A Merry Christmas: Koko and Kola (1950).

The 'Koko & Kola' Christmas Special, published by Vin Sullivan's 'Magazine Enterprises' in 1950.

Vin Sullivan (1911-1999) was an editor for 'National Allied Publications', which was founded in 1934 and is now one of the largest and most successful comic book publishers, known as 'DC Comics'. Sullivan was the one who bought 'Superman' from it's creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. He also edited their first comics, including the famous 'Action comics' #1, which featured the very first appearance of Superman. Sullivan himself, drew the cover for the very first 'Detective Comics' , which would introduce 'Batman' in issue 27. 

After he left 'National' in 1940, he started 'Columbia Comics' with the McNaught Newspaper Syndicate. which remained active until 1988. Sullivan however left only three years to form 'Magazine Enterprises' which published, among others 'Tick Tock Tales', featuring Koko and Kola!

Tick Tock Tales' was published from January 1946 to December 1951, 33 issues appeared in total. Koko and Kola also had their own limited series of six issues, published around the same time, between the fall of 1946 and 1950 (the sixth issue was the Christmas special).

Artwork for 'Tick Tock Tales' was created by the 'Jason Art Studios', also known as the 'Leon Jason Studios'. Magazine Enterprises had a total of 74 different titles running from single issues to limited series and longer series running for at least 55 issues, like 'Straight Arrow'. Beside 'Tick Tock' and 'Koko & Kola' they also published popular comics like 'The Pixies', 'Manhunt' and several western  titles like 'Durango Kid' (with covers by Fred Guardineer). Magazine Enterprises lasted until 1958, and was Sullivan's last activity in the comic business.

The Koko & Kola's special Christmas issue reprinted a cover from 'Tick Tock Tales' #11 dated November 1946 and featured, beside the obligatory written story, three comic shorts starring Koko & Kola and one 'Tom-Tom the Jungle boy' story. Posted beneath are the three 'Koko' stories: 'The Ungrateful Gremlin', 'Salt in the Sea' and a third, untitled nine page short.

Have fun, and a Merry Christmas to you all! Ho-ho-ho! Click the pages to enlarge them!!

Mighty Mouse: Wilbur the Weakling (1951)

Okay, sorry for the delay, but you know what it's like by the end of the year!
So here are the scans for the second Mighty Mouse story from August 1951. As the previous one, they re from the St.Johns Paul Terry comics 49. Its an eight page short!

Mighty Mouse: A Clue in the sky (1951)

Created as a new character for the New York based “Terrytoons” cartoon studio by Izzy Klein, Mighty Mouse didn’t start out as a mouse, but a fly.

Terrytoons was founded in 1929 by animator Paul Terry (photo below) after he left the Fables studios, which he and his partner van Beuren had set up to produce their Aesop Fables cartoon series. Together they had produced their very first cartoon with sound in September 1928 called “Dinner Time”, a month before Disney’s “Steamboat Willy” was widely released with synchronized sound.

Of the many characters that Terrytoons created, their cartoon series featuring “Heckle & Jeckle” and “Mighty Mouse” are probably still best known today.
Terrytoons licensed their characters and turned them into comic book favorites with the help of several publishers. Timely comics, as Marvel was called in the early days, published the first four Mighty Mouse books, after which the small publishing company St. John Publications, founded by Archer St. John, took over from issue 5.

Timely's "Terrytoons" comics were produced in-house under the editorship of Vince Fago but the
St. John comics had art by actual Terrytoons animators as Jim Tyer, Conrad Rasinski and Art Bartsch.
63 issues would follow between 1947 and 1955. Later on, Dell Comics and Gold Key would continue this series. St. John Publications only existed as comic publisher for eleven years, from 1947 to 1958. After that they continued with magazines until 1967.

The scans below are from issue 49 from August 17, 1951 which originally contains the Mighty Mouse stories, “A Clue in the sky” and “Wilbur the Weakling”, with a Gandy Goose short “The Magic Touch” and a single page of the “Terry bears”. I'll post the second story later this week!

Saying thanks with Ken Hultgren.

Trying to stay in sync here with the festivities, I thought I’d post some nice classic comics from Thanksgiving Day 1948.  "Ha Ha Comics" were published from October 1943 to January 1955 by the American Comics Group, a small publisher that existed from 1943 to 1967 and carried a whole lot of comics by the famous Ken Hultgren (1915 – 1968). Ken worked for Disney from 1935, doing model sheets and layouts on “Snow White”, “Bambi” and “Sleeping Beauty”. For Western, Hultgren worked on Mickey Mouse comics and did the very first “Panchito” story, based on the character from “The Three Caballeros”, Disney’s animated feature from 1944. Being part of Sangor Studio’s, Ken created a lot of comics based on Warner’s and MGM’s cartoons. His comic stories include classics from the 1940’s such as “Robespierre and “Izzy & Dizzy”.

After Sangor closed in 1949, Hultgren reunited with Disney. First as an animator, then working on the Mickey Mouse dailies in the 1950’s. He also worked as an animator for UPA on Mr. Magoo, for Jack Kinney on “Popeye” and Filmation's “The Archie Show”. Being a master at drawing (funny) animals, Hultgren published his how-to book “The Art of Animal Drawing” in 1951. "Ha Ha Comics" #60 was published at the end of 1948 and contained seven comic stories of which I’m posting four, including a “Lizzy and Dizzy” story and the very funny “Doc E.Z. Duzzit.” Have a great weekend! Click to enlarge the pages!