Comments on: Sam’s Strip Is Coming; Golden Age of Comic Strip Reprints?

By: Ron Goulart

Ron Goulart — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 21:59:40 +0000

Folks: I always enjoy a plug, but you’ve got me mixed up with Bill Blackbeard. My history of comic strips is called THE FUNNIES. It does have a couple of pages about Jerry Dumas and SAM’S STRIP and, if you can believe this, is even better written than Bill’s book. And cheaper. Best, Ron Goulart

By: Torsten Adair

Torsten Adair — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 12:17:34 +0000

I first discovered Sam’s Strip via an old issue of MAD Magazine. Then I think Mort Walker may have printed a strip in his “Backstage” book. This has been one of those I’ve been waiting for, partly for the comics references, partly because of the great talent.

I’ve explicitly asked Gary Groth about my other dream collections. Barnaby is in limbo, as the Johnson Estate is hoping for a big media license. Dr. Seuss’ Hejji, a brief Sunday strip, would be nice to see (almost all of his other work has been printed). Gordo, although not economically feasible, at least deserves a Sunday collection from the 1960s onward. Have the Star Trek: The Motion Picture strips been collected? Asterix? (I was fortunate as a child. I spent my summers in Iowa, and the neighbor got the daily and Sunday Des Moines Register, and the Sunday Sioux City paper. The Register has one of the best single comics pages in the country, and the Sioux City paper carried weird, little seen small market strips like the Born Loser and Eeek and Meek.)

If you ever find yourself in a university library, grab a mircofilm roll of the local daily paper and just browse the comicstrip pages. If you’re near Missouri, peruse the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

If you can find a copy, Kitchen Sink published a handsome 2-volume set titled “The Comic Strip Century” by Ron Goulart. This was condensed into a book called “100 Years of Comic Strips”. The 2-volume set is beautiful and oversized, but is lacking in the more recent history (1970s-1990s).

By: Bill D.

Bill D. — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:31:39 +0000

Now if we could only get Crockett Johnson’s Barnaby back in print.

By: JennyN

JennyN — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 11:50:32 +0000

Thanks for the link, Joanna – the column’s a great summary of the current state of reprint publishing. Very happy too to see that KC mentioned Classic Comics Press’s editions of MARY PERKINS ON STAGE and the forthcoming HEART OF JULIET JONES. These and similar “women’s interest” strips strike me as being the nearest thing to a real American equivalent of shoujo manga, far more so than most of the female-superhero comics were (honourable exceptions for things like the the early NEW TEEN TITANS). And the art is just *fantastic*. – JennyN (who is also a Milton Caniff fan – go figure).