyyyyy back in 1978 or 9.  It's not a book, but rather a box with 6 over-sized (actually newspaper sized) 8 sheet wonders inside, each unfolding into a retrospective of the great newspaper comic strips of the first 5 decades of The Twentieth Century.  The sixth being an editorial of the collection which is all put together by the great Richard Marshall and Bill Blackbeard of "Nemo: the Classic Comics Library" fame.

I thought it would be a nice way of getting up and going again with this-hyar blog and besides, I finally found a way to scan these monstrosities.

This week alone we have the fabulous works of Richard Felton Outcault ("The Yellow Kid, "Buster Brown"), Frederick Burr Opper ("Happy Hooligan", "And Her Name Was Maude"), Lyonel Feininger ("Wee Willie Winkie's World"), James Swinnerton ("Little Tigers"), Rudolph Dirks ("The Katzenjammer Kids"), George Herriman ("Major Ozone, the Fresh Air Fiend"), Ed Carey ("Simon Simple"), F.M. Howarth ("Lulu and Leander") and the master of them all, Winsor McCay ("Little Nemo in Slumberland")!

It's an item I've treasured for 34 years and I have always wanted to share it.  I hope you dig it too.

Next Sunday:  The 1910's and all their four-color glory.

Talk to you soon.

Sunday Funnies - Nemo #22 - part 2 of 2

It's Sunday Funnies time on this holiday weekend...4 days off AND comic strips...life is good.

Today I share with you part two of "Nemo: the Classic Comics Library" #22...


...the back end of this issue is heavy with some introspection on and examples of the work of the prolific Jimmy Swinnerton. For part one click here.

From Little Jimmy to Mr. Jack to Canyon Kiddies and his love of the American South West, James Swinnerton had a real love of relating everything he loved into pen and ink. A true natural, his work is genuinely worth drinking in.

Again, it's a shame economics didn't allow for this section to be produced in color. Reinforces my love for digital media where such concerns are non-existant.

We even get a little glimpse into a book, then released on the work of Mr. Swinnerton.

And finally Nemo's letter page with some famous correspondents!

And don't forget to come back next week for more of Nemo's coverage of the work of Harold Gray and a complete sequence from the great "Little Orphan Annie". I love this strip and just can't get enough of it.

Talk to you soon.