As part of my trip to the US I stayed a couple of days in Columbus, Ohio to visit the Billy Ireland Cartoon center, which has one or the largest collections of donated art by people from the cartoon and comic strip community, as well as the complete newspaper archives of the Francisco collection from Bill Blackbeard. They also had a huge collection of stuff that must have come from artist David Gantz himself, because it not only contained samples and clippings from his two most famous newspaper strips, Dudley D. (follow the link for samples) and Don Q. (which I have never been able to get hold of, so I haven't shown it yet). There were also a lot publicity materials from a strip I always believed had remained unsold, Moxy. Early versions of this charming strip about a Mouse and a Lion (equally inspired by Aesop's Fables and Pogo) had appeared in the short run Family comics, a mock Sunday newspaper which was produced by Zek Zekely for Californian grocery stores (again, follow the link for a complete sample). After that he tried to sell it to a syndicate and when that worked, they tried to sell it to newspapers. In the files at the Ohio State University was a whole sheet of newspaper ads, with actual papers named. So either it was sold and disappeared quickly or it was retracted just before the actual start because of insufficient papers joining in. Anyway, I plan to do larger article about those, but I though this would be a a great opportunity to show you two pieces of original promotion art made for this strip by Davind Gantz as well as a promotional one-sheet. The latter one was also in the Ohio collection, but I got these from various Internet sources. Also included in the library was a complete daily story in black and white proof, which I hope will one day be available.
Showing posts with label Dudley D.. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dudley D.. Show all posts
Sunday, September 03, 2017
Moxey M.
Saturday Leftover Day.
As part of my trip to the US I stayed a couple of days in Columbus, Ohio to visit the Billy Ireland Cartoon center, which has one or the largest collections of donated art by people from the cartoon and comic strip community, as well as the complete newspaper archives of the Francisco collection from Bill Blackbeard. They also had a huge collection of stuff that must have come from artist David Gantz himself, because it not only contained samples and clippings from his two most famous newspaper strips, Dudley D. (follow the link for samples) and Don Q. (which I have never been able to get hold of, so I haven't shown it yet). There were also a lot publicity materials from a strip I always believed had remained unsold, Moxy. Early versions of this charming strip about a Mouse and a Lion (equally inspired by Aesop's Fables and Pogo) had appeared in the short run Family comics, a mock Sunday newspaper which was produced by Zek Zekely for Californian grocery stores (again, follow the link for a complete sample). After that he tried to sell it to a syndicate and when that worked, they tried to sell it to newspapers. In the files at the Ohio State University was a whole sheet of newspaper ads, with actual papers named. So either it was sold and disappeared quickly or it was retracted just before the actual start because of insufficient papers joining in. Anyway, I plan to do larger article about those, but I though this would be a a great opportunity to show you two pieces of original promotion art made for this strip by Davind Gantz as well as a promotional one-sheet. The latter one was also in the Ohio collection, but I got these from various Internet sources. Also included in the library was a complete daily story in black and white proof, which I hope will one day be available.
As part of my trip to the US I stayed a couple of days in Columbus, Ohio to visit the Billy Ireland Cartoon center, which has one or the largest collections of donated art by people from the cartoon and comic strip community, as well as the complete newspaper archives of the Francisco collection from Bill Blackbeard. They also had a huge collection of stuff that must have come from artist David Gantz himself, because it not only contained samples and clippings from his two most famous newspaper strips, Dudley D. (follow the link for samples) and Don Q. (which I have never been able to get hold of, so I haven't shown it yet). There were also a lot publicity materials from a strip I always believed had remained unsold, Moxy. Early versions of this charming strip about a Mouse and a Lion (equally inspired by Aesop's Fables and Pogo) had appeared in the short run Family comics, a mock Sunday newspaper which was produced by Zek Zekely for Californian grocery stores (again, follow the link for a complete sample). After that he tried to sell it to a syndicate and when that worked, they tried to sell it to newspapers. In the files at the Ohio State University was a whole sheet of newspaper ads, with actual papers named. So either it was sold and disappeared quickly or it was retracted just before the actual start because of insufficient papers joining in. Anyway, I plan to do larger article about those, but I though this would be a a great opportunity to show you two pieces of original promotion art made for this strip by Davind Gantz as well as a promotional one-sheet. The latter one was also in the Ohio collection, but I got these from various Internet sources. Also included in the library was a complete daily story in black and white proof, which I hope will one day be available.
Tuesday, December 04, 2012
Dave Davely
Tuesday Comic Strip Day.
David Gantz was a classmate of Al Jaffee in the forties. For a long time he worked in comics. He even joined up with a guy called Brown to do realistic work, but nothing really stuck. In 1959 Al Jaffee got a newspaper strip Tall Tales) at the Herald Tribune Syndicate. At that point, Gantz was also trying to sell comic strip ideas. One of them was called Moxy and was a reworking of a Pogo-like strip he had done for Zek Zekeley's Family Comics, a line of 'Sunday' comics done especially as give-aways for a chain of grocery stores in California. When he failed to sell Moxy, he tried again with a more bland subject, the story of a man and his dog. The dog was called Dudley D., which I take it stands for Dudley Dog. Zek Zekeley (who himself had done a newspaper strip called Dud Dudley) must have been an inlfuence on the name. The dog could not talk, but we did see his very human thoughts. Th strip ran from 1961 to 1964 before it fizzled out, like many Herald Tribune strips before it. Maybe the blandness of the strip itself was to blame, but the Herald Tribune Syndicate had a very poor record of selling it's strips and a couple of years later a very similar strip, drawn in a similar style about a Basset Hound and his boss, called Fred Basset became a world wide succes which is still running to this day. Fred Basset was created by the Scottish cartoonist Alex Graham in 1963, although I am in no way mplying he might have seen Dudley D. I am just wondering why that strip took off and this one didn't.
I have shown other samples of this strip before, both in color and black and white. The balck and white Sunday from december 196 is from a short period when the color engravers on the Herald Tribune were on strike. All of the other strips mentioned have been shown as well. Except for Fred Basset, which you'll have to find on your own.
Tuesday Comic Strip Day.
David Gantz was a classmate of Al Jaffee in the forties. For a long time he worked in comics. He even joined up with a guy called Brown to do realistic work, but nothing really stuck. In 1959 Al Jaffee got a newspaper strip Tall Tales) at the Herald Tribune Syndicate. At that point, Gantz was also trying to sell comic strip ideas. One of them was called Moxy and was a reworking of a Pogo-like strip he had done for Zek Zekeley's Family Comics, a line of 'Sunday' comics done especially as give-aways for a chain of grocery stores in California. When he failed to sell Moxy, he tried again with a more bland subject, the story of a man and his dog. The dog was called Dudley D., which I take it stands for Dudley Dog. Zek Zekeley (who himself had done a newspaper strip called Dud Dudley) must have been an inlfuence on the name. The dog could not talk, but we did see his very human thoughts. Th strip ran from 1961 to 1964 before it fizzled out, like many Herald Tribune strips before it. Maybe the blandness of the strip itself was to blame, but the Herald Tribune Syndicate had a very poor record of selling it's strips and a couple of years later a very similar strip, drawn in a similar style about a Basset Hound and his boss, called Fred Basset became a world wide succes which is still running to this day. Fred Basset was created by the Scottish cartoonist Alex Graham in 1963, although I am in no way mplying he might have seen Dudley D. I am just wondering why that strip took off and this one didn't.
I have shown other samples of this strip before, both in color and black and white. The balck and white Sunday from december 196 is from a short period when the color engravers on the Herald Tribune were on strike. All of the other strips mentioned have been shown as well. Except for Fred Basset, which you'll have to find on your own.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Waiting for D.
Tuesday Comic Strip Day.
I thought I had some more color images of David Gantz' Dudley D. They will have to wait until another time. Here are more of the dalies of this gentle, but well drawn strip.
Jan 3 1962:
Jan 5 1962:
Jan 7 1962:
Jan 8 1962:
Jan 9 1962:
Jan 10 1962:
Jan 11 1962:
Jan 12 1962:
Jan 13 1962:
Jan 14 1962:
May 15 1962:
Jan 1 1963:
Jan 3 1963:
Jan 4 1963:
Jan 5 1963:
Jan 08 1963:
Jan 8 1963:
Jan 9 1963:
Jan 10 1963:
Jan 11 1963:
Jan 30 1963:
Jan 8 1964:
Tuesday Comic Strip Day.
I thought I had some more color images of David Gantz' Dudley D. They will have to wait until another time. Here are more of the dalies of this gentle, but well drawn strip.
Jan 3 1962:
Jan 5 1962:
Jan 7 1962:
Jan 8 1962:
Jan 9 1962:
Jan 10 1962:
Jan 11 1962:
Jan 12 1962:
Jan 13 1962:
Jan 14 1962:
May 15 1962:
Jan 1 1963:
Jan 3 1963:
Jan 4 1963:
Jan 5 1963:
Jan 08 1963:
Jan 8 1963:
Jan 9 1963:
Jan 10 1963:
Jan 11 1963:
Jan 30 1963:
Jan 8 1964:
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
This dude is no dud
Tuesday Comic Strip Day.
If you come here for the odd and the forgotten, today's a good day. Dudley D. is a forgotten strip by New York artist David Gantz. Gantz is know among comic book fans for his inking work on horror stories drawn by Ben Brown. The team of Brown and Gantz worked for several companies and not always the most highbrow ones. Before that he had worked at Martin Goodman's variously named series of Atlas companies, drawing kids books. Around that time he worked with Al Jaffee, who remained a life long friend. In the seventies he got attention for his satirical newspaper strip Don Q., wherein a Don Quichote type guy took on veiled caricatures of then current politicians. A remarkable strip, which unfortunately didn't run too long.
I don't know most of what he did in between (although I hope one day to find out), but in the early fifties he briefly did another newspaper strip, about a little guy and his dog. Never a very clever or remarkable strip, it was similar to Fred Basset by Alex Graham (which coincidentally started in 1963). It was syndicated by the same syndicate that handled Al Jaffee's Tall Tales and appeared in the same paper from which I got my color Tall Tales samples.
Dudley D. ran until April 3 and I have added the first few as well as the last few strips. I have also added a couple of Don Q. strips from 1975, which I enjoy a lot more. But both the dailies and the Sunday pages of Dudley D. have a cartoony charm, that sums up all that I like best about this period of newspaper art.
Tuesday Comic Strip Day.
If you come here for the odd and the forgotten, today's a good day. Dudley D. is a forgotten strip by New York artist David Gantz. Gantz is know among comic book fans for his inking work on horror stories drawn by Ben Brown. The team of Brown and Gantz worked for several companies and not always the most highbrow ones. Before that he had worked at Martin Goodman's variously named series of Atlas companies, drawing kids books. Around that time he worked with Al Jaffee, who remained a life long friend. In the seventies he got attention for his satirical newspaper strip Don Q., wherein a Don Quichote type guy took on veiled caricatures of then current politicians. A remarkable strip, which unfortunately didn't run too long.
I don't know most of what he did in between (although I hope one day to find out), but in the early fifties he briefly did another newspaper strip, about a little guy and his dog. Never a very clever or remarkable strip, it was similar to Fred Basset by Alex Graham (which coincidentally started in 1963). It was syndicated by the same syndicate that handled Al Jaffee's Tall Tales and appeared in the same paper from which I got my color Tall Tales samples.
Dudley D. ran until April 3 and I have added the first few as well as the last few strips. I have also added a couple of Don Q. strips from 1975, which I enjoy a lot more. But both the dailies and the Sunday pages of Dudley D. have a cartoony charm, that sums up all that I like best about this period of newspaper art.
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