BLACK HORSE WESTERN WEEKEND: THE RETURN

One of the highlights of the recent Black Horse Weekend was the digital publication of Chap O'Keefe's Blackbow comic - strip, unpublished since 1967. However due to a technical hitch the scans were resized by my ISP - well son of Chap, Robin the tech whizz, has solved the problem and so NOW WE PRESENT BLACKBOW THIS TIME IN READABLE SCANS.









ENJOY.



















CLICK ON ANY IMAGE FOR A LARGER VERSION





















Thanks to Keith and Robin Chapman for providing the scans.

EAGLE ANNUAL: BEST OF THE 1960'S

The last annual - The Eagle Annual: BEST OF THE 1950'S did well and so Orion Books have put another best of on the shelves in time for Christmas. This time looking at the 1960's and although this was the decade in which the comic finally folded the features and strips collected here are the best yet.

The annual is features heavy but this is an advantage and offers better value than simply reprinting classic strips (although there are many of them) because they offer a glimpse into what the decade was like and particularly what interested kids at the time. There are many Wild West features and a lot of pop music and sports.

There's a big debate on the letters page on the issue of grammer schools versus comprehensive schools and reader, Paul Riley thinks that comprehensive schools should be banned. Eagle readers were a serious minded lot. Mind you judging by the standard of most comprehensive school teachers these days then Master Paul Riley may just have a point.

Features on hobbies are included and this time subjects range from football program collecting to train spotting. And apparently in the 1960 the UK consumed over 40,000 pounds of jellied eels each week. If these were stretched out they would cover twelve and a half miles. A feature for the strong stomached looks at the process from capturing the slimy creatures to the dinner plate.

They sure don't make comics like they used to.

All of the usual strips and present and correct and expertly reproduced to show the true beauty of the Eagle artwork which was (and is) quite unique. The Eagles was eventually merged into Lion as strip stories began to replace features and text stories. The influence of the comic is still felt down the decades, not only with Dan Dare, but never again would comics look so good.

It's on sale now and makes for a great Christmas gift.

EAGLE ANNUAL the best of the 1950's

EAGLE ANNUAL 1950'S
£12.99
Orion Books
Edited by Daniel Tatarsky

Firstly I want to make it clear that I don't remember the original Eagle Comic. It's first incarnation ran from 1950 - 1969 when it was merged into Lion.

WIKI quote:

The Eagle was the creation of the Reverend Marcus Morris, then vicar of St James' church,Southport, Lancashire, who intended it as a Christian antidote to what he saw as the bad influence of American comics during the post-war period. He strove to produce high quality, inspirational literature unlike any existing at the time, involving the work of teams of graphic artists such as Frank Hampson and Frank Bellamy - even creating mockups of spaceships to use as reference for Dan Dare. The Eagle and its sister papers Girl, Swift and Robin were designed by renowned typographer Ruari McLean, and were read by millions throughout the 1950s and 1960s. Eagle was one of the most popular comics in British history, selling just under 1 millioncopies per week.


END WIKI quote


This collection comes in a great

retro looking boards that have bee produced to look aged and at first glance the book does appear to be a keepsake from the 1950's.



Reading it now is great fun - you can tell a lot about an era from reading its magazines and the 1950's must have been a far more innocent time. Look at the panel here in which Dan Dare fro licks in the bath after a mission. That would be slightly suspect to say the least in today's comics and would get the likes of the Daily Racist (whoops sorry, Daily Mail) in a right spin.

A nice touch with this book is the side panels giving a pocket history of the strip characters. For instance I learned here that Harris Tweed: Extra Special Agent was created by John Ryan who would later go onto create TV's Captain Pugwash. And that world YO-YO champion, Art Pickles recommends the Outspan Whistling Yo-Yo.

The comic wasn't only about strips and as well as text stories it also carried magazine type features that would interest the 1950's comic reading boy. This book contains many of these features such as HOW TO LOOK AFTER YOUR GOLDFISH, TRAINING YOUR FOX TERRIER, HOW TO BECOME A POSTMAN, JIU-JITSU FOR SELF DEFENCE AND MOST BIZARRE COLLECTING CHEESE LABELS - a hobby known as fromology.

Eagle of course was intended for boys but there was a companion title called Girl for girls and there is an annual collection of that magazine also available in the shops.

These books are excellently put together with a great eye for detail in the presentation and are great buys for anyone interested in the history of comic books...or cheese label collecting.