I’m back home after a brief but productive visit in the UK to meet with
my mate with whom we are working on an exciting UK comics-related project that we
will reveal in due course.
In the meantime, I’d like to share some interesting information
which has recently come to my attention.
Those of you who follow Compal Comics online auctions and
like Ken Reid might recall the bust of Frankie Stein that they offered a few
years ago. Here is how they described the item: Frankie Stein Monster Award by Ken Reid for WHAM! (1960s). A one-off
bust made by Ken Reid for a WHAM! readers competition that apparently did not
take place. Entitled 'Frankie's Monster Award' the bust is made from resin and
was modelled and painted by Ken with his brother's help. It measures
approximately 4 x 4 x 2 ins deep. It is unique.
Someone ended up paying £275 for it but would have
probably thought twice before bidding, had they known then what I know now. The
truth is that the auctioneer had almost everything wrong in the description! The
award was in fact offered in Whoopee! in the early 1980s. Here is the cover of
the issue and the page announcing the competition:
The first prize-winners were announced and their
contributions printed in the issue of May 1st, 1982:
The competition continued for 22 weeks and ended in the
issue of Sept 25th, 1982:
You can do your maths and see that at least 70-100 of Frankie's Monster Awards were handed out to the lucky winners so the gift may be rare
but it is certainly not unique.
The auctioneer wasn’t completely wrong when he said it
was made by Reid, only it wasn’t Ken Reid. The busts were in fact modeled and
cast by Ken’s son Antony and his wife who made some 300 pieces of the
award and shipped them to IPC. Unfortunately, the items were fragile and Antony
didn’t pack them well enough so quite a few lost their bolts and other bits en
route from Manchester to London. Antony still has a few of those left in his
basement, here is an image of a coloured sample:
… and a “raw” one:
… and here’s an old photo of a squad of Frankies
before it (the squad, not the photo) was off to London:
It is a nice item and I like the fact that it was
modeled after Ken Reid’s original diabolical FS of the 60s rather its cuddly reincarnation
of the late 70s/early 80s by Robert Nixon, but if you see another one on sale, don’t
be misled by claims that it is a unique piece crafted by Ken Reid :)
