Most all of these 1952 era tear sheets have been courtesy of David Burd, sharing the Tony Peters collection that he inherited, and I (and you, I assume) are ever grateful to David. David has recently started sharing some 1953 Sundays with us, which will let us continue the story into the classic Sam Handwich episode.
THANK YOU DAVID, for these marvelous tear sheets!
December 28, 1952
Thanks a thousand, David!
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot for organizing all this, dear Thom. Your blogs are still the best things on the Web.
Yves, your appreciation is so appreciated! I wish I had more time to dedicate to the blogs, but at least I'm busy with stuff that's fun and productive! Cheers to you!
DeleteI see Kelly continued the same Christmas carol that he quoted the previous week (and again the book leaves it out). My impression is that he always quoted this one seriously, unlike "Deck the Halls" and "12 Days" which he habitually parodied.
ReplyDeleteI think the "Non!" in the last panel here is the only bit of French in this whole sequence that survived into the book.
The book version also suffers a little from the compression of two panels into one, with different wording. Very nice to be able to see the original.
Larry, it's a lot of fun comparing these, isn't it? I like that you're dissecting it as you are. You're pointing out things that I haven't noticed as I rush to put all this together.
DeleteI do wonder about the circumstances at Simon & Schuster in those days, whether they had hand in editing or was it all in Kelly's studio with assistants.
Somehow I didn't notice this until today, but all of the gnomes have horns, not just Melonbone. But the hats and hair obscure the horns, or (often) hide them completely.
ReplyDeleteDoes this say anything about what kind of critturs they are?
Also, note that Melonbone's shirt doesn't get larger (or older and worn out) even though the Fountain of Age affects both him and his roast leg bone. Of course, from a cartoonist's point of view, the same-size shirt is a handy way of making Melonbone's growth obvious to readers.
Funny how, from a cartoonist's point of view, cartoons can do anything and be anything their creators ask of them. And likewise if these little fellers turn out to be part of a cartoon characters dream . . . well . . .
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