Lou Fine, Artist

A Different Spirit
Recently the Digital Comic Museum posted a series of Spirit sections from 1945. It's a rare treat to see any Spirit sections in their original form. These are especially interesting because they represent the period when Will Eisner was in the service and The Spirit had been given over to other hands: notably, those of Lou Fine.

There's no question that the 1945 Spirit was not the "original" Spirit. Stories suffered the most as Eisner's carefully-structured scripts gave way to mundane, rather disjointed stories like this one. The art changed even more. Gone were Eisner's cartooniness and cinematic layouts (though some of the best of these lay in the future after Eisner returned from the Army). The new style was more like mainstream comic books. But though the style may have been different, it certainly wasn't bad art.

I believe this story is mostly Lou Fine's work. It offers a fascinating glimpse of the Golden Age great changing from his over-the-top superhero style to the handsomely-drawn conservative style he'd use for the rest of his career. The drawings of Soapy on page 4 could have come straight out of the ad comics he and Don Komisarow did for J. Walter Thompson in the 1950s. (Fans of Fine's ad art must check out this entry in Today's Inspiration about his collaborations with Komisarow.)

This might not be the famous "real" Spirit, but it's sure a bunch of nice drawings!

Space Conquerors!

A Fine Day in Space

When I was a kid I was a Boy Scout. I had a subscription to Boy's Life, a large-format monthly filled with short stories, fact articles, lots of ads for guns and...a comics section!

Naturally this was my favorite part of the magazine. The section ran full- and half-page color comics, their subject matter divided amongst fact, humor and adventure. I later learned these strips were produced by Johnstone and Cushing, the legendary comic art studio. At the time I was reading Boy's Life the section's roster included "The Tracy Twins," "True Stories of Scouts in Action," "Tono of the Longhouse People," biblical and historical one-shots, and my favorite, an s-f series called "Space Conquerors."
From my garage/midden I've recovered the handful of tearsheets I clipped from the magazine in the early 1960s. For years they'd been my only mementos of the series. Three cheers for the Internet! While googling in preparation for this post I discovered a complete index of the series with links to every episode in Google Books' run of Boy's Life!
I learned that the feature began in 1952 and went through several reboots as well as periods during which it simply presented astronomical facts. The story I'm posting turns out to have been the first episode of one of those reboots. It introduces three nameless astronauts exploring space in the first faster-than-light spaceship. Early episodes were rather tame, but later the series became a wild and woolly space opera. Not that the stories were very good: half a page per month made for sketchy plots and no characterization. It didn't help that the writer (presumably Al Stenzel) occasionally changed plans in mid-story.
This 1962-1963 episode was drawn by Lou Fine in his most generic style. Art on the strip was generally good. Fine had replaced George Evans, who had replaced the second of two guys I don't recognize. Fine drew several stories, then Alden McWilliams took over for a long run. After a surprise appearance by Gray Morrow, Fine returned. This time his art was more elaborate, though in some strips he seems to have been inked by another hand. Fine died in 1971, so the art variations may have been related to illness.According to Planettom, the series ended in 1972. However I swear that years later...maybe the mid-1980s?...I came across a copy of Boy's Life, now thinner and in a smaller format, and found an episode of "Space Conquerors" drawn by Ernesto Colon. Did I dream this? Does anyone know about post-1970s Boy's Life comics? Several later "Space Conquerors" originals are out there. Here's a nice 1964 page from Stephen Donnelly's collection. From near the end of the strip's run comes this one from 1971 which belongs to Alan Crouse. Both are by Fine.

1950s Advertising Comics

Mr. Coffee Nerves and his Rivals
I don't know if Mr. Coffee Nerves was the first advertising comic strip "super-villain." He certainly was one of the longest-lived. I have plenty of Postum strips in various reprints, but the only real one I own is this battered one-third-page from 1949. It stars the modernized Mr. C. N.: A snazzy jet-pack replaces the old opera cape and a Buck Rogers helmet substitutes for the top hat. The artist is surely Lou Fine. The surprisingly awkward balloon placement interferes with the slick professionalism that marks most Johnstone & Cushing strips.

But Mr. Coffee Nerves wasn't alone in the world of invisible enemies whose lives were devoted to bringing misery to the American family. From 1952 comes this adventure of Peter Pain, the little green man with a strange flat hat and the chin of a 1930s safecracker. Ben Gay to the rescue! The delightful drawing is by Jack Betts. If you want even more Pain, Ger Apeldoorn has a gallery of them here:
http://allthingsger.blogspot.com/search/label/Peter%20Pain

From 1954 comes this chronicle of a rather flabby-looking green guy with "Mr. Stomach Upset" scrawled on his tummy. His flaming trident is about as convincing as his "hep" dialogue in panel two. When he's banished by Pepto-Bismol, he says "Curses!" like his old mentor. Strictly bush league, if you ask me.

I wonder how many of these series pain-pushers there were. If anyone knows who was the first such mascot, won't you let me know?