Friday Fun FAST WILLIE JACKSON "Jabar in The Good Old Days"

From the premiere issue of Fitzgerald's Fast Willie Jackson...

...comes this never-reprinted two-pager by editor/writer Bertram Fitzgerald and artist "Gus LeMoine" that makes a serious point in a humorous way!.

Published by Black-owned company Fitzgerald Publications (who had previously published the Golden Legacy non-fiction comic series about Black history), Fast Willie was their entry into the mass market.
(There were no comic book stores at the time)

Though not Comics Code-approved, it received newsstand distribution, and sales were climbing for each successive issue.

Unfortunately, it reached break-even only with the seventh (and final) issue, when other matters caused Fitzgerald Publications to cease producing new material for an extended period. When Fitzgerald briefly resumed publishing, Fast Willie was not among the titles.

Written by publisher/editor Bertram Fitzgerald, illustrated by "Gus LeMoine".

Note: There's no record of Gus LeMoine outside of a brief comics career for Archie and Fitzgerald which coincidentally ends with superb Dan DeCarlo mimic Henry Scarpelli leaving his staff position at DC and becoming a full-time staff artist at Archie...at which point LeMoine's credits disappear!

Most artists in the comics field do other (fine or commercial art) work before and/or after their stint in comics.

There's no trace of Gus' work anywhere else!

If anybody can provide a link to his pre/post-comics work or some sort of biography I've missed, I'd be extremely grateful for the info!

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Black Comics

Politics of Race and Representation

Reading Room UNKNOWN WORLDS OF SCIENCE FICTION "Occupation Force"

From the mind of Frank Herbert, creator/author of the Dune series...

...comes a tale of how the concept of a screwed-up government bureaucracy is literally, universal!

This never-reprinted tale from Marvel's sci-fi anthology magazine Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction #3 (1975) is an extremely-faithful adaptation by writer Gerry Conway, penciler George Perez, and inker Klaus Janson of the Frank Herbert short story that originally appeared in Ziff-Davis' sci-fi pulp Fantastic #V4N5 (1955).

In a kool touch, the creatives took the originally all-Caucasian Krolians...

...and made them an inclusive, interracial group.

Humans are humans, no matter their skin color, after all...

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Frank Herbert's Dune Saga

(Box Set of the Original Six Books written by Herbert himself)

Baker Reading Room JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY "Green Fog!"

Before a long-haired hippie (hey, it was the Swinging Sixties) with a hammer took over the book...

....Atlas-Marvel's Journey into Mystery was first a horror, then sci-fi anthology featuring some of the best work of the era...quite a bit of it never-reprinted, like this tale from #50 (1959), penciled by the legendary Matt Baker and inked by Vince Colletta!

The scripter is unknown, but probably isn't editor Stan Lee, who tended to incorporate his distinctive signature into the title page when he wrote the story.

You'll note the inking is much more detailed here than in the previous Baker Reading Room story, also inked by Colletta, but published by Charlton!

Atlas' reproduction quality was better than Charlton's, so art studio owner/inker Colletta (who packaged stories for Atlas, Charlton, Dell and others) put more effort into the final product.

The Marvel Masterworks: Journey into Mystery reprint series ended with Volume Four (2012), which only reprinted up to #40, so almost all the non-Thor and Tales of Asgard material since #40 (including this story) hasn't been seen since original publication!

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Matt Baker

Art of Glamour

Monday Madness HEAVY METAL "Mara's Edge"

Here's a retro-kool short story illustrated by one of the most underrated comic creators currently working...

Milton Knight Jr!

As you might have guessed, Knight was heavily-influenced by 1920s-40s animators including the Fleisher Brothers, Tex Avery, and Chuck Jones.

He's worked in comics, animation, magazine illustration, commercial art, even CD and LP album cover graphics!

Though he collaborated with writer Steve Riggenberg on this tale never-reprinted tale from Heavy Metal V9N7 (1985), Knight usually scripts his own material.
Check out his website HERE!

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Graphic Canon

Volume 3

(Featuring Milton Knight Jr's graphic adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston's classic "Poker!")

Baker Reading Room OUTER SPACE "Incredible Giants"

Here's another never-reprinted sci-fi tale...

...by renowned Black artist Matt Baker, who penciled, but didn't ink, the story!

Inker Vince Colletta employed a number of excellent, detailed pencilers like Matt Baker and Joe Sinnott to work for his studio, which "packaged" stories, series, and even book-length tales for publishers.

Unfortunately, when dealing with smaller publishers like Charlton (who didn't pay as much as DC, Marvel, Harvey, etc) to save cash, Vince inked most of the work himself, usually rushing it to meet deadlines!
Compare with another story, inked by long-time Baker collaborator Ray Osrin, and you see the difference inkers can make!
The same level of page layout and storytelling is obvious in both tales...but the rendering...hoo boy!
BTW, Joe Gill wrote this story from Charlton's Outer Space #23 (1959).

One important plot point was that the giant children thought the scout ship was a seed pod due to it's design...

...an element cover artists Charles Nicholas and Rocke Mastroserio didn't follow though on with their re-do of the story's splash panel!

Were they not informed, or did the editor deliberately insist on a more traditional ship design?

We'll never know the answer!

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Matt Baker

Art of Glamour

Monday Madness FAST WILLIE JACKSON "Introduction" & "Jabar in The One and Only"

In the 1970s, there was an Archie-style comic aimed at Black audiences...

...and though it used artists who worked for Archie Comics, it wasn't published by Archie Comics!

Fast Willie Jackson was published  by Black-owned publisher Fitzgerald Publications who had previously published the Golden Legacy non-fiction comic series about Black history.

Fast Willie was their entry into the mass-market comics market.

Though not Comics Code-approved, it received newsstand distribution, and sales were climbing for each successive issue.

Unfortunately, it reached break-even only with the seventh (and final) issue, when other matters caused Fitzgerald Publications to cease producing new material for an extended period. When Fitzgerald briefly resumed publishing, Fast Willie was not among the titles.

Written by publisher/editor Bertram Fitzgerald, illustrated by "Gus LeMoine".

Note: There's no record of Gus LeMoine outside of a brief comics career for Archie and Fitzgerald which coincidentally ends with superb Dan DeCarlo mimic Henry Scarpelli leaving his staff position at DC and becoming a full-time staff artist at Archie...at which point Lemoine's credits disappear!

Most artists in the comics field do other (fine or commercial art) work before and/or after their stint in comics.

There's no trace of LeMoine's work anywhere else!

If anybody can provide a link to his pre/post-comics work or some sort of biography I've missed, I'd be extremely grateful for the info!

Please Support Atomic Kommie Comics!

Visit Amazon and Order...

Black Comics

Politics of Race and Representation

Baker Reading Room LASSIE "Isle of Adventure"

Besides being a superb "good girl" artist, Matt Baker was also a superb nature illustrator!

This tale from the era between the movie series and the TV show demonstrates Baker's amazing artistic range!

This page is black-and-white because it's the inside back cover.
Dell (and most comic publishers) printed the inside covers as b/w or two-color to save money.

After the last movie in the original series came out in 1951, the comic continued, with Lassie linked to new humans, including photographer Rocky Langford and his girlfriend Gerry Lawrence on their trip to South America!

Penciled by Matt Baker and inked by long-time artistic partner Ray Osrin (who inked, among other Baker stories, It Rhymes with Lust), this tale from Dell's Lassie #22 (1955) is from the final issue of Matt's four-issue tenure as the feature's primary artist.

The writer is unknown.

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Matt Baker

Art of Glamour