Saturday Leftover Day.
For all the Gill Fox fans out there, I am showing a little extra piece today, I found last week in an unlikely magazine called Story-a-day from 1953. I don't know how long this magazine ran (probably not longer than a year), but is an interesting thing that seems to have attracted a lot of New York cartoonists. In this issue (Volume 1 #13) there is not only a four page story illustrated by Gill Fox, but also one with illustrations by Jack Sparling and a one-page illustrated poem by later newspaper artist Mel Lazerus. I did a bit of googling and found another one by Gill Fox online here, or at least partly so. The same issue (#15) is for sale somewhere online as well and that shows it doesn't only have Fox in it, but also fellow Boy's Life contributor Bill Walsh and the guy who took over Jeanie when Fox left it in 1953, Leon Winik. Hm... do I smell a Johnstone and Cushing connection here?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/50284559@N00/
Now I have to admit I a not a great fan of this particular style of Gill Fox. It may be because I am from 1959 myself and around the time I started reading almost all children's books were done in a style like that. Instead I turned to comic book, which I found a lot more exciting. Having said that, I must admit that Fox's take on this bloodless style is a lot more lively than any I have ever seen. But the fact remains that he wasn't the only one who used it (I have a box full of the pocket sized Children's Magazine with boring 'modern' illustrations that anyone who wants to pay for the shipping can have and Jack and Jill magazine from that period isn't a lot better). In contrast to the other website I am also showing the story, which is written by Jack Webb. Jack Webb was of course famous for writing and producing Dragnet and playing the main character Joe Friday. I have found no record of him writing children's stories, so this might be a fluke or something the biographers missed - or another Jack Webb. I hope any Dragnet fans out there will help me out.
2 comments:
the way the story flows, if you read it in Jack Webb's DRAGNET voice, is totally him!
Apparently Jack Webb tried his own hand at drawing cartoons in the Army Air Force. There was a temporary exhibit at the Liberty Aviation Museum in Port Clinton, OH, USA featuring a couple purportedly drawn by him.
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