OJAI FILM FESTIVAL and A FOND FAREWELL
 In Felix, 11-5 to 11-11-1934, the homeless cat tangles with a snake charmer and a real snake, and figures out how to get a free meal from the mind reader, Madame Seezall. Felix has found a new home in the Sunday page and makes friends with a new little boy, but accidentally lets a flock of Messmer owls into the joint in the last two panels.
 Myrtle this week is from 8-9 to 8-15-1948. The 8-10 episode originally appeared on my birthday, 67 years ago. Lots of good Bingo gags this week, and Hyacinth the cat dominates the 8-14 as she puts the grip on Bingo’s tail through a hole in the fence. Watch for her in the “Our Ice Cream Social” Sunday page, as she again attacks Bingo’s tail, starting to tie a big knot in it.
 Krazy is all about Kommandos in the strips from 11-16 to 11-21-1942. The word “kommando” in German means “Unit” or “Command”, but was sort of re-defined in English as an undercover soldier or spy. Offissa Pupp, Ignatz and possibly Krazy are in disguise for most of the week. The War subtly enters Coconino again, but Garge doesn’t take it too seriously.
 Here’s the penultimate appearance of Yogi Bear in this blog! In the November, 1965 Sunday pages, Yogi plays baseball with Huck, Quick Draw, Boo Boo and Baba Louie in the November 7th episode. That’s a great pose in the 5th panel as Yogi swats the ball, but a rather strange result as he supposedly smashes the bottom of a glass bottom boat with the fast moving spheroid. That would have to be some crazy hit to loop around and smash the glass bottom from the top! Ranger Smith appears in the 11-7 and 11-14 strips and his wife appears in the 11-28, featuring another tiny bit awkward gag as Yogi puts in strings of lights for the Ranger Ladies Annual Outdoor Dance. Mrs. Smith and the other girls look like typical Hanna-Barbera women, probably Iwao Takamoto’s designs. The 11-28 really looks like Willie Ito’s drawings, as Yogi dreams about Cindy Bear in the first panel. The Bunny, Owl and drowning man also look like characters that Willie could have designed. Sometime next month I’ll post the last Yogi Sundays that I cut out of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in December of 1965. Yowp has tapped into a New York newspaper site that has beautiful copies of the half-page Yogi Bear Sundays in black and white, so from now on visit his blog for more adventures of that braggin’ bruin. His address is www.yowpyowp.blogspot.com.
     Itza Cat and I will be at the Ojai Film Festival in Ojai, Ca. on November 7th, 2015. We will be presiding over an Animation Workshop at the Art Center Gallery. For more info go to http://www.ojaifilmfestival.com/workshops/. The great Jim Keeshan (he’s related to Bob Keeshan of Captain Kangaroo and Clarabelle Clown fame) will be interviewing me about my career. We’ll be showing a lot of animated cartoon clips from stuff I’ve worked on since the early 1970s through 2011. So if you are around there on Nov. 7th, please drop by, it’s only 15 little dollars.
  A dear friend of Itza Cat’s, and a cherished Ailurophile, a wonderful lady named Ronnie Scheib has left us. She and her S.O. Greg Ford, struggled against her cancer and fought it off for awhile, but eventually poor Ronnie succumbed to it. Ronnie was a good friend for many years and dearly beloved by Greg, who was constantly at her side for the last several years both in the hospital and at home. Ronnie had one of those soft New York accents that was very pleasant to listen to, a bit like Harpo Marx’s speaking voice by some accounts. She was a very good film reviewer, she and Greg collaborated on many columns for Daily Variety for a number of years, you may still find some of her by-lined reviews on-line. Ronnie travelled to many film festivals to see cinema for her columns, often working from hotel rooms and “faxing” them in to Variety. Her knowledge of cartoons was vast, she loved them almost as much as Greg and I did. She appears on camera in the documentary FORGING THE FRAME, which Greg Ford produced and is on Popeye the Sailor DVD Volume One 1933-1938 on Disc #2. I’m so glad she participated in this one, as her on-camera appearances were rare. She sits on a beautiful overstuffed chair and comments on Winsor McKay, Felix the Cat, Koko the Clown and many other early New York animated personalities. She holds her own quite well alongside such animation wiseguys as Michael Barrier, the late Michael Sporn, Mark Langer, John Canemaker and many others. Itza and I will miss you, Ronnie, wherever you are. Thanks for your support and encouragement over the years. We love you!
Your Comics Page 9-29-2015
 Here’s Felix, 10-29 to 11-4-1934. Felix visits the county fair this week. Lots of sideshow type fun at the carnival, such as the grouchy fat man who trips over Felix in the fat man’s race, then rolls over the finish line. He’s grateful to Felix and calls him a lucky cat in the 11-1. Watch that snake charmer in the 11-3, he comes back into the dailies next week. In the Sunday from 11-4, Felix is happy to be back on dry land and takes shelter in a pet store. There, he is observed by a rich dowager and her little boy, Milton. The dowager buys Felix for Milton but his father “don’t approve of him–bah”, as he exclaims in the last panel. I love how merry Felix looks even though he isn’t in a loving household like Danny Dooit’s.
 Myrtle is from 8-2 to 8-8-1948 this time out. In an idea that Ward Greene originated in his “Happy Dan, the Whistling Dog” short story from 1937, Myrtle decides to teach Bingo to whistle. (Ward Greene’s story inspired the Disney feature cartoon, “Lady and the Tramp”, and in comic strips, Greene created Scamp, the strip about Tramp’s little son.) Almost immediately, Bingo begins annoying the community with his new skill. Slug thinks that Bingo is his girl in the 8-6. Apparently, Slug and his girl have a secret whistle signal to each other and Slug winds up kissing Bingo after hearing his whistle. Even Junior, Bingo’s canine sidekick develops a super powerful whistle in the 8-5 that nearly busts Myrtle, Sampson and Bingo’s ear drums. The Sunday shows Mac and Freddie camping out with a 1948 television receiver and a portable refrigerator while everybody else prefers a primitive campsite.
 Krazy is from 11-9 to 11-14-1942 for this round. Garge continues the Cow Jumped Over the Moon jokes from last week. In the 11-12, the cow and a hen seem to be imitating Frank Nelson from the Jack Benny program as they both use his catch phrase, “DO I!” The shifting Coconino backgrounds are outstanding in the 11-13, especially the mountains evolving out of clouds in panel two, and the mesa emerging from darkness in panel four. In the 11-14, Krazy reacts in a Yiddish accent to a grandfather clock that chimes 13, as he cries out: “I Dun’t Billiv It”!
 The Ranger and the Indian tribe appear twice in the Yogi Bear Sunday pages from October, 1965. The cartooning is good in these strips, might be by Iwao Takamoto or Jerry Eisenberg, or a combination of both. Yogi’s solution for getting his head caught in a bee hive is very similar to Groucho getting his head caught in a big jar in “Duck Soup”, they draw faces on the surface of the hive and big jar to disguise themselves. In the 10-21, the Ranger tries to tie down an apple tree so that Yogi won’t bump into it and smash the greenhouse glass panes with the apples. In “Moon Mullins” fashion, Yogi trips on the rope and smashes the next two greenhouses in line with the apple missiles. We’ll have more comic delights here next time.
Your Comics Page 9-15-2015
 Felix from 10-22 to 10-28-1934 features a horse that Felix is grooming for racing at the County Fair named Dobbin. Dobbin can’t race because the judges grabbed his horse shoes for a pitching contest. The 10-26 features a black guy who is confused with an eggplant and in the Sunday page, Felix gets booted back to land after consuming the entire day’s catch of fish. Dig that cat design in the “Laura” topper, he resembles Krazy just a bit.
 In Myrtle, from 7-26 to 8-1-1948, Sampson sews up Freddie’s shower curtain and turns on the cold water after Freddie refuses to talk to him, Susie spanks Myrtle for sitting in the corner instead of standing in the corner in the 7-31, and in Dudley Fisher fashion, this action occurs BETWEEN panels three and four. In the Sunday, the whole town goes on a picnic by the lake and Myrtle goes skinny dipping, refusing to come out even when it rains.
 Krazy, from 11-2 to 11-7-1942, has Garge in a literary mode, doing a whole week’s worth of strips based on the old nursery rhyme; “Hey, Diddle Diddle”. The cows and the bull in the first 4 strips sport rather outlandish feet, more like human hands than hoofs. Krazy tries to jump over the moon in the 11-6 and Offissa Pupp is definitely not the little dog who laughed as he truculently jails the dish for “kidnaping” the spoon! CU soon!
Your Comics Page Marches On! August 30 2015
 In our comics this time, we start with Myrtle by Dudley Fisher from 7-19 to 7-25-1948. The first three dailies center around a weird character called Mr. Dinglebott who causes a handyman to hold on to the wrong end of a soldering iron in the 7-21. There is a good example of Dudley Fisher’s gag timing in the 7-24 daily. There’s a comic strip “stage wait” in the last panel as Myrtle busts open the front door on her way to rip her rival for Sampson’s affections, “Gussie”, to pieces! The Sunday features a visit to the zoo, with plenty of downshot antics in the Monkey enclosure.
 Felix comes to us from 10-15 to 10-21-1934. Felix is back on the farm in the dailies, but runs into raging pork as he tries to balance out the lives of two farm pigs, one fat, one only plump. In the Sunday, Felix is beyond the 12 mile limit as he tries to trick his way into port, even impersonating two sharks with his ears placed just below the water’s surface.
 In Krazy, from 10-26 to 10-31-1942, Ignatz and Offissa Pupp continue to be at eternal cross-purposes to defray the brick from reaching Krazy’s noggin. I like the 10-29 as Pupp flies his own plane and nabs the brick in mid-air; just look at that beautiful cross-hatching surrounding the aircraft. I also like the 10-30, as a flea who looks like he escaped from Garge’s illustrations for Don Marquis’ “Archy and Mehitabel”, charges Ignatz and winds up hitting bottom in a deep canyon. Krazy’s special language is evident in the 10-29 as he completes the thought, All Wool–“and not a Yodd Wide.”
 Yogi continues his Jellystone adventures in all four Sundays from September, 1965. I like the gag in the 9-26 strip as Yogi fakes a feathered head-dress to gain entry into the Indian Pow-wow. I think it’s a beaver strapped to Yogi’s hat, isn’t it? Yogi drives a runaway bulldozer and flies a park helicopter upside down. He also figures out a way to cheat at archery, driving Ranger Smith loco. I suppose the art on these is mostly by Iwao Takamoto, but they could also be by Willie Ito or Jerry Eisenberg, depending on who’s commenting. Remember to visit Yowp-Yowp’s H-B blog at www.yowpyowp.blogspot.com , for more anaylsis of these comics, if you’re lucky!
Charles Schulz, Theresa and Yours Truly
 Here’s a scan of an old slide that my brother discovered in the family archives, and it prompted this reminiscence:
The San Diego Comic-Con was at the El Cortez Hotel in 1975, and I went there with my dear friends Vincent and his first wife, Theresa, Davis. I knew that Charles Schulz was to be a guest, and I brought a copy of the first “Peanuts” book with me in case I had the good luck to meet him–and behold(!) I spotted him striding fast across the lobby of the El Cortez, and I practically tackled him. I was lucky to find Mr. Schulz by himself, armed with felt tip pens. I asked for his autograph and timidly requested a Snoopy–He looked pretty annoyed–but obliged me–you can see the drawing above. Later on, Vincent talked Mr. Schulz into posing for this slide–of course Theresa was pretty enticing in her girl scout outfit, so once again Mr. Schulz obliged us zany fans.
Charles Schulz is an early example of a comic strip fan becoming a member of the fourth estate–after all, his nick-name was “Sparky”-after Billy DeBeck’s “Spark Plug”. What a great thrill it was to meet him–going to the Comic-Con with Vince and Theresa was an annual event in my life for about 5 years. You should have seen Vincent handle all those famous cartoonists–he was never intimidated and his humorous appearance was a great ice breaker. Those days are gone forever–but I’ll always remember.
 In Krazy this week–from 10-19 to 10-24-1942, there’s plenty of slapstick in the 10-19 as Krazy socks Ig with a rock in retaliation–only bricks are pleasurable to KK. I love the “ZIZ” lettering in the 10-20 as “Kapri Kornus” the goat, butts Ig. There is kwirky kat langwitch in the 10-21 as KK says “Paul Troom” as code for “poltroon”. Ignatz paraphrases the early 1940s song hit: “I’ve Got Spurs” in the 10-22, and the brick-tossing coconut monster in the 10-24 is a vintage Herriman Horror.
Myrtle from 7-12 to 7-18-1948 features a story that lasts until 7-16, of a broken dinner plate. Sampson tries to replace the prized plate that Myrtle broke, but secretly “borrows” the plate from Bingo! If you find Sampson’s lisp annoying, you’ll love the 7-17 as Myrtle does something about it. The Sunday page is called “Ship Ahoy!!!” and features Dudley Fisher’s patented two panel down shot layout, as Myrtle hooks an extremely powerful fish.
 “Just a rolling stone, that’s me” Felix from 10-8 to 10-14-1934, features the homeless puss taking up with a sculptor, then a hypnotist. I love the statue coming to life in the 10/9, as Felix, hiding in the clay, brings it to life. Felix uses the old mirror gag in the 10/13 to turn the hypnotist into a chicken. The Sunday page looks like Felix is going home at last, but he is a Cat without a Country as the Captain of the ship is too cheap to pay import duty on Felix, so he is repatriated to the sea.
Thanks to all you readers for sticking with me. I just turned 67 on August 10th and will soon qualify as the world’s oldest boy cartoonist. C Ya!
Your Comics Page 8-1-2015
 Here’s Felix, 10-1 to 10-7-1934. The homeless puss manages to get into a vacant hotel room, order room service and escape from the hotel dicks unscathed! In the Sunday, Messmer uses a tried and true Felix formula, he is chased by angry sailors who are convinced he is a jinx, then he manages to plug a leak in the ship with the body of an escaping mouse (Skidoo?). Felix is once again “in good” with the sailors.
 Myrtle is from 7-5 to 7-11-1948 and Dudley Fisher’s special timing is most in evidence in the 7-5 as Freddie is in the “doghouse” with Susie after scolding Bingo and making him cry. I like the wordless final panel. I also like Freddie’s struggle with nicotine addiction in the 7-7 after he throws his cigarette out the window and lives to regret it, and the Sunday page is fun with the boys away at a business convention and the wives and girlfriends at home playing cards, which so many people did as a past-time in the early twentieth century.
 Krazy was originally published from 10-12 to 10-17-1942 and the strips seem a bit trimmed around the edges, don’t they? I love the 10-17 as Krazy and Ignatz trip over puns and Kat Langwidge. “Harmony”, “Hominy” and “Quantidy”, as Krazy interprets Hominy as “How Many?” Garge comments on his own work as Ignatz says “Corn” and Offissa Pupp says “..and in more ways than one, Corn is right.”
 Here’s Yogi from the month of August, 1965. I’m missing the 8-8 Sunday page, so perhaps old dog buddy Yowp at http://yowpyowp.blogspot.com will dig it up. (UPDATE: Yowp posted a black and white image of the 8-8 and I have it! I just didn’t know the date, so here it is thanks to the great Internet dog!) These appear to be Iwao Takomoto’s work once again. He does an attractive job of designing these pages, I especially like the 8-1 as Iwao handles the trees and landscape that Yogi and the ram inhabit as a little island surrounded by blue sky. The kid with a huge baseball bat up to bunt in the 8-22 seems like an old Percy Crosby “Skippy” baseball joke, reworked for Yogi. Ranger Smith pops up in the 8-29 along with Iwao’s personal brand of cute squirrels. Again, there is something essentially flat in his character design, especially in the last panel as the squirrels catch the falling walnuts. Harvey would have drawn them rounder and cuter, making them look more like the squirrels in the Barney Bear cartoons “The Uninvited Pest” and “Sleepy-Time Squirrel”. This post got side-tracked for awhile; the power supply on my computer was knocked out by a Glendale power outage on Tuesday night. Evidently the old power supply couldn’t handle the surge when the lights came on again after two hours down. Thanks to Robert Karsian of Jewel City Computers, the old Dell Demension 4550 is now operational and works a little better. Robert restored a “dead” computer back to life with a rebuilt power supply. He even makes house calls! If you are local here in Glendale, CA or surrounding communities, give him a call at 818-457-1207 or email him with your problems at Robert@JewelCityComputers.com . He really knows his stuff!
Your Comics Page 7-21-2015
Felix, as written and drawn by Otto Messmer, continues from 9-24 to 9-30-1934. I love the first panel of the 9-28, Felix is in despair; “Nobody wants me.” This panel should be plastered in every animal shelter where homeless cats wait for their forever homes, and by extension, should be plastered on the fences of all the skid rows in all the world. Felix is adopted in the 9-28 by a henpecked husband who uses Felix as a detector for his wife’s rolling pin. I hope the homeless Felix can do better. In the Sunday, Felix lands on still another ship and interferes with a treasure hunt.
 In Myrtle, 6-28 to 7-4-1948 you’ll see many examples of Dudley Fisher’s unique gag timing. My favorite is the 7-3 daily, as Bingo appears in the master bedroom complete with his sleeping bag in the last panel. Hyacinth the cat appears in the Sunday called, “Love Letters”. Myrtle is deviously selling her parents’ old love letters to the neighbors to earn a few dimes, sounds like real kid behaviour to me.
 Here’s Krazy, 10-5 to 10-10-1942. However, we are missing the 10-6-42 episode. Perhaps the “Kat” man, G. Heinlein himself, can supply it? (UPDATE! Gerd Heinlein has come through! Thanks, Gerd for the missing 10-6-1942 strip! You are the official “Kat” man forever.) I’m somewhat mystified by the 10-5. Does Krazy’s tortilla look like a chuck steak to Offissa Pupp? And what’s the gag here? I like the 10-10 strip the best this week, it’s funny to see a fire dog misinterpret Krazy’s yell and watch Ignatz get soused. We’ll have another post very soon, see you then.
Your Comics Page 7-1-2015
 Here’s Felix, from 9-17 to 9-23-1934. Felix is still searching for a loving home, but instead gets spooked by some mice, gets set up to be chased by a dog, gets ignored by a man in training for night watchman duty and gets poked and prodded by a musician’s bow and trombone. Felix longs to be free as a bird, then meets a caged parrot! In the Sunday, Felix fends off the ape he met last week by accidentally giving him a hornet’s nest instead of a coconut. The intrepid cat then sets off to sea in the shell casing.
 Myrtle is from 6-21 to 6-27-1948 this post. In the dailies, Freddie starts out the week by trying to wash his golf balls. That turns into a treatise on being absent-minded, until Myrtle really loses her mind in the 6-26. Reminds me of the ending of Tex Avery’s “Happy-G0-Nutty”:”You think you’re Napoleon, but you’re not! I AM!” In the Sunday, Freddie gets a call from “Toodles”, an old sweetheart, and Susie is a bit concerned. But Toodles has gained a lot of weight since she last saw Freddie, to everyone’s relief including Bingo.
 Here’s Krazy, from 9-28 to 10-3-1942. Much ado about a “Cat O’Nine Tails” this week, in the 9-28, the Nine-tailed wonder turns out to be a fake, and in the 10-2, the W.C. Fields-type dog claims to have known a TEN-tailed feline. I like Offissa Pupp speaking of himself in the third person as a “Kop”. He tries to beef up his ego, but Ignatz escapes in a bottomless garbage can before his story can be continued….in Jail.
 I do believe we have come to the final Harvey Eisenberg Yogi Bear Sunday page, from 7-4-65, and Yogi finds himself lassoed to a rocket ship, going from a mare to the air. (Hey-Hey!)
 These next three, 7-11, 7-18 and 7-25-1965, appear to me to be mostly the work of Gene Hazelton, who is a bit more of a graphic artist than Harvey; he drew a little flatter, Yogi seems a bit less rotund with Gene. Huck Hound makes a rare appearance in the 7-11 with a little boy scout that looks like a Hazelton design. Click to enlarge the 7-18 strip, and you will see an unusual episode giving Yogi credit for the Wright Brothers successful aircraft! The last Sunday page for the month has an ingenious use of a friendly porcupine as Yogi spears some forbidden apples. If you keep in touch with Yowp’s blog, www.yowpyowp.blogspot.com, you will find more complete versions of the third-page strips I have loaded here, in black and white. The “Tab” format Sundays with the “Yogi Bear” logo, two of which I’ve included in this post, are only missing one panel that was in the half-page format. You’re missing very little on these if you just read them here. Have a crazy Fourth of July, enjoy all your illegal fireworks and learn not to burn (Hey-Hey-Hey!).
A Gentle Touch
 The Catblog presents actual cat pictures! This week it’s a cat named Fitz being petted and visited by little Charlotte. Charlotte is the great-granddaughter of our dear neighbor, Belle. Charlotte’s just a little over one year old now, and seems to be a budding cat fan. Her other cat friend, Scout, should be familiar to you; she’s appeared a few times on the Catblog. I just love how gently Charlotte’s small hand brushes against Fitz’s soft fur in the first picture. Fitz is a rescued cat, and is very friendly and well-socialized. Belle just loves these pictures and thought that you would enjoy them too!
 Felix continues to try and be adopted in the strips from 9-10 to 9-16-1934, but runs afoul of a nearsighted man who can’t read the reminder note from his wife to feed Felix. Felix leaves the house in disgust when the nearsighted man can’t even look down to see him. Suspense is set up by the 9-15 strip as Felix finds what seems to be an abandoned house to live in. The Sunday page continues Felix’s expedition in the artillery shell as he drifts to another island inhabited by a coconut hurling ape. This looks like a friendship in the making, we’ll see.
 Myrtle is from 6-14 to 6-20-1948 this time. The gags are charming and some have the Dudley Fisher timing I’ve spoken so often about. The cookie jar gag in the 6-18 and the shower curtain for the birdbath joke in the 6-19 are good examples of the Fisher timing. The Sunday entitled “Cool off, Freddie”, showcases one of the early whole-office air conditioning units. These were no doubt a novelty in the immediate post-war years and this one seems to work very well. Even the birds talk about being part penguin, they take to the cool temperatures so rapidly. Would this have been a Trane unit, a GE or a Lennox?
 The Krazy strips this time are from 9-21 to 9-26-1942 with the strip from 9-25-42 missing. Does anybody have this one?
Our faithful reader Gerd Heinlein has supplied the 9-25-42 strip! He’s come to the rescue before and we really appreciate it! Thanks, Gerd!
The 9-21 addresses the rubber shortage as Krazy starts to call a passerby a “Rubba..(neck)” and the rest of the cast shout, “Where?” In the 9-25, Garge draws the “Carats” as if they were turnips! The 9-26 uses gas masks as proto-Halloween get-up. Krazy and Ignatz scare each other away when they try them on. Garge draws them almost as if they are old-fashioned stereoptican slide holders. The gas mask was a holdover from the World War One years. Well, that’s our blog for this time, see you soon.
Red Skelton DVD Review and Your Comics Page!
 Your Comics Page begins with Krazy from 9-14 to 9-19-1942 this time. You’ll note that the first three dailies are about Pouter pigeons, which Krazy thinks are “Powder” pigeons and might explode (wartime flavored gag). The next two dailies address the old poem “The North Wind Doth Blow” or “The Robin”. No one remembers who wrote the old English Nursery Rhyme, which no doubt dates back hundreds of years. My mother used to recite it to me, and I memorized it. But what is the poem Krazy is reciting in the 9-19? Is it from “Julius Caesar” by Shakespeare, or “The Martyr of the Catacombs”? If anyone can solve this Kat puzzler, a lifetime subscription to this blog is your reward!
My esteemed brother and retired Calculus tutor, Kurt, says: “The quote in the Krazy strip is from ‘Supposed Recitation of Regulus’, a popular ‘recitation’ piece of the period by Elijah Kellogg. You can find it complete if you google it. The actual quote is ‘Calm and unmoved as the marble walls around him, stood Regulus, the Roman!’ Pretty gripping stuff, huh?”
Not only gripping, but winning! Thanks Oh Mighty Tutor, you now have a lifetime subscription to the Catblog!
 Felix is from 9-3 to 9-9-1934 this time. He escapes from the evil scientist by punching him out after receiving an injection of Gorilla serum. Felix is less trusting of future homes, as he rejects a maker of dog kennels, a fat lady on a diet and a beginning saxophone player. In the Sunday 9-9 episode, Felix does a quick escape from the cannibal island by turning the shell casing into a sort of canoe. We’ll see if he gets home from there next time.
 Dudley Fisher’s Myrtle is from 6-7 to 6-13-1948 for this post. My favorite daily is the 6-8. Myrtle takes a gag photo of Bingo dressed up in Freddie’s hat and pipe, resulting in Bingo eating his meals with a spoon! Fisher lets the reader fill in the gaps here, as Bingo makes the leap up the anthropomorphic ladder from wearing hats and smoking pipes to eating his meals with a human utensil. I also love the 6-10, as Myrtle asks for a piece of bread and jelly and restricted to “just one” by Susie, Myrtle slices the bread length ways (you got your bread unsliced in 1948) and chows down on a cinemascope slice. The Sunday, 6-13 is called “First Flight”. Hyacinth the cat is fastened securely in Bingo’s doghouse as a baby robin takes it’s first test hop out of the nest into Myrtle’s hat.
 The Yogi Bear Sundays from June, 1965 are here, courtesy of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Harvey Eisenberg’s legacy continues for now, but in the July episodes other hands start carrying the load. The 6-6 episode is a beautiful drawing job, as Yogi baby sits for a Charles Addams type couple who seem to be the missing links between Mr. and Mrs. J. Evil Scientist and The Gruesomes. The 6-13 is OK, but the last panel seems to drop the ball a little as Yogi and Boo-Boo skate away from the Jellystone General Store with a pillow somewhat awkwardly placed near their rear ends! Yogi’s rhyme is rather lazy here too, he matches “right” with “right”! The 6-20 has some good Eisenberg staging in it as Yogi tries to get a tattoo artist to draw an arrow correctly. The concept is a bit weak here, Yogi doesn’t have human skin, so a tattoo on his fur would disappear almost immediately. The 6-27, once again drawn by Eisenberg, seems to reprise an earlier Indian gag, as Yogi seems to be doing a tribal dance, when actually the gyrations are caused by sitting on an ant hill. I’m sure that Yowp will come up with more complete copies of these Sundays in his blog soon, so keep checking in at www.yowpyowp.blogspot.com .
 I just finished (after 5 months) watching this historic DVD set of Red Skelton shows published by The Shout Factory. Here is my review:
Red Skelton Show, The Early Years Shout Factory 11 Disc Set
The name “Red Skelton” is fading away in the 21stCentury, but way back in the 20th, he was a beloved and well-known comedian. In our family home when my brother and I were little, Red “visited” us by TV nearly every week. Our Grandma Katie just adored Red, although she seldom laughed at his actual comedy. She loved his shy little four-fingered wave to the audience as he came on to the stage, the dimples in his smile, and his show-closing phrase: “Good night and may God bless!” This is the Red Skelton that is best remembered today, the “old people’s” Skelton.
The Skelton in this 11 disc DVD set released by The Shout Factory, is not for the most part, the “old folks” Skelton. The earliest TV shows Red did are visual extensions of his radio program. Red’s radio programs from the 1940 to 1944 and the 1945 to 1954 seasons were his true legacy. Like Joe Penner before him, Red had the capacity to be both inside and outside of his material at the same time. His most endearing character from his radio days was the “Mean Widdle Kid”. “Junior” was wise beyond his years, one of the craftiest rascals on radio. He played off Harriet Hilliard as his mother on the early shows, but the funniest Junior scripts featured Verna Felton as his “Namma”. She often spoke to Junior with that “Hairbrush tone” in her voice. There were no “time outs” in Junior’s lexicon, just extreme corporal punishment. Junior made “I dood it” and “He don’t know me very well, do he”, beloved catch phrases, but Red’s outstanding achievement with the character was making such a brat seem somehow endearing. Junior’s influence on cartoons of the 1940s and 1950s was in every Wise Guy hero, from Bugs Bunny to Tweety, Woody Woodpecker, Skrewy Squirrel: every character that broke the 4thwall and had no respect for authority owed their existence to Red Skelton’s radio program and his head writer and first wife, Edna Stillwell. Skelton’s other radio characters, such as Clem Kadiddlehopper were imitated by Tex Avery (“The Hick Chick”) and by Bill Scott as Bullwinkle Moose, “Deadeye”’s “Aw, Come On Horse, WHOA!” became components of Yosemite Sam and Quick Draw McGraw–Mike Maltese, who wrote for these characters, was imbued with Red’s comic bad guys.
The first Skelton TV shows tried to do a visual version of the radio program. Ironically, although Red looked hilarious as Clem Kadiddlehopper with his crossed eyes and receding chin, and Cauliflower McPugg with his broken down prizefighter’s facial ticks and catch phrases such as “a flock of ‘em flew over that time”, or “Deadeye”’s crummy mustache and even crummier marksmanship–all these characters were just as vivid on the radio without the makeup. The listener could easily imagine what they looked like and the attempts by the makeup men to make them visible comes off a little cheesy. It’s significant that Red made almost no attempt to recreate “Junior” visually for TV. He used the “Junior” voice and turned his fedora upside down to simulate being a Fauntleroy type kid, but turned the character into a parody of his own son, Richard. Red was a big guy over six feet, and he wisely decided against performing as Junior alongside Verna Felton or Lurene Tuttle. “Junior” on the radio was a tiny, scampering, atomic powered bundle of mischief, so Red’s stature was all wrong for the character.
Having said all that, these TV shows have their own rewarding qualities. Edna Skelton was still the head writer (even though she and Red were divorced) and the characters that she and Red created could coast on their energy. Red loved to make fun and criticize the writing as he performed it, (“now there’s a brilliant line”, “I’m proud o’that, it ain’t written here”). He would often break up on camera as he went along, and sometimes threw off the timing of his supporting cast in doing so. An early member of that cast, Lucille Knoch, is a standout in these 1950s kinescopes. She’s petite, blonde and very cute, Jeff to Red’s Mutt, and really seems to be enjoying Red’s comedy, mistakes and all. It’s a delight to watch her break up along with Red. Jack Benny was very critical of Red’s unprofessionalism, laughing at himself. Yet somehow breaking up became an integral part of his routine and bridged less-than-perfect comedy writing. Red would comment: “I gotta laugh, ‘cause I know what’s comin’” and “I only just got the joke.”
What’s the value of this SHOUT FACTORY DVD set to a collector of television shows of the 1950s? Invaluable. Red Skelton held the rights to all his television kinescopes, and how fortunate we are that he did hold them and didn’t syndicate the programs. Part of the reason Red didn’t want his early programs seen during his lifetime might have been that his son Richard, who was the subject of many of his father’s comedy routines, died of leukemia before he turned 10, and his second wife Georgia, mother of Red’s two children and featured in several of the Christmas Skelton shows, shot herself to death in 1976. Red was probably too saddened by the loss of Georgia and Richard to look at his old shows. He continued to make new ones until 1971; he preferred to go on and not to look back.
The first season, 1951-52 , has the most manic energy–Red had to change costumes several times in each episode, and there are no “God bless” endings here–Red is usually dragged under the curtain at the end of the show in mid-sentence by a stage hand! Cauliflower McPugg, Clem Kadiddlehopper and Willie Lump-Lump are the featured characters. The show was as big a hit as Red’s radio program and he won two Emmys for his TV program and for being an outstanding comedian. Unfortunately, the first episode from 9/30/1951 is not included in the set, perhaps the print went vinegar–it’s a miracle that so many of these episodes have survived at all, Red must have had good film storage. In the 1952-53 series, they tried to make it easier on Red by filming the performances on a sound stage with mostly canned laughter. The show really suffered without a live audience and Red’s comedy was enhanced by real laughter–so the filmed shows lasted only one season. Being shot on 35mm, they look great.
NBC dropped the Red Skelton show in 1953, due to low ratings, and CBS picked it up, running it on a sustaining basis at first. More shows were one-character per episode affairs and there were many singing/dancing interludes by the “Red-dettes” to give Red some breathing room. It’s a real treat to see these CBS kinescopes. The network had a terrible track record on film storage and most of their early kinescopes were destroyed. We owe Red our gratitude in preserving so much of his television legacy for us to see today.
About this time in the show’s history, a new character began to dominate the programs, a hobo named Freddy the Freeloader. Skelton used his father’s clown makeup for Freddy’s face. In the early appearances Freddy spoke quite a lot, but in the later 1950s and 60s he became largely a pantomime character. He was a gentle soul, but was rather coarse in his manners, I remember an episode that featured Greer Garson, whom Freddy addressed as a “broad”. Red’s skill at acting and comedy without using words make him worthy of study by animators and actors today. He had absolute control over his face and body and could become an old man, a little boy, a drunkard, a haughty dowager or two seagulls just by changing his posture or wearing his hat differently.
There are many Skelton legends that aren’t included in the biography documentary on the bonus disc. Tales such as Red in his dotage responding to unexpected visitors ringing the bell at his Bel-Aire home by running out on to the driveway clad only in a bathrobe and brandishing a rifle! Red supposedly wouldn’t let anyone near the vault rooms in his mansion where all the film was stored, reportedly he refused to show the old kinescopes to people, including himself. Red was a right-wing God and Country type guy in his later years and accused CBS of persecuting him for his politics when they cancelled his show in 1970, still at the top of the ratings.
Shout Factory has cut nearly all the commercials out of Red’s prints but have left the filmed spots he did for Tide Detergent in the first season shows. The ads are funny and painless, nearly devoid of plugs until the last minute of the skit. You won’t find any of the Pet Milk or Johnson’s Wax ads in the later shows, however. Maybe they couldn’t clear the rights.
I give this set the highest rating a film collector can give it–4 Reels! There are so many interesting episodes including guests like Bela Lugosi, Peter Lorre and Vampira and a filmed rehearsal for a 1953 NBC episode featuring “Deadeye From Mars” which lets us in on Red’s freewheeling and irreverent attitude towards his comedy. He cracked up when the elaborate space bicycle prop fails to take off at the end of the sketch. It’s always fun to watch Red just take flubs and fluffs in his stride and make them “funnier than what’s written here”.
By all means get this set and savor it slowly, there are 92 shows included and you’ll be sorry when you’ve used up all the episodes!
Your Comics Page 5-20-2015
 Felix is from 8-27 to 9-2-1934 this time. In the dailies, Felix wins over the young lady (who mistakenly believes Felix is a present from her fiancee) with orchids he found lying in the street. Felix searches for a new home, and manages to land one with (who else) a professor who wants to turn the hapless cat into an experimental animal. In the Sunday, Felix hides in an artillery shell to escape the returning crew, only to be fired into space and land on a cannibal island. The cannibals think that the empty shell is a new-fangled cooking pot. I think Messmer used this gag several times. By the way, look at the cat in the “Laura” topper, I have a weak spot for Messmer’s alternate designs for cartoon cats and this is one of his best.
 Krazy is from 9-7 to 9-12-1942 this time and Garge’s inking is beautiful! The military gags go through all six strips and feature Ignatz as a private interacting with a lot of army dogs who closely resemble Offissa Pupp. I like the 9-8, in which Ignatz meets a canine spy: great inking in the second, third and fourth panels as the big spy tells Ignatz, “I AM”. The 9-9 is the runner-up for me, as four Ernie Pyle Pupps show up and tell Ignatz they are columnists. Noting that there are four of the dogs, Krazy asks “Where’s the Fiff one?” The “Fifth Column” refers not to journalism, but to military spies, such as Quisling in Poland in 1940.
 Myrtle is from 5-31 to 6-6-1948, I love the 5-5 as Bingo gives Sampson a nudge which turns on Sampson’s libido. He grabs Myrtle and kisses her, leaving her puzzled. I’ve included the Sunday page which bestows a new power lawn mower on Myrtle. The new gasoline engine mower goes AWOL and smashes through a nearby neighbor’s yard.
 Here is a new feature on the Catblog, George McManus’s BRINGING UP FATHER, from 1-2 to 1-7-1950. The reason Jiggs pops up here? I’m PO’d at the King Features comic website, Comics Kingdom. They have some nice proofs of BUF that they recently stopped running with the episode for 12-31-1949. I think they should have kept running Jiggs in chronological order so the readers could see the eventual abandonment of the dailies by George McManus. If I can run the post-1949 dailies here, why can’t King Features run them on their website? A syndicate that has distributed so many fine features for so many years should have a much more complete archive of their classic strips than they do. By the 1950s, George M. had been cartooning for over 43 years! He passed away in 1954 having logged in 41 years of Jiggs and Maggie, starting in 1913. His ink line was very delicate, and sometimes reminds me of Winsor McCay. McManus drew the whites of his characters’s eyes blank, once in a while with very tiny dots for irises, looking like Harold Grey’s Little Orphan Annie eyeballs. BUF will only be an occasional feature here, as the strips rarely feature continuity, except for the repeating gags of Jiggs being socked by endless crockery from his wife’s well-stocked china cabinets (which he paid for). I always enjoy McManus’s sense of staging, silhouette panels and sense of design. I love the 1-6 as Jiggs and Maggie visit their local movie theatre. McManus suggests the movie show with silhouettes of Jiggs and wife along with other movie goers in front of a totally white space above the line of theater seats. We don’t need to actually see what’s on the screen, the black figures and dialog fill us in on all the movie details. McManus is one of newspaper cartooning’s finest cartoonists, but he is easy to take for granted. Watch for more of his work coming soon.
Your Comics Page 4-28-2015
I’ve saved a lot of crazy cat pictures over the years, here’s one of my favorites. Reminds me of a real life Tom and Jerry or Ignatz and Krazy on the flip side.
 Krazy from 8-31 to 9-5-42 displays the incursion of the second World War into Garge’s Coconino County. In the 8-31, Krazy is singing “There’s Something About A Soldier” as Ignatz goes into the infantry as a Colonel. Offissa Pupp is an M.P. In the 9-5, a Dog who says he’s a General marches into the strip and says to Ignatz: “Hi Private, What’s Cooking?” The General seems to be Irish, since he has the craves for potatoes, and Ignatz makes a hasty retreat, having no potatoes cooking, or otherwise.
 In Myrtle, 5-24 to 5-30-1948, Myrtle and Sampson put out their own typewritten newspaper, with an “e” missing. Slug, in the 5-27, submits a comic strip to the fledgling paper, but Myrtle, Sampson and Bingo reject it. I love the panel with Slug keeping his job as a soda jerk, looking at his strip: “I still think it’s good!” The Sunday from 5-30 has the whole family painting the house, Slug defiantly walks under the ladder and look what Hyacinth the cat pushes over!
 Felix, 8-20 to 8-26-1934 has Felix trying to find a new “owner” as the crook he was bound to is now in the clink. He finds himself being given away to Miss Daisy Pipp, who is expecting flowers and instead receives a “common cat”. In the Sunday, Felix manages to get the whole battleship to himself as he plays around in the hold with explosives and the whole crew take to the lifeboats. We’ll see whether Felix blows himself up or becomes an Admiral!
 Here are the Yogi Bear Sundays from May, 1965. Harvey Eisenberg is still represented by the comics he left behind, and he managed to create quite a backlog of Yogi pages while he lived. My favorites here are the 5-16 (click to enlarge the thumbnails) in which Yogi leads his own humming group of hummingbirds. Harvey was very good at drawing realistic birds, his “Bertie Bird” text illos in many of the Tom and Jerry comic books attest to that. The hummingbirds he designed for this strip are very appealing. The 5-30 episode is a little bit puzzling to me, who’s Henry? He’s a bit hard of hearing, and celebrating his 91st birthday. Does this Henry have anything to do with Henry Orbit, from “The Jetsons”? Henry Orbit was an old-timer, and as I remember, a little hard of hearing. Maybe the Henry in this Yogi Bear page is the great-great-great grandfather of Henry Orbit? I know nozzink. Maybe Yowp can help with this H-B puzzler. So long for now.
Easter Cats!
 My dear wife, Cathy, makes up a little Easter basket and decorates eggs with her wonderful drawings each year. She found a little egg-shaped wooden cat head at a local store and re-created it’s face on one of the eggs. The other egg is a small Japanese ceramic cat she found in the same store which she named “Sake Cat”; this one was an Anniversary gift. Now they are both featured on Easter eggs. If you go to Itza Cat’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/someothercat, you’ll see another one of Cathy’s Easter egg creations featuring Itza’s face.
 Here’s a cozy shot of our Easter basket, made up by Cathy. In it, you’ll see a dark chocolate bunny, a couple of Cadbury Caramel eggs (my favorite), a jar of apple butter and some cloth roses. We’re still sampling the delicacies, well into April. I gave Cathy a special card and about 10 pink roses, so it wasn’t an entirely one-sided Easter. It was a happy, peaceful and memorable one.
 Felix, from 8-13 to 8-19-1934, at last foils the robber who has been in a black-face disguise to fool the police. The disguise works until a stray bullet punctures a water pipe and washes off the burnt cork. In the Sunday, Felix tightrope-walks over to an immense battle ship and locks the Admiral in his cabin with the whole crew standing at attention. The crafty cat then proceeds to eat his dinner in the Officer’s Mess. The “Funny Films” topper features a black artful dodger, if you put the toy together you can see him dodge the baseballs that Felix throws at his head. If you want to see Popeye throwing balls at another black dodger, just find the first Fleischer Popeye cartoon (actually a Betty Boop) called: “Popeye the Sailor”.
Here’s Myrtle from 5-17 to 5-23-1948. My favorites this week? The 5-18, one of those “makes you think” gags, where Myrtle is wearing her pajamas underneath her skirt as she writes on the blackboard, and the 5-21, a Fisher Fantasy touch as the vacuum cleaner sucks up a cookie crumb and burps, sending Myrtle to the corner. I also found the Sunday page called “Another New House” where the whole neighborhood has fun with a steam-shovel, including Hyacinth the cat!
Here’s Krazy, from 8-24 to 8-29-1942. The first three strips feature the infrequently featured character, Mr. Bum Bill Bee. In the 8-27, Krazy seems to be suggesting the “heavy light” of Neutron Stars, or is he just being silly? The 8-29 strip doesn’t register with me, I can’t remember the “old watermelon gag” that Offissa Pupp is referring to. Does Ignatz usually hide inside a watermelon each year? Maybe one of my readers can help crack this Kat puzzler. UPDATE: The mighty Pat Ventura, cartoonist extraordinaire has shed light on this Kat puzzler. Here: 
 is the Sunday page from 7-11-1927 in which Ignatz not only hides in a watermelon, but goes over a waterfall in it. Look at the comments below to find out more about this page. If the Kats will stay out of the Korn field, I should be back before the end of the month with another post filled with comics, including the next batch of Yogi Bear Sundays. Remember to click on any image to enlarge it. 
Your Comics Page 3-26-2015
Gentle readers, here’s Krazy from 8-17 to 8-22-42. The sharp-eyed completists among you will notice that 8-20 is missing. King Features doesn’t have it, and I was unable to find it elsewhere, so if anyone can furnish the strip, you will get a free subscription to this website! (Our wonderful reader G. Heinlein has furnished the missing Krazy from 8-20-1942! Thanks, G.! You now have free access to the blog!) Herriman’s staging stands out to me in the 8-17 and 8-19 strips as the lower half (which was often cut-off when 1940s newspapers crowded 16 to 18 daily strips on a page) is adorned with rugs and dark spaces under the floor boards of the Coconino desert stage where the action takes place. I especially like the last panel of the 8-22 as Garge shows us what Krazy looks like to a near-sighted worm, the inking is a perfect representation of how a near-sighted person without glasses would see the Kat.
 Here’s Felix from 8-6 to 8-12-1934. He is still the reluctant pet of a house-burgling crook. Otto gets into a bit of 1930s style racial caricature in the 8-10 and 8-11 strips as the crook paints Felix white and blacks his face up to foil the police. In the Sunday, Felix is still pursued by the ravenous animals on board the deserted ship. He sets a captive bird free, and the grateful avian flies out to land with a rope so that Felix can tightrope walk his way to safety.
 Myrtle is from 5-10 to 5-16-1948 this time, complete with the 3/4 downshot Sunday page. My favorite is the bunny joke from the 5-15 strip, in which a picky rabbit wants mayonnaise on his lettuce. Dudley Fisher had a way with cute animals and birds, his gentle comedy has no counterpart in today’s nonstop snark that’s taken over just about all comedy outlets, including comic strips.
 These Yogi Bear pages from April, 1965 appeared in the last month of Harvey Eisenberg’s short life, he died four days before the 4-25 strip reproduced below. The 4-4 and 4-11 pages feature “Mugger”, a snickering pooch designed by Iwao Takamoto for the “Hey, There, It’s Yogi Bear!” animated feature. Harvey was just as adept at drawing Iwao’s designs as Ed Benedict’s or Dick Bickenbach’s, so he exaggerated Mugger’s teeth and streamlined his body for action in a very pleasing way. Harvey’s poses and his way of arranging figures and action on a page always remind me of the best of the Tom and Jerry cartoons. Just click to enlarge the 4-18 strip above and you’ll see a tennis gag that is carried entirely by the action poses.
 Here’s the cover of a “Dexter” comic book from 1947, that Harvey drew for the Dearfield comics company. Harvey was the co-owner of that company along with Joe Barbera, and they published many handsome looking comics with the characters “Red Rabbit” and “Foxy Fagan”. I had never heard of the “Dexter” series until I ran across them on the Internet. Harvey’s trying to tap the teenage comic market which was starting to catch fire post WW2. Archie comics, Mayzie comics, etc. were eating into the funny animal market, so Harvey and Joe tried to fill a niche. I don’t know how adept Harvey was at drawing teenage boys, but his girls are cute, and so is the steer. I’d like to see an issue or two of “Dexter” to see if Harvey drew the interiors. Anybody want to scan any pages for me to look at?
 This was not the last Yogi Bear Sunday that Harvey would contribute to, as you’ll see in future posts, he worked about 9 months ahead, so his art continued through just about the rest of 1965. He died of a heart attack. My guess is that he put in so many hours at the drawing board, that he never got any exercise, and like most folks of the “greatest generation”, he probably smoked as well. He left us a grand legacy of beautiful cartoon drawings, animation layouts, comic books and comic strips. Yowp is no longer posting these Yogis on his blog, so this is the only place where you’ll see them from now on. See you soon!
Back From Ojai-On to the CTN Expo!
November 18, 2015
Uncategorized
No Comments
Mark
Look for Itza and me at Jerry Beck’s table at the CTN expo in Burbank, 11-20 and 11-21-2015. I’ll have cels for sale from Itza’s cartoons and I want to meet all my hundreds of blog readers, so get on down!