Richie Rich! November, 1968

Traditionally, Americans love financially challenged underdogs in stories featuring the rich because, well, most of us are financially challenged underdogs. One of the few exceptions to this is Harvey's Richie Rich. He has always been one of my favorites. I've yet to meet a comic book lover that didn't have a pretty good opinion of Richie. He's just such a good boy - fair, smart, and just so darned happy about life. Richie and His girlfriend, Gloria, have the aura of American royalty about them. These two stories come from Richie Rich No. 75, November 1968. I believe the artist for both is the great Ernie Colón (but it wouldn't be surprised if I am corrected regarding the second story).

The Richie Rich covers by Warren Kremer were among the cleverest of the Harvey covers - always showing Richie's flamboyant relationship with money. This one is no exception, capturing Richie's pure joy with the green stuff perfectly.

Tubby! - November, 1950

More from the glorious team of John Stanley (story) and Irving Tripp (art). Tubby is one of John Stanley’s greatest characters. The magic of Stanley is that his Tubby is not a “gifted” kid. Nor is he a brilliant scientist kid or a kid with a magic friend. He is simply a very believable kid with a great deal of charm and kid fallibility. I've included the inside back cover story as well as the back cover ad for good measure.

This story is from Marge's Little Lulu No. 29, November 1950.

If you want more Stanley after reading this story, you'll be made happy by visiting Frank Young's great blog, Stanley Stories.

"Lucky Lulu!" Stanley and Tripp - 1950

It's not accurate to call John Stanley and Irving Tripp a "team" in the same sense that Jack Kirby and Joe Simon were a team, since Tripp's assignment was to prefectly reproduce the established Stanley style, often working from layouts provided by Stanley (Tripp always said Stanley's rough layouts were often very complete). Still, a huge portion of comics thought of as "Stanley stories" were at least polished up and inked by Tripp, if not drawn. And he always did such a magnificent job at it.

What I love about Stanley's writing is the sweetness without any stickiness. Not for nothing - look at the personality he brings to the homeless vagrant, who ultimately enjoys a Thanksgiving dinner with Lulu and family. This story is from Marge's Little Lulu No. 29, November 1950.

If you want more Stanley after reading this story, you'll be made happy by visiting Frank Young's great blog, Stanley Stories.

Space Mouse!

This blog is so educational . . . for me! Last post I was in the dark about the posted artist, and Jim Engel (the gentleman who supplied the art for this blog’s beautiful banner) clued me in. The artist for last post’s Sam–N-Simian story was John Carey. As Jim patiently explained, a Carey characteristic throughout his work was the way he drew flying sweat drops off the heads of anxious characters. Isn’t that cool? Here is another story with Carey artwork featuring Space Mouse, complete with aforementioned flying sweat drops. This comes from Four Color No. 1132, August October, 1960.

PS: Also spot on in identifying the artist was Joe Torcivia. Way to go, Joe!