BUSTER COVERS BY LEO BAXENDALE

The Spanish artist Angel Nadal was responsible for the vast majority of BUSTER covers in the period from 1962 till 1974. The few exceptions included six episodes of Buster's Diary by Leo Baxendale in 1967 (the issues cover-dated 6th May, 15th July, 5th Aug, 26th Aug, 23rd Sept and 21st Oct).

My speculation is that the Editor wanted to have insurance in case Nadal’s artwork didn’t arrive on time in the post from Barcelona, so he asked Leo Baxendale to draw some and kept them “in reserve”. Here are some of the covers. I prefer Nadal’s version of Buster’s Diary. 

BLACK LOGO BEANOS FROM 1954

For a 7-issue stretch, Nos. 631 – 637 inclusive, in 1954 the Beano came with a black title logo. I’ve got no idea what prompted DC Thomson to carry out this brief experiment but the seven issues seem to have some extra appeal to collectors and are more difficult to come by. I have recently received the last missing issue of my “black-title-logo-run” and can now show the complete gallery of the covers. Whatever the colour of the logo, Dudley D. Watkins’ artwork is always nice to see: 

All Images 2015 © DC Thomson, Ltd.  All rights reserved.

MORE NAUTICAL FUN BY JOE COLQUHOUN

Two posts ago I mentioned that Joe Colquhoun’s Cap’n Codsmouth appeared in three JAG Annuals. Below is the second episode from the 1972 edition published for the Christmas of 1973.  Captain and his men go into business of selling “build-it-yourself” model kits of the “Scuttlebutt”!

NAUTICAL HILARITY FROM THE HAND OF JOE COLQUHOUN

Joe Colquhoun is best known as illustrator of Charlie’s War and Roy of the Rovers. The artist has received quite a bit of attention on Kazoop!, in particular in the series of articles covering Kid Chameleon – an adventure story presented in full colour in COR!! comic. You can refresh your memory of this beautiful strip by clicking here.

Joe Colquhoun is also one of my favourite British humour artists in comics. His weekly episodes of The Goodies that appeared in COR!! weeklies throughout 1973 are a treat to the eye; I covered the strip in a dedicated post in my COR!! series a few years ago, you can revisit the article by clicking here. A few more humorous one-offs can be found by typing the name of Joe Colquhoun in the search box of this blog.

Today’s post is dedicated to Cap’n Codsmouth – yet another comedy strip from the hand of the master. It belongs to the category of nautical humour featuring an inept skipper and his clueless crew. Few people remember the feature, probably because it only enjoyed a brief 5-month run in the short-lived JAG comic in 1968/1969, and only the first of the two serialised stories was illustrated by Mr. Colquhoun (The Calcutta Voyage, May 4th – July 20th, 1968). Here is the opening episode of the story from the first issue of the tabloid-size comic:

Mr. Colquhoun’s Cap’n Codsmouth made a comeback in the early seventies and featured in JAG Annuals 1971 – 1973 (probably also in JAG Football Special 1968 but I don’t have a copy to check). Curiously, the Annuals contain an impressive amount of Joe Colquhoun’s art – both original strips and reprints, so I strongly recommend them for JC’s fans. Below is the complete story from JAG Annual 1971. I plan to show the other two in my later posts. Enjoy! 

All Images 2015 © Egmont UK Ltd.  All rights reserved. Used with permission.