Skyrocket To Fantasy Isle

When last we left off with Skyrocket Steele, i was off to hunt for the other issue #3 of Amazing Mystery Funnies to see if we could find out what happened next.

After consulting with Hamir, it didn't seem very likely that we'd find that next issue. Fortunately, we don't have to!

Fantagraphics released a multi-volume collection of Bill Everett's work nearly a decade ago. Damn nice of them.

So here's the cover to issue #3b, and the ongoing story -

The Fantagraphics collection is in two volumes - Amazing Mysteries, from which these pages come, and Heroic Tales. Both have lots of good stuff in them. They released another book the previous year - Fire & Water: Bill Everett, the Sub-Mariner and the Birth of Marvel Comics. I haven't checked it out yet, but my expectations are high.

In that same post, i mentioned i was hunting for the first chapter of Tippy Taylor's tale since my copy was too trashed to use. I did find a digital copy, but it was little more that oversized thumbnails. I've done what i can to clean it up and enlarge it for easier reading and a better look at the artwork of George Loomis, so let's go visit Fantasy Isle, shall we?

On to chapter 2!

There were only 9 episodes in total for Tippy and  Lilliput  Fantasy Isle, so we'll be back to follow along and see what's in that cave...

page art by Bill Everett and George Loomis for Amazing Mystery Funnies #s 3b, 4, 17 & 18 (1938, 1940)

Steele Sidetrips And Dizzy Distractions

So... I was on my way to meet up with Steelgrip Starkey when i got distracted by Skyrocket Steele. You might not know either of those guys, but i suspect most of you know Bill Everett, the creator of Sub-Mariner (among others).

His Skyrocket Steele first appeared on the cover of Amazing Mystery Funnies #1...

Oddly enough, despite the cover he did not appear inside. It was in the next issue that he made his debut...

The tale continued in issue #3...

...and then it gets tricky. I thought i had the next part in issue #4. Nope. There were two #3s! 
Silly me, i thought there was only One.

So, i'm off on a hunt now. And not just for the other 3, but also for the debut chapter for this guy -

Whether i can find one better than my crappy copy or not, we'll be meeting up with Tippy Taylor soon. I assure you it beats the hells out of the new Fantasy Island.

While i'm hunting, here's a slightly deranged little strip to enjoy, Adam The Atom-Smasher...

As far as i know, that's just what he did and we never saw him again.

But we'll be back to see more of those other guys.

page art by Bill Everett, Grieg Chapian, and Fred Schwab for Amazing Mystery Funnies #s 2, 3, & 17-19 (1937, 1938, 1940)

Epic Connie Kurridge

Buckle up, gang - we're going on an epic adventure with Frank Godwin's fly girl Connie. How epic, one might ask?

Fighting Dragons On The Moon 1000 Years In The Future Epic!

Note the cover illustration is by Bill Everett, of Submariner fame.

At 30 pages, this is probably the largest single story we've presented here. Just one more record for the girl who went from flapper Blondie in 1927 to first female aviator comic hero in 1929 to  Buck Rogers in 1936.

Before we get started, note that this is a comic book reprint of a Sunday comic strip. Different page aspect ratios necessitate reworking the original layouts to the new format, and so these can look substantially different than the original newspaper strips. More than that, some dialogue can be dropped to make space. To illustrate the difference, here is the ink layouts for the Sunday version of the first page. Also note that she travels to 2936 here as opposed to 2941 in the modified comic book version.

Connie just does not slow down! The remainder of that final page was spent setting up the next tale - before they can even change clothes.

Connie by Frank Godwin from Famous Funnies #s 84-92 (1941, 1942)

reprinted from Connie Sunday strips (Ledger Syndicate)(1936)