Fun reading in old newspapers

Once in a while I like to search old newspaper archives for things related to Disney comics. Two of my recent discoveries are not really that interesting, but still fun to read.

In The Roanoke Rapids Herald, August 05, 1948 we can read about a study into children's comic reading. According to their findings, kids that read Disney comics apparently have a higher IQ than the ones that prefer superheroes...
 

From The Roanoke Rapids Herald, August 05, 1948

In The Sunday Star (Evening Star, Washington DC), March 2, 1941, there is a long text about “the cop who saved a thousand kids”. 

From The Sunday Star, March 2, 1941

To teach kids about safety, he used comic characters in his own lantern slides.

 

From The Sunday Star, March 2, 1941

These are not official Mickey drawings, but a fun example showing how the character was used by others in the early days. Note the size of Mickey compared to the humans (!)

From The Sunday Star, March 2, 1941

365 Days with Winnie the Pooh

At end of last year Dark Horse published a nice little hardcover book collecting daily strips and Sunday pages with Winnie the Pooh. I was a little bit reluctant to get the book at first, partly because I saw online samples and the art looked really pixelated there. And I noticed some other things I didn't like, which I'll discuss below. But getting the book in hand it looks a lot better on print, and the majority of the content I've never seen on print before.

As someone with a special interest in Disney comics there are things I wish was different with a collection like this, but for a casual or "normal" buyer I think this is a great book that I can recommend.

Daily strips inside the book

Sunday pages inside the book

My main disappointment with the book is the selection of the comic strips. This is far from a complete collection and I'd rather see a complete chronological collection of all the strips in a series of books. But even for a selection, I wish they at least would include some strips with the most interesting part of the entire series. And by that I'm talking about Sir Brian and his dragon!
 

Daily strip June 21, 1978 - first strip with Sir Brian's dragon

This book does not contain a single strip with Sir Brian and the dragon, and they were such a huge part of series from the very beginning to the end! The characters of Sir Brian and the dragon were actually created by Don Ferguson and Richard Moore specifically for the newspaper comics, and an article about this would also have been great.

 

Sir Brian in a 1986 Sunday page

I can't stop thinking that a collection of the Winnie the Pooh newspaper comics would have been much better as part of IDW's Library of American Comics. And speaking of those books lets do a little size comparison.
 

As you can see the Dark Horse book is a lot smaller in size than the Disney newspaper books from IDW. That was also a concern of me at first, but getting the book in hand the size didn't really bother me at all.

When printed in the newspapers the daily strips were in black and white while the Sunday pages usually were in colors. In the Dark Horse book all strips are colored, and the Sunday pages with completely new colors and not using the newspaper coloring as a guide like the IDW books.

Newspaper coloring (left) vs. new coloring (right)

When coloring the strips, the original texture effect for shadows and b/w coloring is also removed.

Texture removed when coloring

And all the dialogue is changed to a computer font rather than using the original hand lettering. But I didn't manage to find any examples where the actual dialogue was changed.

Original lettering (top) and computer lettering (bottom)

Original lettering (top) and computer lettering (bottom)

But I suspect that the computer lettering and coloring is not really done for this publication. They are probably updated for distribution to modern newspapers, online viewing and for easier translation. And this book is using those strips as the source material.

My biggest surprise in the book was at the very end. Here we got the three Winnie the Pooh serials created for The Treasury of Classic Tales series of Sunday pages. But the surprise was that these actually are reinked/redrawn versions of the Sunday pages, created with the modern character design. I had no idea this version of the comics existed! Again, this can be illustrated by comparing to IDW's Library of American Comics.

At the end of Treasury of Classic Tales vol.3 we get a preview page for the planned 4th volume, that was supposed to include the original version of the Pooh Sunday pages.

[Note: There was plans for four volumes, but the series was cancelled after the 3rd book due to poor sales. You can hear more about this in episode 6 of the LOAC podcast.]

Here's a panel by panel comparison of the original version and the new one:

Original Sunday page (top), and the new version (bottom)

Original Sunday page (top), and the new version (bottom)

Now I just wish someone would publish the complete run of the original one too!

Disney comics from Peachtree Playthings (Dollar Tree)

Online ad for new comics at Dollar Tree

Peachtree Playthings recently started publishing Disney comics, and I've checked out some of the first ones. According to their webpage they have a number of retail relationships, but I've only heard of these comics being sold at Dollar Tree in the USA – and that's what the online ads say too.

 

Peachtree Playthings retail relationships

The comics seems to be released in batches of 4, with the first ones in sale at the very end of last year. Titles include Mickey Mouse, Toy Story, Frozen and Disney Princess.

All the #1's from Peachtree Playthings

Two of the #2 issues from Peachtree Playthings

 
On the back of the comics we have an ad for the next number of the issue in hand and the other available comics from the same batch.
 

Back cover of Mickey Mouse #1 and #2

Looking at all the covers you would assume they are exact reprints of earlier comics from Marvel, Joe Books and IDW as the cover art, layout and logo are the same as used before.

Comics from IDW and Marvel compared to the Peachtree ones

Comics from Joe Books compared to the Peachtree ones

For the Toy Story comics and the Disney Princess comics that is actually true. They have the exact same comic pages inside as the Marvel and Joe Books issues. The Frozen comic from Peachtree have the same long story, but is missing the shorter story at end if Joe Books' earlier edition. The Mickey comics only have the shorter stories from the same IDW issues, while the rest of the content is made up of other short stories, but still taken from IDW's run of comics.

 

The contents in the two first Mickey Mouse issues (click to enlarge)

As you can see there's nothing new in any of the Peachtree editions if you already have been collecting American Disney comics the last decade. But I still think it's great that Disney comics are sold at Dollar Tree. And hopefully they are reaching a wider audience making them more popular.

Redistributing comics

A couple of weeks ago I was visiting Germany, and as I usually do on my travels I bought a few Disney comics as souvenirs. This time I picked up a couple of plastic bag type of things.

Mickey Mouse Wundertüte #18 and a Donald Duck Doppel Pack

One was #18 of something called "Micky Maus Wundertüte", and the other one was a "Donald Duck Doppel Pack". The Donald Duck bag looks more generic in design with no numbering and had Die tollsten Geschichten von Donald Duck Sonderheft #384 and Lustiges Taschenbuch #474 inside. The other copies at the same store had the same comics in the bag, and I found a picture of the same one online too. I guess the content is not random then and if you are a hardcore completionist you could collect these double-packs. But the bags are not listed on inducks and such.

Two Micky Maus comics from inside the Wundertüte bag, including free gifts (= useless plastic junk)

Inside the Micky Maus Wundertüte I found Micky Maus #19/2018 (with an attached DuckTales comic) and Micky Maus #14/2018. Doing some searching online I found a guy on YouTube opening three of the same packaging, but with different comics inside, so in this bag I guess the content is random back issues of Micky Maus.

In both cases I suspect these comics are unsold back issues that are redistributed at a discount price. This way of redistributing comics is not normal where I live, but I tried to remember if I could think of any other examples of the same. Doing some digging in my archive I found a double-pack from Finland I bought years ago, and a couple from Italy too.

Double-packs with comics from Finland and Italy

The Finnish one I'm pretty sure is an official redistribution bag with two issues of Roope-Setä. The two Italian ones I'm not so sure about. I got them at a regular newsstand/kiosk and not from any used comics book shop. But the shrink-wrap looks more home made, and while one of the two books inside looks new and unread, the other one is clearly a used one.

Here in Norway I don't see much of any redistribution anymore, but in the past it was common for comics in album and pocket format. But the way it was done here was to add a redistribution sticker on the comics with updated information about the price and return week.

Norwegian Donald Pocket with redistribution stickers

Above is an example from two issues of the Norwegian Donald Pocket. While it is common for the most serious collectors here to collect different editions and printings, comics with stickers like this is not something that is collected and registered in databases and price guides. As you can see from another example below, the stickers often fade over time too.

Norwegian albums, original and with redistribution sticker

Another way to redistribute unsold comics is to make a completely new comic book out of them! That's what happened with some American comics in Australia in the late 70’s/early 80’s.

The comics pictured above where all sold in Australia, but inside they have American comics from Western Publishing (under the Gold Key/Whitman brand). The original covers are removed and the rest of the comics glued together with edges cut to make a new paperback comic.

American comic reused in an Australian paperback

My copy numbered WD 614 has Donald Duck #204, Donald Duck #206, Super Goof #60, Winnie-the-Pooh #20 and Donald Duck #207 inside. But the fun thing is that if you find another copy of WD 614 with the same cover, the content will most likely be different. There's no point trying to index these comics as the content vary, and they are not added to the inducks database. But you can find a listing of the different covers that exist here.

Another example where almost the same was done is the Gladstone leather bound collection of albums.

These books were made as limited-edition collectors' books and hand numbered.

But they basically just contain old stock issues of the Gladstone Comic Album Series bound together as a hardcover. When writing this I noticed that the books actually have later printings of the albums. This can easily be spotted on the very first albums where the ring around the number differ from the first and second printing.

First printing of album #1 and a later printing used in the leather bound book.

Edit Feb. 24, 2020

After writing this blogpost I discovered another example of old stock comics being redistributed. In Sweden they are putting old issues of Kalle Ankas Pocket back in sale in 2-packs, with a paper binding around.

 

Front

Back

The most interesting thing however is that the paper around the old comics is numbered "Kalle Ankas Bäste" (= "Best of Donald Duck") #1, 2020. The two-pack even got its own series name different from the books you actually buy…

Restored version of a Barks one-pager from Uncle Scrooge #22

In late December last year, a small collection of original art panels was sold on Heritage Auctions. The panels were from various Disney artist including Paul Murry, Al Hubbard, Tony Strobl and one single panel by Carl Barks. And the Barks panel turned out to be a panel cut from a one-pager he did for Uncle Scrooge #22, and never before seen on print!
 

Newly discovered panel by Carl Barks

It didn't take long for a restored version of the one-pager to get published, and we saw the newly discovered panel on print for the first time this February in the Swedish Kalle Anka Extra.
 

Swedish Kalle Anka Extra #1/2019

Under is a comparison of the page as originally printed in Uncle Scrooge #22 and the restored page in Kalle Anka Extra #1/2019.
 

Uncle Scrooge #22 (left), Kalle Anka Extra 1/2019 (right)

As you can see, the panel got cut to make space for the "Dell pledge to parents" in US #22. Also, it looks like the last panel was slightly extended for the original print (probably by another artist than Barks), and that panel had to be cropped a bit for the restored layout. I tried to look closely at the last panel as printed in the Carl Barks library from Another Rainbow (in black and white), and it's hard to tell exactly what part of the panel has been extended. But I guess the Swedish restoration is pretty close to the original as drawn by Carl Barks.
 

Original layout (top), restored panel (bottom)

Checking a couple of other reprints of the page, the Dell pledge got replaced by Scrooge's head in Uncle Scrooge Adventures #3, while an early British reprint simply adjusted the pledge to their own name…

Gladstone's Uncle Scrooge Adventures #3 (left), British "World Distributors" #52 (right)

Original pledge (left), British adjusted pledge (right)

***

The Swedish issue might not be that easy to obtain around the world, but rumor has it that the restored page will be printed in Fantagraphics' book The Mines of King Solomon that will be on sale in comic shops next week.

Fantagraphics' book that (supposedly) will include the restored page