Dandy & Beano: Our Crazy Creatures

Cap Haggis · Post by **Cap Haggis** » 26 Aug 2007, 02:23

Yikes Andy and apart from the 40's and 70's titles I have them all -had no idea it a so many years- I feel old now

Peter Gray · Post by **Peter Gray** » 27 Aug 2007, 18:34

Its interesting that DC Thomson has had a shift of emphasis from character only to now artist and character which is a good thing...

Maybe due to the internet mentioning Beano and Dandy artist names...enough time has passed to talk about it...whatever has changed its for the better...

Its nice to see the face of the artist and info behind
Desperate Dan...Dudley
The island of monsters..Paddy B
Three bears..Leo Baxendale
Korky Charlie Griggs etc..

All the past Beano and Dandy books have hardly ever mentioned artist names..this book is the first one to do this!

Also another change (which must be due to Paul Gavetts book showing Leo Baxendales story boards original work) is seeing the original storyboards which are super to see and seeing the changes before print...

Lets hope this is the start of more original comic art and artist being seen...
The art of Paddy B book
The art of Black Bob J. Prout
The art of Dudley D Watkins
The art of Leo Baxendale
etc...etc...
you never know..........
hope Classics of the comics can put more artists name to characters as well...and maybe original art...?

Post by **AndyB** » 29 Aug 2007, 17:08

Mr Ed is best placed to answer that, but I'd say Morris Heggie would have had a hand in that, since he took over managing the DCT archives.

colcool007 · Post by **colcool007** » 29 Aug 2007, 18:22

AndyB wrote:Mr Ed is best placed to answer that, but I'd say Morris Heggie would have had a hand in that, since he took over managing the DCT archives.

Ooooh! That's a very useful bit of information to know. I wondered where Morris had moved to. Additionally, I now know who to beg to in order to get hold of information about Victor, Hotspur....

Lew Stringer · Post by **Lew Stringer** » 29 Aug 2007, 23:31

Peter Gray wrote:Its interesting that DC Thomson has had a shift of emphasis from character only to now artist and character which is a good thing...

Picked up a copy today. I agree that it's a great book! A nice selection of strips from 70 years, thoughtfully produced. The Jack Prout anecdote was quite touching. (Rumour has it DC Thomson gave him a border collie pup as a thank you for his work on Black Bob.)

Lew

Post by **AndyB** » 30 Aug 2007, 17:33

Managing may be the wrong term, but from my understanding he's trying to figure out how to make best use of them.

PaulTwist · Post by **PaulTwist** » 06 Sep 2007, 13:22

This is just ?4.99 in my local WH Smith - not sure that I'm a big enough fan to justify buying it even at that price, but I thought some of you may be interested.

steelclaw · Post by **steelclaw** » 06 Sep 2007, 14:31

Dandy & Beano: Our Crazy Creatures.
Please tell me this isn't the first,book annual like this, I'm sure I've seen something similar , in a comic shop for 50p a few months back,It was published in the 90's.

Peter Gray · Post by **Peter Gray** » 06 Sep 2007, 19:13

you may of saw these- there have been 20 books so far...

1987 Fifty golden years
1989 More from the first fifty years
1990 Great stories from the first fifty years
1991 Fifty years of annuals
1992 Famous faces from the comics
1993 Magic moments
1994 Fifty years of fun
1995 101 great stories
1996 An alphabet of fun
1997 The Comics at Christmas
1998 Around the world in sixty years
1999 Side by Side
2000 A library of laughter
2001 History of fun
2002 Funshine and laughter
2003 Favourites from the forties
2004 Focus on the Fifties
2005 A spin round the sixties
2006 A seventies selection

kevf · Post by **kevf** » 07 Sep 2007, 07:59

philcom55 wrote:
Well if it's any help I just had a look at the new Beano Annual and discovered that it contains a multi-part Billy the Cat tale in which he faces an evil version of General Jumbo!

Yeah! I wrote that! It's out now? Brilliant.

Did my writers credit stay on the art, or has it fallen off in transit?

Kashgar · Post by **Kashgar** » 08 Sep 2007, 10:59

Just picked up a copy of 'Crazy about Creatures'. As always an excellently produced now 'platinum years' publication from DCT. I always get the feeling that Thomsons take a great pride in what they've published over the years, and rightly so, and that all these 'best of' titles are a bloody marvellous way of showing off.
On looking through the present volume I've noted a few points that may be of interest to forumites.
Although he doesn't get a mention the regular artist on Big Eggo was Reg Carter but, now and again, other artists would fill in for him and one of these is featured on page 17, in the strip titled 'Big Eggo's Wartime', the artist in question being none other than Jack 'Black Bob' Prout who goes on to get a fair amount of coverage in the book in that regard.
Speaking of Jack Prout the story about the dog being given to him by the Dandy staff on his retirement is touching but sadly apocryphal. When he began his twenty year stint as the regular Black Bob artist for 'The Weekly News' etc he quickly became the butt of dog jokes around the art dept and in response in all the time he drew Black Bob if asked did he have a dog himself his reply was always that 'I wouldn't have one in the house'. When he did retire however his son presented him with the fait a complit of a border collie pup feeling that his dad's 'negative' attitude to dogs had always been a bit of bluster, and this proved to be the case as Prouty took to his new Andrew Glenn role like a shepherd to the Selkirk hills.
In the book it also states that Jack Prout was the only artist who drew Black Bob and apart from the odd strip drawn by George Ramsbottom for many years I thought this to be the case but thanks to communication with the daughter of the another Thomson staff artist George 'Dod' Anderson it appears that 'Dod' was a fantastic copyist of Jack Prout's style (and I can vouch for this) and that as much as a quarter of JP's accredited Black Bob work completed up to 1961, the time of Dod Anderson's death, was actually the work of the latter artist. More research is needed in this regard.
Lastly, in the photo of the Thomson Home Guard unit which was taken in 1940 ( Dudley Watkins left the unit to become a special constable with the Fife Constabulary in the period 1941-1945) there is another artist much featured in the 'Crazy about Creatures' book present on the photo and that is Jimmy 'Korky the Cat' Crighton who is standing at the extreme right hand end of the second row next to Dudley Watkins.

Peter Gray · Post by **Peter Gray** » 08 Sep 2007, 22:58

These Best of books could really show off Fleetway comics like Buster...Whoopee...Whizzer and Chips...Oink...Cor!!..Monster Fun...its just crying out to be done and loads of material to choose from...artist info...original art...posters...I hope this will happen!

What a shame they missed James Crighton in the home guard photo...well spotted Kashgar...they should add that in the book if it is reprinted..

Prout drawing Big Eggo was fun to know...

Also amazing that another artist drew some Black Bob...

Its funny how Prout was teased for drawing Black Bob...wonder if James C got loads of cat jokes...

being known as the artist that drew Black Bob wouldn't be laughed at today....
Black Bob and Glenn deserves a statue in honour of Prout

Post by **AndyB** » 21 Sep 2007, 20:11

I've had a look at my copy, and it's good - even with the duplicate Our Smarty Grandpa strip!

I think the artist mention is a result of lobbying and awareness of what's happening here. Mentioning creators is largely incidental, but it does reflect the interest I and others have shown in books focussing on particular artists but wouldn't attract the same interest from kids - it's added value for us.

MikeC · Post by **MikeC** » 24 Sep 2007, 22:18

I think it's great but I doubt if this website had any influence on it, AndyB. Deffo because Morris Heggie is doing the books now and he really knows his stuff - it's coincidence that it's what we're interested in.

Steve Flanagan · Post by **Steve Flanagan** » 25 Sep 2007, 20:33

These Best of books could really show off Fleetway comics like Buster...[etc]

One problem is that none of those titles is currently in print. The marketing guys would be very unhappy. Note how the DCT reprint volumes, even if they contain material from Beezer and Topper, only mention Dandy and Beano on the cover; or how Titan sent their first attempt at the cover for Albion Origins back to replace the logo with one that more closely matched Wildstorm's covers for Albion.

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