The Yankee Wasn't From Conecticut (or Can't Get Enough Dick (your choice))

Before we dig in to today's Dick Briefer brief, let's make a quick stop at the first page of the first issue (#3, because - comics!) of Boy Comics, from whence today's tales originated. And bring back a logo we haven't seen since the early days of this blog...

We'll not be looking closer at this guy...

(Obviously the victim of steroid shrinkage)

...because who knows what we might see!

But, also - it shows one of the big problems for today's feature. The early issues of Boy Comics are scarce. So much so that i've only ever seen microfiche copies of most of them. Out of his first dozen appearances, i only have 4 paper copies.

So, naturally, those will be the ones we look at today. 

Yankee Longago - The Boy Of To-Day In The Land Of Yesterday, like another Yankee recorded by Sam Clemens and popularized by Bing Crosby, isn't so tightly bound by time as most folks. In his first adventure, instead of leaping back to King Arthur's court, he found himself in the lands of King Cole (who was NOT a merry old soul). He quickly established himself as someone worthy of note by putting out Bad Bimbo's eye with a rubber band & paper clip. Shortly after, he was cranking out bicycles, parachutes, and weapons of war to bring about change in the land before returning home.

However, on his second 'trip in time' he did find his way to Arthur's time - back before Arthur was King. After helping him to pull the sword from the stone, Yankee winds up facing off against an evil Merlin before returning to his own time.

And now we come to his 3rd tale, the first i have on paper. So let's join with Yankee as he meets Al - the Alchemist (and a couple more famous characters)...

A couple issues later, Yankee was meeting up with Napoleon...
 

Having previously corrected "Chris" that he was seeing Brooklyn, not India, Yankee's travels brought him closer to home...
 

Our final tale today brings Ponce De Leon to meet Longago at the Fountain...
 

Between 1942 and 1946, Dick Briefer did about two dozen of Yankee's adventures.
I'll see how many more i can dig up on paper.

page art by Dick Briefer from Boy Comics #s 5, 7, 12, & 14 (1942, 1943, 1944)

Thunder Fun With Jack & Dick

Man, i hope whoever decided to "upgrade" Blogger to justify their job loses that job in a very loud way that discourages others from continuing this vile practice.

I say that because it's been about 45 minutes of struggle to get all of today's pics to upload. And that's becoming quite frequent and likely to start leading to skip days or time off from blogging.

...

Okay, let's try to get the mind back around to where it was an hour ago. I had a good intro in my head, but it seems to have gotten tired of the wait and gone walkies.

Didja know that Dick Briefer inked Jack Kirby? They did four stories together, including the first time that Kirby had a Thunder God up against the aliens from Saturn, decades before Journey Into Mystery's debut of Thor.

Of course, it was different Saturnians...

...and a different Thunder-God...
 

...not to mention a different art style since they were working in C.C. Beck's playground.

As you may have noted over time, i generally prefer not to work with reprints. For today's tale, we have little choice in the matter. I've never seen an intact copy of the original comic. On the plus side, i didn't have to do any de-aging today.

From 64 Pages Of New Captain Marvel Adventures (seriously, that's the title of the book from 1941) here's The Monsters Of Saturn...
 

One of the reasons i tend to disfavour the reprints is the colours often come across as garishly not right. In part, that comes from working with much whiter/brighter paper and from changing aesthetics. 

If you perceive things the same way, you can fix it for yourself. Here's the story with just the line work so you can colour to your own preferences -
 

And, bonus - something to keep busy if you need it.

page art by Jack Kirby and Dick Briefer from 64 Pages Of New Captain Marvel Adventures #1 (nn) (1941)

Is She Stupid Or Evil?

As the post line says, is this woman Stupid or Evil?

The masks are to protect other people from the wearer's exhalations. This has been said over and over and over again.

So is this alleged person just outright stupid? Or is she just evil and does realize that, despite the wording, what her sign really says is "YOUR Body, MY Choice"?

There are many ways one could protest wearing masks, but regardless of whether she is Stupid or Evil, this method of protest is Both. And a fair summary of why this country is in a prolonged state of collapse.

In related news, our Fake President will be sending troops to the beaches with bombs and flamethrowers to heroically fight off the evil tides invading our shores. 

Idiocracy by Fake President (half a year of damage remaining)

Getting Trippy With Tippy

While our fake president breaks down into full mad-dog desperation mode in his efforts to drag the USA back to pre-Revolutionary legal standards (ref. Boston Massacre and why people decided 'unitary' tyrants had to go, and why our constitution made it illegal for tyrants to use Federal Troops for Civilian law enforcement (until more recent tyrant wanna-bes effectively added "unless ordered to" to the Posse Comitatus act)), i feel like we could use a break.

So, just a quickie little bit of out-there oddness for today from Coo Coo Comics #16 with artwork from Jim Tyer -

Don't forget where you parked your brain. Lord knows, i'll be wandering for hours looking for mine...

page art by Jim Tyer from Coo Coo Comics #16 (1945)