Recently, good friend, Pappy (of Golden Age Comics Blogzine fame) ran a great Beany & Cecil post by Jack Bradbury. Feeling inspired, I dove into my collection, looking for some JB. Being such a fan of the artist, I didn't have to look far. Bradbury was one of the greatest cartoonists of all time, and these two stories give evidence to the claim. Both are from Coo Coo Comics No. 36, November 1947.
This first has Bradbury doing his version of Supermouse, a character many greats worked on (Milt Stein, Al Hubbard, Dan Gordon, and Gene Fawcett to name a few). Bradbury's Supermouse, to say the least, holds its own in some very fast company.
This second story stars Dodger De Squoil, a feisty, scrappy squirrel with a Brooklyn accent; who seems more than a little influenced by a well known feisty, scrappy rabbit with a Brooklyn accent. More great stuff here - what great character design.
Finally, this awesome ad from the same issue. "Fellers - here's a dream of a game!" Show of hands. Who would rather play with this than with PS3? C'mon! I can't be the only one!
Beautiful! Always like seeing Jack's work when he wasn't tied into the strict Dell layout format.
ReplyDeleteI had a version of that football game, and even though I dislike sports, I loved it. As the broken record repeats: Kids today don't know what they're missing!
Bill: I know what you mean about this vintage of Bradbury's work. I feel the stuff he did for Giggle, Ha Ha, etc. in the 1940s was his most representative work.
ReplyDeleteMan, I want that game!
When I looked at Jack Bradbury strictly though the Dell and Gold Key prism (which I HAD for many years), he was the guy that I was disappointed to find in MICKEY MOUSE when it wasn’t by Paul Murry, and the same in DONALD DUCK when it wasn’t by Tony Strobl.
ReplyDeleteYet, this stuff is wonderful, and he is deservedly respected for work like this. Beyond the four-tier format, which artists from Carl Barks, to Harvey Eisenberg, to Jack Manning found ways to “be interesting”, yet remain “confined within”, why did the qualities of this work not translate fully to those higher profile comics? He shouldda been bigger, there.
Was the game in the ad, the infamous “vibrating football game”? I received one of those the year Monday Night Football began. The “teams” were plastic players, fully red or white (head-to-toe, even faces), each atop a base with a magnetic bottom – and, when you switched it on, you just hoped one of your guys would vibrate over the goal line.
Such a game even made a cameo appearance in a SIMPSONS episode – the one with Joe Namath, and “Tom Landry Hat-wearing Homer” as a kids’ football coach.
Joe: I agree, working within the Disney style and confines was not the best venue for Bradbury's work; and within those confines, you've mentioned a couple of greats (Murry and Stroble)! I know a few that think Murry was Mickey's greatest artists!
ReplyDeleteNo, the electric football game from Jim Prentice (who is himself a bit of a mysterious figure - he was neither an ex-player or a sports announcer as is often assumed, but rather, it seems, simply a board game inventor and clever marketer) was not like that vibrating surface game you describe - I had one of those games in the late 60s, too! Here is a description of the Prentice game from boardgamegeek.com: "1950s era Electric Football game. Players select offensive play and defensive formation and press buttons. Light bulbs light up a chart on the board to indicate the result of the play and yardage gained. A metal marker is moved along the edge of the "field" to indicate line of scrimmage and line to gain."
For the link, click Here!
As a child of the Silver Age, I was one of those who regarded Paul Murry as one of the very best. Still do! He WAS the “Mouse Man” for me. Even Strobl didn’t seem quite right, when he did Mickey. He “belonged” to Murry!
DeleteAnd, though I did get to work with a mid-sixties Murry story that was first published in the USA in 2011, the first actual Disney comics American English scripting I did was on an early-70s Jack Bradbury story, originally written (I later learned) by Mark Evanier! See the Super Goof story at this link.
http://coa.inducks.org/issue.php?c=us/MMMB++2#c
In both cases, I was extremely honored for having had the opportunity to do so.
That electric football game sounds quite interesting! I’d have loved to see one operate for real!
Great work, Joe!!
ReplyDeleteThis is the first Supermouse strip I've seen by Bradbury. As always, his artwork is superb, right up there with the best of the Soupie artists like Milt Stein and Al Hubbard. Thanks, Mykal.
ReplyDeletePappy: Bradbury - solid as a rock!
ReplyDeleteI've re-read this post a few times now, gets better each time!
ReplyDeleteDoesn't it, though? I hope you enjoy my new post as much. Hint: Lou Cameron!
ReplyDelete