1979 COR!! COMIC ANNUAL

1979 COR!! Comic Annual. £1.10, 144 pages,

Here is a summary of the contents:  Jack Pott’s Jackpot game, Football Madd (1 new episode by Les Barton + 2 reprints from old COR!! weeklies), Helpful Hettie, Nightmare (new episode by Les Barton), Tomboy (3 episodes), Fiends and Neighbours (2 new episodes by Les Barton, both signed + 1 reprint from an old COR!! weekly), Tease Break feature (2 instalments), Ivor Lott and Tony Broke (6 reprints and 1 new episode), Teacher’s Pet (2 episodes), Jack Pott (2 episodes), Benny Bendo! (2 episodes), The Slimms (2 episodes + The Slimms Weight For it Game), The Gasworks Gang (4 reprints), Jelly Baby (2 episodes), Hire A Horror (5 reprints and 1 new episode), Whacky (5 episodes), Spotter, Jasper the Grasper (two original episodes, one by Les Barton and one by John Geering), Donovan’s Dad, Swopper Stan, Tricky Dicky (2 episodes), Football Quiz (by Les Barton), Wilfred the World’s Worst Wizard, Football Funnies (by Les Barton), Xmas Word puzzle, Val’s Vanishing Cream (2 episodes), Chalky, Patch-Eye Hooker, Mike’s Magic Mould, Gus Gorilla (3 episodes), "The Stairs” … A Silly Story, The Way-Out West jokes (by Jack Clayton), Willy Worry (2 episodes).

The annual was the first one that had no ‘proper’ colour pages but was probably still advertised as a full-colour book because all of its pages were presented in three-colours (save for a few pages that had no white or no black).

Two episodes of Tomboy were signed by Jim Watson:

The annual contained two new Jasper the Grasper stories: a two-pager by Les Barton (shown below in its entirety) and a 6-pager by John Geering (illustrated below with one panel):

The one-off The Stairs... A Silly Story, doesn't really qualify as a comic strip and is poorly drawn but here it is anyway:

 Jack Clayton contributed two nice pages of Wild West jokes:

What I like best about this annual is that it has as many as two original episodes of Fiends and Neighbours by Les Barton whose style suits the strip very well indeed. The level of detail suggests that the artist enjoyed drawing it. Editors must have liked Mr. Barton’s version because the two sets were the first out of many episodes of Fiends and Neighbours illustrated by Les Barton in subsequent COR!! holiday specials and annuals. Here is one of the two stories from the annual: