Saturday Solutions - 81 Years Later

It probably helps if i actually post the solution after prepping it, eh?

Friday Fun & Games - ID'37

Currently cut off from our archives and primary tools, we're going very simple for today's edition of

Let's jump back 81 years for a 4th Of July puzzle page from the Oakland Tribune:

Don't worry, the 11 July edition is on-hand for the answers in tomorrow's Saturday Solutions.

puzzle from Oakland Tribune (1937)

yeah, i know i'm not supposed to tell today, but it was kind of why we're here, so...

Covering Brundage

Continuing from last night's post, the complete Weird Tales covers of Margaret Brundage in chronological order -

1936

1937

1938

1940

1941

1942

1943

1944

1945

We've got a bonus post following this evening featuring some of the paintings from these covers without all the wordage for better enjoyment of Margaret's fine artwork.
Stop on by if you're interested.

covers by Margaret Brundage for the indicated issues of Weird Tales (1936-1945)

Saturday Immortals

This week's Friday Fun & Games quiz comes from the pages of Look magazine in August of 1937 - their first year of publishing. Life magazine started just a handful of months before them, at the end of 1936. Those hugely influential magazines were both born in the dawn of the comic book age. What else was born in that time of creation?

Just wondering.

Anyway, there are plans afoot to go digging through some of those mags from early in the last century - and the one before that - in upcoming entries. After all - just look at how Odd that mix of images is for this cover.

But now - here's their first annual most popular celebrities list for the solution to yesterday's quiz, with the extra fun of listing how much each was earning 80 years ago. (Yeah, as we can see on #3 - some things seemingly never change):

pages from Look v.1 #12 (3 August 1937)

Friday Fun & Games 014 - An Immortality Survey

Once again, Friday arrives and to justify wimping out on Friday Night Fights each week, it's time for

It's pretty much a given that we'll never have the kind of immortal stars like Marilyn Monroe again. Back around the turn of the century, Hollywood ensured it by making it illegal to make our celebrities icons. Think of all those classic images, like the Andy Warhol prints of Marilyn. Now us artists have to pay them up front if we want to do something like that. That means the vast majority of such celebrity worship and public adulation in the arts will die unborn. The biggest celebrities today will likely be remembered in another generation only as a source of embarrassing names, and after that - not at all except by media historians.

Well - that's not much fun, nor is it a game of any sort, huh?
All right. Let's jump back 80 years, to 1937. How many of the Top 20 Most Popular Stars could you recognize today?
Shall we see?

No - don't be thinking Ethel Merman for #9 just because of the water.

Hey - here's an odd little tidbit: When i talk about heading down the hill into town for my various supply runs and medical visits, it's #19's hometown to which i travel.
(And, No. I didn't choose this collection just because 3 was too big to be contained in one person)

Tune in tomorrow for the answers (or - i suspect - peek at the comments later for at least 3/4 of them)
Same ODD Time!
Same ODD Blog!

I know it's the wrong voice, but i still hear Gary Owens reading that.
It's kinda disturbing...

NOT The 3 Brothers...

Let's jump way back 80 years ago to 1937, back when Will Eisner was still calling himself William. In the dawning days of the comic book when they were still trying to figure out what to call these new critters, we find Eisner working on Funny Picture Stories.

Eisner gets top billing on the table of contents, even in those early days:

I love some of those other titles - Rocky Baird (Adventurer and World Tramp), The Swamp Rat, Battling Beau Brummel, Camera Of Crime....  7-11 Gang? Huh?
What the frell is that? 7-11 was still known as Tote'm Stores for another 9 years after this was published. So what's the 7-11 reference? Hmm...  we'll have to come back to that. But first - you know i can't pass up a good 3, so...

You may have noticed that Eisner was also credited for Silver Speed in the TOC. That's not a story, just a two page spread:

They had hockey outside of Canada 80 years ago? Hnh.

Meanwhile, back at The 7-11 Gang...
I went back and read it. The name is referenced 3 times:

That's all we get for an explanation of the name. So, either someone (Tony Basso? The editor?) just thought it sounded good, or they were an ongoing feature whose name was explained previously, or there's a forgotten cultural reference eluding me here.
Hmm....

The Brothers 3 by Will(iam) Eisner for Funny Picture Stories #4 (1937)