Forgotten Funnies

Not every vintage comic strip is fondly remembered and destined for the complete hardcover treatment.  Here are two forgotten funnies that will likely never be collected for posterity.  That's unfortunate -- as these two examples have me, at least, wanting to know what happened in the weeks preceding and following.  So enjoy this particularly wacky sample of Stanley Link's Tiny Tim and a smoke-filled episode of Little Joe.  You might not ever see too many more examples. 

If you think Little Joe looks a lot like Harold Gray's Little Orphan Annie, you're right.  Joe's creator, Ed Leffingwell, was Gray's cousin and had assisted on LOA.  Some speculate that Gray contributed some writing and art to Little Joe as well.  Links here will take you to entries in Don Markstein's Toonopedia, a great website chock full of information about comic strips and books. 

Caniff!

Milton Caniff  of Terry and the Pirates and Steve Canyon was one of the all time cartooning greats.  Here's a pic of me meeting the man back at the 1982 San Diego Comic Con (photo by Alan Light).  Below is a classic publicity shot of a younger Milt, working on a Steve Canyon Sunday page.  The strip samples shown are a Terry from '35 and a Canyon from '54.  If you'd like to see more of Milt's work on line, check THIS.  If you're a serious comics fan, you should make room on your bookshelves for IDW's wonderful six volume Complete Terry and the Pirates -- available from various booksellers.

My posts about vintage comic strips continue, as we lead up to the publication of Big Funny!

Dick Tracy -- 1935!

From the same 1935 Sunday section as the ads in my previous post, it's Chet Gould's Dick Tracy.  Dig that classic profile! One of my favorite comic strips -- though, truth be told,  I prefer the '40s and '50s -- great villains, great stories -- and really cool cartooning! Thankfully, we're currently getting a classy hardcover reprint series of the strip -- just now getting to the really good stuff from the mid '40s.  I had the pleasure of visiting Chet at his Woodstock, Illinois digs in the '70s -- thanks to my pal Max Collins, who'd just taken over the writing of the feature upon Chet's retirement.  

And now a word from our sponsors -- 1935 style.

Stepping into the wayback machine for some even older comics scans -- here are a pair of Sunday comics ads from The Chicago Tribune of December 1, 1935.  Some of the Mr. Coffee Nerves ads were by the remarkable art team of Noel Sickles and Milt Caniff -- this is not one of them.  I'll be posting some of the actual comic strips from this section as well.

Bushmiller!

Do I really need a reason to share this wacky Nancy Sunday with you all...? Love that hillbilly hat!

Sgt. Snorkel in Slumberland? Part Two!

Mort Walker dreams up some more comic-related adventures for Sgt. Snorkel -- Superman and Snoopy get spoofed.

Hold on for Big Funny!

Comics in the comics!

The Archie gang rescues some vintage comic books and Fred Flintstone is distracted by the Sunday funnies.  The comic book titles mentioned in the Archie strip are real comics at one time published by MLJ (also the publisher of the Archie titles) -- except for "Captain Biceps" -- that's just silly.  

I'm told that Gene Hazelton was the primary artist on the Flintstones and Yogi Bear strips. Click on his name for more info.

 Big Funny is still on the way!