Cracking Partch

Friday Very Important Day. Between 1944 and 1948 Virgil Partch (VIP) was one of the regular contributors to the Crackups daily cartoon series that ran in the liberal New York PM newspaper. He filled the Sunday slot in PM (which was actually their 'weekend' paper which combined Saturdays and Sundays). Other papers also ran it, which is great because the micro-fiche availabillity of PM is not very good and what there is is often scratched as well. This year I ran into a source that actuaally ad most of the Crackups run and I proceeded to try and find all the VIP cartoons. Here is everything I have from 1944. I still have to see if there were more in PM before the Chicago Sun started running them, but by this count Partch did 20 in the second half of that year. Some are missing, but they were missing for the paper as well.

 

Does A Bear Type In The Woods?

Sunday I've Got More Day.

It will be no surprise to regulars of this blog that I have a thing for Virgil Partch (VIP). I particulary like his earlier style and it was never more on dsplay than in the illustrations he did for Arthur "Bugs" Bear's column in King Features' Pictorial Review (a sort of illustrated column magazine section for newspapers). I have shown more of these before (some of them even from my own scans). These are fom an online source, but they are quite large, so I can blow them up and read the text as well. I am not quite sure if you can. I expect that Blogger will be downsizing them. If anything is due for a reprint of these, although I am not quite sure how much of the text should be reproduced. Maybe it could be edited so the illustrations still make sense.

Adding To The Fun

Monday Cartoon day.

Just as comic strip as were a staple of Sunday newspapers in the forties nd fifties, cartoon ads were very frequently used in magazines. Often using the same artists that were doing the cartoons in that same magazine. Of course Virgil Partch was a favorite, adding a sense of absrudity to the ofen dull ads. Sam Cobean ,a great cartoonist who dies too young in the early fifties, was used a lot as well.

Starting Up Is Hard To Do

Thursday Confession Day.

Many times I tried to get the blog going again. After many months of intensive scanning for a new book I am doing here in Holland (and some other distractions) I finally have time again to clean up my many scans for this blog. But knowing that the pressure will be on as soon as I start up again, I keep putting it off.

So I have decided to start doing this weekly first. Lower the pressure. The posts will be phenomenal. Without the daily grind I have been able to collect the rarest and most impressive of my scans. Starting next Saturday you will be seeing new posts every week. I hope you will come by and enjoy.

For today, I have an oddity. A promotional piece by Milt Caniff for the Newspaper industry I have never seen before. I did see two similar pieces from the same period, by Virgil Partch and Mell Lazerus. I don't know if this was a paid promotion, or if some cartoonists got togetehr and decided to do this. But it sure is well done. I wonder if there are more.