They Went Pogo

Tuesday Comic Strip Day.

Because the weather Pogo's I showed yesterday were already reprinted in one of Bill Crouch's books, I will share something for the Pogo fans today that no one will have seen outside of Holland. It is a rare early strip by Dutch artist Dick Matena. Although he is now mostly know for his realistic work, he started his career at the Dutch Toonder Studio's, where he drew the newspaper strip Panda for several years in the sixties. He branched out with a strip of his own for a woman's magazine, called Polletje Pluim. A funny strip about a group of animals living in a forest, which shows a definite Walt Kelly influence. Like many of his contemporaries he was an admirer of Pogo. I think he even translated a couple of stips for the Dutch fanzine Stripschrift later on. Anyway, Martin Toonder himself had been influenced by kelly as well, but more in a sideways sort of way. Toonder had started his most famous creation Tom Poes before Kelly got going, but at some point he picked up some of Kelly's way of doing Disney. Or he started working with collaborators who did.

Anyway, Polletje Pluim is a long forgotten strip that has never been properly collected. Back when the Okefenokee Star was still being published I toyed with the idea of doing a piece on all European Pogo influenced strips and artists and hommages. Because Polletje Pluim is only the tip of the iceberg. I scanned these from my wn collection, which is not the complete story (and at least missing page 10). But I guess y'all won't be readin' it anyways.

The Weather Outside Is Delightful

Monday Cartoon Day.

One of the enduring qualities of Walt Kelly was that he could create a vigntte drawing like no one else. For a long time in 1952 (and probably some time before that) he did smal 'weather cartoons' for the papers that ran his strip Pogo. They were good advertising and the papers loved using them. There are som edoubles, but still the variety from just less than two months is staggering.

Pogo Poop Scoop

Saturday Leftover Day

I don't think I have ever seen this Pogo ad before and I do have quite a collection of Bull Crouch's books on the sunjct. Ufortunately, the microfiche representation of Gogle Archive search, where I found this, ruins the line quality. Maybe someone can find the real one?

State of the Ward

Monday Cartoon Day.

On some Auction site (I think it was the current HA auction) I found these three small cartoons by artist George Ward. He was either an very competent inker on Walt kelly's Pogo strip or at some times the ghost for the Sunday pages. Opinions differ. These certainly show the influence.

Testing...

Monday Repair Day.

This is just a test to see if I can upload from a different user on my computer.

It seems I can.

Pre-hysterical Pandemonia!

Monday Extra.

Great news for all Pogo fans! Thomas Buchanan has started a special blog to show all of the Pogo in Pandemonia sequence from 1966 I mentioned a couple of posts earlier. I found his name in the list of visitors, but if he ever decides to contact me, I will give him all my scans and help him make his blog as complete as possible. His almost complete run of this series is mostly tabloid Sundays. I have a couple of three tier Sundays, that have an extra panel, so that might be one way I can help. And I mght also supply a weekly run or two. But the honor is all his. I am just excited to see someone else is crazy enough to spend his time on this.

I have added his site's adress to my links, but here it is directly: http://pogoinpandemonia.blogspot.com/

Kellyphant

Saturday Leftover Day.

I am glad Fantagraphic has anounced the publication of a complete Pogo in color and black and white. While I think it is a shame that every reprint series starts at the begining of this strip (the main reason I never bought any of Fantagraphics' previous Pogo reprints), I will certinly be buying thi one because t is a. complete and b. has the earlest Sundays, most of which I have never seen. I do have quite a good selection of Sunday sheets and copies from Pogo Sunday pages all through the fifties, but none of the first few years, so that will be a treat. I hope and trust thye will use the three tier half page format, which has an exra panel compared to the tabloid version.

Still, when I joined Newspaperarchive, the first thing I looked for were the Pogo srips of 1966. After a couple of years of lackluster work, especially in the Sundays, Kelly revitalized the strip with a yearlong sequence about Pogo and Albert's trip to a pre-historic valley. Pogo had traveled to 'Mars' before and it always turned out to be another corner of the earth. But this time there really were dinosaures and sabre-tigers and lots of other things Kelly liked to draw. Very little of this sequence was ever reprinted, apart from an abridged version in Prehisterical Pogo, one of the most rare of the Pogo reprint books.

Over the last year I have gathered quite a few Sunday pages from this period ad I will show them here together with the missing ones in black and white from Newspaperarchive. I don't think I'll add the dailies, though. That is too much work and I think there should be a proper reprint. And hopefully it with not be the sixteenth in the Fantagraphics series.

Today I am showing you a short sequence from 1966, where you can see Walt Kelly getting back into shape. It featured a very cute elephant.


After that I am sharing two of the early Pogo's which Fantagraphics will be reprinting in their series. I hope it will be sooner rather than later.

May 30 1966:


June 1 1966:


June 2 1966:


June 3 1966:


June 4 1966:


June 5 1966:


June 6 1966:


June 7 1966:

June 8 1966:

June 9 1966:


June 10 1966:


June 11 1966:


June 12 1966:


Feb 19 1950:


Dec 16 1951: