Here is part three of the article by
John Wigmans, a guest-writer on this blog, where he covers the genesis of Gulliver Guinea Pig. Check out the
previous posts if you missed the first and second part.
The First Steps of an Unlikely but Very
Likeable Hero: Gulliver Guinea-Pig (Part 3)
by John Wigmans
by John Wigmans
In
February, 2018 I wrote this about what I then considered to be the first steps
of our brave little hero, Gulliver Guinea-Pig: "As it turns out, Gulliver
didn’t start his travels in Playhour dated 24 May 1958 (No. 189). As far
as I now know, his real debut was in Tiny Tots dated 17 May 1958 (No.
1298), as part of The New Nursery Rhymes." Luckily I kept my options open
as I continued the post: "Unless other information surfaces, Gulliver made
his first steps in [...] Tiny Tots dated 17 May 1958, No. 1298."
Well, other and more exact information did surface. High time to share
these hitherto unknown details.
In September, 2018 I did some
additional research in the bound volumes of Tiny Tots which are held by
the British Library in London. In this often neglected comic I found, to my
surprise, four delightful stories starring Gulliver, three of which I had not
seen before (well, two actually: see the list below). All were published as
centre-spreads in 'The New Nursery Rhymes’ series, three in May and the last
one in July, 1958. The instalment I had assumed was the first-ever appearance
of Gulliver (#1298), was in fact the second. By the way: buying the comic with
this episode on eBay in November, 2017 led me to write about the first steps
of our unlikely but very likeable hero.
To cut a long story short, here is a
list of the numbers, titles of the stories and cover dates of the four issues
of Tiny Tots featuring Gulliver Guinea-Pig:
#1296, GGP gathers his cherries;
dated 3 May 1958:
#1298, GGP is shipwrecked; dated 17 May 1958 (presented on this blog, 15February, 2018)
#1300, GGP in China; dated 31 May
1958
#1305, GGP under the sea; dated 5 July 1958 (reprinted in Harold Hare
comic, 4 April, 1964, and presented on this blog, 25 February,2018)
A revision of my earlier statement
is now in order: As it turns out, Gulliver didn’t start his travels in Playhour
dated 24 May 1958 (No. 189). His real debut was in Tiny Tots dated 3 May
1958 (No. 1296), as part of ‘The New Nursery Rhymes’. This official debut
predates his adventures in Playhour by three weeks. But it still remains
a mystery to me why Gulliver started his life in Tiny Tots. Was the fate
of this comic already sealed in May, 1958? And were the travels of the
guinea-pig used to entice young readers (and their parents) to switch over to Playhour,
some eight months before the actual demise of Tiny Tots? Perhaps one of
the readers of this blog can shed some light on this matter.
Now
Irmantas can hopefully start working on a string of blogposts covering the entire run of
the strip in Playhour, as he recently let me know. I can only hope
he'll start this string with the adventures of our ‘roving world-traveller’ as
published in Tiny Tots 1958 and the Tiny Tots Annual for
1959.
Click on the POWER PACK banner in the right-hand column and get your
copy of the POWER PACK OF KEN REID -
the deluxe two-volume set of Ken’s strips in WHAM!, SMASH! and POW! comics of
the ‘60s.
Hi Irmantas,
ReplyDeleteDid you notice that all instalments were signed by the artist? The fourth episode, GGP under the sea, was reprinted in 'Harold Hare' comic without Mendoza's signature in the last panel, but with some extra artwork (by some unknown artist?).
Thanks for posting the third and last part of my article.
John
so special this strip...even in one colour version...sublime..
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for these wonderful articles. I have very fond memories of reading about Gulliver and would love to see a collection.
ReplyDeleteA Gulliver Guinea Pig book was one of my first books as a very small child. I loved it and still have it! It was about Gulliver going to the mountains to see his friends and curing a "roaring granny" of her cold. The pictures were very well drawn and very attractive Thank you for this reminder, which caused me to raid my library to find my old copy. Alas without its dust jacket any more.
ReplyDeleteNow I believe Gulliver predated 1958 slightly as I was born 1953, and he was my first favourite comic character. My memory takes him to about 1956 or 1957.
ReplyDeleteWe kept Guinea pigs in London, not to eat, and the first male was called Gulliver and 'we' bought him a mate called Snowdrop. Sex was a major thing for GPs and when presented with Snowdrop , Gulliver spent the first half hour doing cartwheels around his pen. Within no time at all we had a tribe of guinea pigs. Now we moved to Devon in Early 1959, with guinea pigs and even more rabbits acquired at the same time. So, I think 1957 as more 'realistic.'
The stories ran for 7 years, I wonder if they finished in Peru.?????
Jeff
Hi Jeff,
ReplyDeleteInteresting recollections. Thanks for sharing your memories and thoughts.
But I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you. As part of my research on David Roberts and Basil Reynolds, I visited the British Library several times. I worked my way through a multitude of bound volumes from the 1950’s of comics like Playhour, Jack and Jill, Chicks’ Own, Tiny Tots, Express Weekly, Top Spot, and the list goes on. The earliest appearance of Gulliver I was able to find is in Tiny Tots No 1296, dated 3 May 1958. There were four installments in Tiny Tots and after a few weeks, Gulliver was transferred to Playhour, in glorious full colour. I have yet to find earlier publications of the adventures of Gulliver than the ones presented on this blog. So, unless other evidence comes to light, I really think that the guinea-pig you named Gulliver became part of the family no sooner than May 1958.
Now there was another character in Tiny Tots called Little Snowdrop as early as January 1957 – or even before that in 1956. This young girl and her brother Jim were orphans, and they had all kinds of weekly adventures. In October 1957 Snowdrop and Jim replaced ‘Uncle Jack’, who wrote the weekly Letter to the readers (Uncle Jack’s Corner). From 5 October 1957 until the demise of the comic in February 1959, the orphaned siblings not only had their adventures each week but they wrote the weekly Letter to You from Snowdrop and Jim. Readers could write to Sweetshop Corner, the Fleetway House, London. Perhaps Snowdrop from Tiny Tots inspired your family to call the female guinea-pig after her?
@Irmantas: can you answer Jeff’s question re the end of Gulliver’s adventures? Did he finish in Peru?
Best wishes,
John
In the last episode Gulliver took a boat, sailed from the British coast and reached Guinea-Pig Land where he was reunited with his Mummy.
ReplyDelete