Rockin' With Ed

Well, i didn't think we'd be getting back to Ed Wheelan for a bit. And when we did, i thought we'd be going to the Circus. But... nope. When i sat down this morning to do a post, the brain went cave crawling.

So - let's take a gander at Rockhead McWizzard - The Stone Age Genius. You didn't think it was only boy genius/inventors that appealed to me, did you?

Rockhead wasn't around for very long - fewer that a dozen and a half adventures. He premiered in Flash Comics cover dated June 1946, with an almost simultaneous second appearance in Green Lantern's June/July issue. Aside from that GL, he also appeared in one issue of Wonder Woman, one issue of All-Flash Comics, and two issues of All-Star Comics. Beyond that, he had stories in about a dozen issues of Flash, appearing throughout 1946, then irregularly for a few more tales, always three pages short. (It seems wrong to use the word 'long' with only 3 pages)

Here are his first half dozen appearances from Flash Comics -

Rockhead McWizzard, ladies and gentlemen - the inventor of the Hot Bath!

page art by Ed Wheelan from Flash Comics #s 71-76 (1946)

Before They Were Fractured

As we watch what happens when Fake President meets Real Crisis and wonder how much better things might play out if we had an adult in charge, let us contemplate these Words To Live By -

"They're not as important as saving the world from COVID-19 and POTUS-45 but I can actually do something constructive about them." -M.E.

(M.E. is ALWAYS Mark Evanier)

Focus on your world close at hand and you can make good use of our current Down Time, and maybe even avoid driving yourself a fraction as crazy as our fake president.

(BTW - for those who are confused as to what Obamagate is since fake president cannot explain it when asked - it's daring to be tolerably competent and make plainly obvious what a complete and useless fuck-up our current 'leader' has proven to be.)

So, let's turn away from the ongoing effort to ignore and wish away the trump flu while hiding the death toll his incompetence has caused*, and instead lose ourselves in some more friendly twisted fantasies. 

Today's offerings come to us from the man who brought us "Comics" McCormick and the Minute Movies - Mr. Ed Wheelan. Here are a half dozen of his Foney Fairy Tales for you to enjoy -

I hope that helped.

page art by Ed Wheelan from Comic Calvacade #s 15 & 20, Green Lantern #34, Sensation Comics #62, and Wonder Woman #s 19 & 21 (1946, 1947, 1948)

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*(It is VERY worth remembering that Fake President is currently pushing for punishing those who mishandled the Trump Flu crisis (see China by his words) and prosecuting former Presidents for perceived crimes.
After all this is over, those are two things we should very strongly consider, according to his own words. Make America Great Again - Prosecute Rich Criminals)

Thirsty ADventures

Last time we looked at some ADventures, it was for "R.C." and Quickie. As i mentioned then, back when i drank soda my preference was for RC or Pepsi. So, i guess this time we should look at "Pepsi" the Pepsi-Cola Cop, eh?

I was actually surprised when i went gathering strips for this feature. Out of well over 100 appearances, there seem to be only 5 actual strips being repeated over and over. On the plus side, that makes them rather easy to collect and display -

Where it gets oddly interesting is back at the beginning. There were three more adverts that ran only once each and were seemingly never repeated. As a purely guesswork answer as to why, i'd suspect it has something to do with the artist on that first trio of ads - the legendary Rube Goldberg! He was already a popular media presence, and his contract may have granted him more remuneration that Pepsi wanted to spend?

No real clue, but here are those first three from 1942 -

Now i'm thirsty...

page art by Rube Goldberg and Graham Hunter for many titles (1942-1947)