Nostalgic for old comic books

Cafe Society
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I’ve been reading recently about a lot of comic book characters and titles that came out when I was in my maximum comic book reading and buying period (basically, the 1960s and early 1970s), and was kinda bummed out because I’d never heard of or even seen these characters or titles. That’s pretty surprising, because the newsstands in my town used to lay oiut a long set of comic books in rows or extensive racks where you could see all the covers. Not as extensive as a modern comic book shop, but, still, you’d think adequate for the period.

Evidently not. I never knew that Harvey comics – which ran Casper the Friendly Ghost, Richie Rich, and that bunch – had a line of superhero comics (and had been doing that since the 1940s). Or that American Comics Group, too, had superhero comics. I never saw any of the Dell superhero comics. I rarely saw the non-Archie comics produced by , well, Archie comics. There were entire characters that were apparently well-known that I never saw, like Blue Beetle (who’s had his own movie).

I was too young to have seen the Gaines horror comics, or Captain Marvel (the Shazam guy – I saw the Marvel comics version).

I blame iffy distribution.

By the time I was reading them, DC had extended its superhero line (which never stopped running Superman, Batman, or Wonder Woman during the 1950s) to second incarnations of The Flash, Green Lantern, etc. and Marvel had responded with The Fantastic Four, The Hulk, Iron Man, Thor, and the rest of their line.

Here are the comic publishers I knew, besides DC and Marvel

Dell – published Walt Disney characters, Tarzan, Turok, and lots of movie adaptations.

Gold Key – took over a lot of Dell titles in 1962, including Disney, movie adaptations, Tarzan, and Turok. Surprisingly, Dell continued to put out titles, including adatations f TV series like Mission Impossible, but their comics became increasingly more difficult to find. I never saw theyr Dracula and Frankenstein comics, which later on made them into superheroes (!)

American Comics Group – published mainly spooky stories. The ghosts were always shown with dashed outlines and colored green. I occasionally saw their “Herbie” comics, but never saw the superhero lines.

Classics Illustrated – great stuff, and they didn’t change them every month.

Charlton Comics – the slum of comic books, with poor quality and weird-looking lettering. They published the movie adaptations of the monster movies Konga and Reptilicus and Gorgo and later made them into series (the latter retitled “Reptisaurus”. Amazingly, Steve Ditko drew several Gorgo stories in his distinctive style.

Fawcett – they had ceased publication of the Captain Marvel series and just about everythuing else before I was around, but they continued to publish a whole line of Dennis the Menace comics, most notably the Special EDitions that usually had him visiting someplace like Washington DC or Hawaii or Mexico

Archie – There was a seemingy infinite number of comics about Archie, Jughead, Veronia, Betty, and the rest of the gang. Even Josie, before she was a Pussycat, and Sabrina. I occasionally saw a couple of thir superhero titles, like The Jaguar and The Fly (and ly-Girl), but didn’t realize there were others, like B-Man.

George Pflaum – only published the Catholic comic Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact, which was only available through our school, until near the very end of its run, when I saw it on newsstands. Surprisingly good compendium of two continuing “serials” and features on arts and crafts, historical characters, sports, recipes (!) and other, with at least one religious piece thrown in per issue. I got a lot out of it, especially from Frank Borth’s “How to Draw” series, whch taught me about perspective and other tricks. I didn’t learn until later that Borth was one of the artists who drew The Raven, Spider Widow, and the infamous Phantom Lady (condemned by Fredric Wertham’s book Seduction of the Innocent as both bondage porn and scanty costumed “headlights” art. I’m surprised he got the gig at Pflaum, but he churned out superb episodic advbenture stories for kids.)

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Between the ages of 6 and 13 (the same period), I had so many comic books they filled the back seat of my dad’s car during summer vacation. He was constantly telling me to get my nose out of a comic and look at the country we were driving through.

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I’ve heard it said that “the Golden Age of comics is 12”.

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My big blind spot during my peak interest (age 12, 1975) was Atlas/Seaboard Comics founded by Martin Goldman after he sold Marvel. Their stable of writers and artists included Steve Ditko, Neal Adams, John Severin, Alex Toth, Howard Chaykin, Wally Wood, and even Stan Lee’s brother Larry Lieber. I have yet to actually get my hands on one of those books.

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Of course, DC isn’t just superheroes.

ETA: then there’s EC Comics, publisher of MAD and other stuff.

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I do remember the Dell ‘Dracula,’ and actually had a couple of issues once upon a time. The others, not so much.

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I SWEAR that, although I know they existed (because of the ads) I NEVER saw a copy of Sugar and Spike. Or The Three Mouseketeers or Bob Hope (I did see The Adventures of Jerry Lewis, though)

A couple of weird comics I did see:

The Mighty Atom – a comic book about an elf superhero, from a company I otherwise never heard of, Magazine Enterprises.

https://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=357611

Superduck – published by the Archie Comics people. He looked like a cheap knock-off of Donald Duck, and only had one nephew (Faunt – short for “Fauntleroy”) instead of three. Despite the name, he wasn’t super, although he WAS a duck. Apparently in his early issues he was a Superman paody, but that was long before I saw him. Apparently he struck a nostalgic chord, because occasionally I see people mention him. Rober Crumb drew an x-rated parody in 2002

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My parents didn’t mind us reading comic books during our trips; they always kept a stack on hand so we wouldn’t get too bored. I don’t remember any superhero comics being among them but we did have some Sugar and Spike, Harvey’s Sad Sack, and others.

'Course, there wasn’t much to see from the interstate to Chicago and points north.

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I have such fond memories of comic books or as we called them, funny books. My dad loved them. Not so much the super hero variety but he loved Donald Duck, Scrooge McDuck, Chip n Dale, Bugs Bunny, Archie, Lulu, etc. We had a family lake cabin and spent all of our summer weekends there. My mom would buy a 3 pack of funny books every week for my dad. This was 60s-70s. I can remember eating my mini box of cereal and reading a funny book every morning. I can still see my dad lying in a lawn chair reading one. We’d read them over and over again.

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Their letterist was a typist named Veronica who went under the clever handle “A. Machine”

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Left out of the op:

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There was a supermarket in Joliet, IL, that had an entire wall stocked with comics of every type. I used to stand before it in awe while deciding which ones I was going to buy that week.

My favorites were always DC war comics, especially the ones with Lt Jeb Stuart and “The Haunted Tank” (an M3 Stuart) and Sgt Rock of Easy Company (“Nothin’ was ever easy in Easy Company!”).

I liked the talking babies in Sugar and Spike, also from DC, but bought the company’s superhero comics (mostly Superman and Batman) only on occasion.

I think Sgt Fury and His Howling Commandos was the only Marvel comic I ever bought. Their superheroes just didn’t appeal to me.

I loved oddball ones like Magnus, Robot Fighter and Herbie (the fat kid with the lollipops that gave him superpowers), which didn’t fit neatly into any category other than SF.

I had virtually all of the Harvey comics (Casper the Friendly Ghost, Little Dot, Little Lotta, etc.), and all of the ones from Disney (Donald Duck, Uncle Scrooge, Mickey Mouse, etc.).

I loved “service” comics like Sad Sack, Gabby Gob, and Beetle Bailey.

I bought Archie now and again, and not just because of Betty and Veronica.

Dennis the Menace and Little Lulu were always on my list, especially their “special editions” set in other countries and summer camp.

Their was once a Peanuts comic book, but I think I may have had the only edition. I had to settle for reprints of the newspaper strips, and I had a lot of those.

Ghosts, which I think was from Classics Illustrated, scared the hell out of me. The Time Machine and War of the Worlds kept me awake all night; Taras Bulba, not so much.

I always enjoyed one-offs like Stingray, Supercar, and Thunderbirds, which were based on Gerry Anderson’s TV shows.

Quite a walk down Memory Lane. I wonder if there are any I missed?

Oh, yeah: One-offs based on movies, like Dinosaurs and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

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Oh, yeah – another non-superhero DC comic that I never saw (but knew existed, because they advertised them in the comics) was Fox and Crow. The comic lasted well into the 1960s, from reports. But I never saw a copy.

I’m surprised they lasted that long – the comic was based on a series of animated cartoons from the 1940s that I also never saw – even on TV shows running bottom-of-the-barrel cartoons. I’ll bet most other kids of the era didn’t see them either.

It’s odd that the cartoons disappeared – they were created for Screen Gems in the 1940s by Frank Tashlin, who used to be a cartoon director at Warner Brothers and at Disney before coming u with Fox and Crow – with voices by Mel Blanc (at least first). Chuck Jones acknowledged this cartoon as inspiration for the Road Runner series. Tashlin later went on to direct Jayne Mansfield movies nd Jerry Lewis films.

The cartoons never received a standard release on VHS or DVD, although on-request collector’s copies did come out.

The comics, as I say, lasted until 1968, but by that time the issues were taken over by a different series – Stanley and his Monster – which I also didn’t see. At least until Phil Foglio resurrected it for DC, along with Angel and the Ape
https://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=184051

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I had all of those, along with Fox and Crow and Stanley and His Monster! :grin:

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I had relatively few superhero comics but had quite a few other comics. I remember Bugs Bunny, Yosemite Sam, Daffy Duck, and other Warner Bros characters. Can’t recall who published those.

But also had some Harvey comics, like Little Lotta, Richie Rich, Casper, Wendy, and Baby Huey.

I recall some Gold Key comics in my collection. Only one I can think of off the top of my head was Heckle and Jeckle.

I also remember another comic publisher…Whitman. I still have a box of old Cracky comic books in the basement. Probably worthless, but brought me hours of fun back in the day.

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Those were great! I loved it whenever one of the characters chowed down, since the panel would be filled with sound effects like “Eat! Eat! Chomp! Chew!” :rofl:

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Was Cracky anything like Dizzy Duck?

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I still remember those. Some were so so creepy at the time I read them, I was haunted by a few choice stories…On the other hand, I enjoyed DC comics ‘Metal Men’ immensely. But my heart belonged to Marvel. I collected every single Marvel comic I could get my hands on and joined the MMM (Merry Marching Marvel society). I think they printed one of my letters. (and Millie the Model, also Marvel comics. I remember when it took sort of a more adult turn.)

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I’m not familiar with Dizzy Duck, but these are some covers of old ‘Cracky’ comics

Cracky was a parrot.

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When I was a kid there were 3 places that had the most comic books: an Open Pantry on the South side of town, a Walgreens in the middle of town, and a book store on the north side of town.

Even for a small city that was a lot of walking or even biking for a 10 year old kid.

They were all serviced by the same distribution company.

Thing is, every store had different comics. So in order to get the absolute best selection you had to hoof it to all 3 stores once a month.

I don’t know what the thinking was in that.