Friday Fun BASEBALL COMICS "Rube Rooky Climbs Up from the Pit...."

Will Eisner's saga of how a baseball superstar is created continues...

...as Rube leaves his family and girlfriend to pursue his dream...

Wow!

Big-screen TV in 1949?

Who knew?

Next Week: the exciting conclusion to Rube Rooky's amazing saga!
BTW, anybody here see a parallel between Rube and a real-life ballplayer who faced similar problems being accepted by his teammates because he was "different" just a year before writer/penciler Will Eisner and inker Tex Blaisdell created this tale?

Think about it...

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Baseball Comics #2

(A follow-up published decades later)
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Reading Room KANDI THE CAVE KID "Dinosaur"

Creationists believe the Earth is only 6,000 years old...

...so to them, this could be considered a chapter in a history book!

This never-reprinted story from Dell's Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies Comics #15 (1943) was the final appearance of the Walt Kelly-created character.

Besides both print adaptations of theatrical cartoons and new tales of existing Warner Brothers characters like Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, Dell introduced a number of new characters to fill out the pages of the comic anthology, including Kandi and Pat, Patsy & Pete.

Kandi was one of the shorter-lived ones, with only a half-dozen short tales from #3 to #15.

Friday Fun BASEBALL COMICS "Rube Rooky"

Is there anything Will Eisner hadn't done during his long, illustrious  career?

He took chances experimenting with genres like this baseball-themed 1949 comic book...

...which predated a rush of sports-themed comics from various publishers the next year.

Unfortunately, the big problem with being first is that, often, the world isn't quite ready for you, and Baseball Comics lasted only one issue.

But it certainly wasn't for lack of quality, as this Eisner-written and penciled tale, inked by Tex Blaisdell, proves.

There's more to Rube Rooky's one shot at stardom, and we'll be running it here at Friday Fun for the next few weeks, so don't miss it!

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Baseball Comics #2

(A follow-up published decades later)

Space Hero Saturdays SKYROCKET STEELE "Chapter 2"

Three Years Ago, We Left Space Hero Skyrocket Steele in a Cliffhanger...

...but we're going to correct that oversight starting now!

Great!
Another Cliffhanger!
But we're not gonna wait three more years to present the next chapter!
Skyrocket will return next month!

This second chapter in Steele's space-spanning saga by writer-artist Bill Everett appeared in Centaur's Amazing Mystery Funnies V1N3(a) in 1938.
And there's a simple reason for the weird numbering, which we'll explain when you return next month!
Trivia: Pop culture historian and prolific genre author Ron (Star Hawks) Goulart utilized the name (but nothing else from Everett's strip) for a hysterically-funny novel about 1940s sci-fi movie serials...

(click for bigger image)

...which, while available on Amazon (as seen below) can't be found as this 1980 first edition with a kool cover by noted artist Carl Lundgren!
Snarky Note: I bought it in 1980,when it came out!
That and Goulart's very HTF Tremendous Adventures of Bernie Wine...

...a PG-13/soft R mass-market novel about a young (and extremely horny) comic book artist in NYC, are among my favorite Goulart books in my collection (and I have a lot of them, including ghost-written standalones and series)!

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Skyrocket Steele
by Ron Goulart
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EASTER WITH MOTHER GOOSE Cover Gallery

From 1946 through 1949, Dell  produced an Easter with Mother Goose  annual..

...with all-new stories and art by Walt (Pogo) Kelly!

Here's several of the best covers (also by Kelly)!

Lunar Reading Room CONTACT COMICS "Moon Express"

Before We Actually Put Anybody into Space...
...we had to figure out how we would get them out there!

The hopeful author of this feature from Aviation Press' Contact Comics #12 (1946) believed we'd have a rocket reaching the Moon by 1950!
(In fact, the first rocket, the Russian 'Luna 2', didn't reach the Moon until 1959.)

The writer also believed legendary science fiction writer/editor John W Campbell to be a "uranium expert"!
(Campbell did have a BA in Physics, and, as an editor, pushed his writers to be as scientifically-accurate as possible.)
This 80 year-old never-reprinted story should give you an idea of how the concept of reaching somewhere outside of our atmosphere has captivated humans for centuries, and returning there a half-century later can still grab our attention!

Easter Reading Room EASTER WITH MOTHER GOOSE "Fun and Games"

Besides numerous single-page, two/three page, and longer stories...

...Dell's annual Easter with Mother Goose books by Walt (Pogo) Kelly usually included a game/puzzle page centerfold!

Three of the four issues from 1946 thru 1949 had them, and none have ever been reprinted!

...but we have them for your reading (and playing) pleasure, you lucky duckies!

Enjoy!

All written and illustrated by Walt Kelly, from Dell's Four Color Comics #103 (1946), #140 (1947) and #220 (1949)!

Space Hero Saturdays FANTASTIC COMICS "Space Smith and the Crustaceans of Ganymede"

Space Smith Doesn't Seem to be Quite Himself...

...as another artist fills-in for Fletcher Hanks, bringing a rather Buck Rogers-esque feel to the strip!

While the scripting on this story From Fox's Fantastic Comics #7 (1940) has that Fletcher Hanks "feel", the art, definitely, is not Hanks!

It looks like the artist is trying for the same look as Dick Calkins' original Buck Rogers newspaper strip, which was incredibly-popular at the time!

The next issue would feature a totally-Fletcher Hanks tale....for the last time!

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Buck Rogers in the 25th Century
Complete Newspaper Dailies
Volume 1: 1929-1930
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Lunar Reading Room PLANET COMICS "Life on Other Worlds: A Trip to the Moon"

 Pre-Sputnik/Space Race Comics About the Moon were Really Wild...

...and boy, could they be talky!

(I wonder if the letterer could've charge by the word!)

This chapter of Fiction House's Planet Comics' ongoing feature "Life on Other Worlds" appeared in #59 (1949) and, unlike other entries, was never-reprinted later in the comic's run!
The writer is unknown and the artist (who signed "Bay" on the art) also did so on two other Fiction House assignments, but appears nowhere else in published comics.

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Planet Comics

Volume 12

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Lunar Reading Room / Tales Twice Told STRANGE WORLDS "A Nation is Born"

Here's the original Golden Age version of a Bronze Age story...

..we ran on Tuesday!

Illustrated by Golden Age journeyman Rafael Astarita, this tale appeared in Avon's Strange Worlds #4 (1951) and was reprinted in IW's Strange Planets #9 (1959).

It was then re-illustrated, with only minor changes to the script (including a re-titling), in Eerie Publications' Strange Galaxy V1N8 (1971) as we showed on Tuesday.

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Showcase Presents

Strange Adventures

Volume 1
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