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Here are pics of a few more Ganes books. Due to their rarity, I have only been able to secure old, small scans from eBay sales from years ago. I know very little about these particular comics. From 1967, "Builders of Canada: Sir John A. MacDonald": Perhaps the first comic that Ganes produced. From 1959, "IGA Safety Guide for Bicycle Riders": Another early one, from 1960: "Farm Machinery: Safety Sense for Everyone." I have confirmed that two versions exist. One is from Manitoba Pool Elevators, but I have not found a scan. The other is from the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool, which I present here. Other versions may exist. Finally, here is an image of another McCarron comic called "Wayne and Shuster Comics."

In 1975, a comic book called "Captain Cola" was commissioned by the Pop Shoppes of Canada. I have not been able to find an example of this comic, but I have found an advertisement and an example of the Captain Cola Secret Society membership card. If anyone has a scan of the comic, I would really love to see what it looks like.

I find it quite interesting that you consider the Weird SuspenStories issues to be Superior attempting to adhere to the Fulton Bill. I've always considered this to be quite the opposite. What I mean by this is that I see removing "Crime" from the title as a clever way to sell crime comics in a way that bought them more time or was even a kind of subterfuge against the government. The contents of all three issues circumvented the law, even though they changed the title. Around the same time, Bell Features ceased its production of crime comics altogether, with series such as Crimefighers, All True Crime Comics and Lawbreakers ending in 1949 before the bill became law. Weird SuspenStories, on the other hand, came out after the bill was passed. Regardless of whether or not one subscribes to my view on the matter or Stephen's, one thing that I think is for certain is that Bell Features and Superior dealt with the Fulton Bill in totally different ways.

Here is a relatively obscure comic/colouring book that was published in 1978 by Le Fédération Acadienne de la Nouvelle-Écosse. This was written by Edith Comeau Tufts (who was a Member of the Order of Canada) and illustrated by Valérie Pelletier. From what I understand, this was given away at schools. Comeau was lauded at the time for writing the first children's story for Acadiens by an Acadian. It tells the history of the Acadiens in Nova Scotia from their arrival to their deportation. He is "Le Petit Acadien: Son identité en images":

I've long wondered just how often that Canadian comic companies attempted to flout the rules. Superior was known to try to find loopholes or even blatantly disregard the law later on when the company was challenging the Fulton Bill. It's entirely possible that there are other examples of this that have not been uncovered, but given the extent of your research into the period, I suspect that if something "new" were to turn up it would be a delightful surprise.

Ivan, I'm curious as to what you think about the Canadian Exciting Comics # 39 from 1945 that we were discussing yesterday. Have you ever encountered a FECA style book that was released during WECA? It caught me off guard.

That's part of the "charm" of these FECA books. The texture of the cover, poor quality paper and extremely common off registration problems were all part of how these companies kept costs down to maintain the 10 cent cover price. That's also why these are 36 pages instead of 52. They're not "sexy," but they are definitely interesting artefacts from a bygone era of Canadian comics. All of the books you posted close-ups of look to be in better shape than I expected. Great find.

That's definitely a Canadian White. It's a late run WECA book from around 1945 that reprints Spike & Mike stories from Joke Comics. All original Canadian content. This sort of stuff doesn't get the same amount of love (or the big bucks) as the superhero books, but it's still super cool.

I plead Section 13 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

At almost 25,000 posts here on the boards, you're probably more culpable than anyone else!

Sorry, Mike. I'd only be willing to sell if I had a duplicate, which I do not. If I do end up with an under copy you will be the first to know. Best of luck in your hunt. Have you managed to pick up any Canadian TECs lately?

Glad to help. Cool to learn about such an early FECA style book! Thanks for sharing.

No problem. My only main question for you is whether or not the interior comic art is from Exciting Comics # 35, 39 or something else. You stated that the comic has 16 interior pages. So, 18 pages including covers. This is what we would expect from most Canadian reprints as, counting each side of the page, you have 36 pages. Most Canadian reprints are 36 pages (rather than the 52 that were standard in the USA at the time). As such, your comic might have completely different contents from Exciting 35 or 39. It's more likely, though, that it has the same contents as one of the aforementioned issues, but is missing a story or two. Here's a link to the GCD for the American prints of Exciting Comics. Luckily, all of the issues have been indexed, so it shouldn't be too difficult to check. I'm curious to know what you find out. https://www.comics.org/series/167/ Cheers, brian

I've been meaning to buy these comics for a while, especially after I bought one of the original art pages from Vol. 2, # 2 last year from Sandy Carruthers.

I just checked and the inside cover is an advertisement. The story starts on the first page.

FECA books have been on the rise lately, but they generally do not sell for as much as US versions. However, this is a very interesting find. Many Pines books were reprinted in Canada during the FECA era after 1947, but they are hard to spot because unlike other publishers the Pines reprints generally do not have CDL or "Canadian Edition" written on the cover. I have an issue of America's Best Comics # 28 and Exiting Comics # 60 and 62 in my collection, but all were printed in 1948. The 1945 printing of your Exciting # 39 predates FECA and actually places this in the late-WECA period, prior to the end of WWII. The later Canadian Pines books were published by Better Publications of Canada, which has the same 36 Toronto Street address in the indicia as your comic does. However, your book's publisher is Publications Enterprises Limited (which is not to be confused with Publication Services Limited, which was a different Canadian publisher, also based in Toronto). This is a publisher that I have not encountered in the past, but obviously became Better Publications of Canada over time. Prior to now, I had never seen a US reprint (the Anglo-American Fawcett books are a different case) this early in the period. That said, the GCD does have pictures of three early issues of America's Best that may also be from 1945, but it is impossible to know for sure without having access to the indicias of those books. The early date of this book really throws me for a loop, because it predates FECA. Honestly, I am surprised that this even exists. Perhaps one of the board's WECA experts, like Stephen Lipson, can provide more information.

All joking aside, the law has had a negative effect on the history of the Canadian comic book industry. The law essentially forced Superior (the last Golden Age Canadian Comic company) to close its doors in the 1950s. It was enforced sporadically until the 1980s. The last time the law was used was in 1987 in Calgary when police raided a comic shop and charged the owners with selling obscene materials. This led to the creation of the Comic Legends Legal Defense Fund: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comic_Legends_Legal_Defense_Fund

Canadian Government to Make Comic Books Legal Again for the First Time Since the 1940s! One of the most ridiculous things about comic books in Canada is that "crime comics" have been illegal in the criminal code since the Fulton Bill was passed into law in 1949/1950. Comics are banned as part of the "Corrupting Morals" section of Canada's criminal code. Here's a link to how the law is phrased, verbatim (see 163, 1b): https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Canadian_Criminal_Law/Offences/Obscenity These laws have not been enacted since 1987 (which led to the "True North" comic series) and are considered "zombie laws." However, following the letter of the law in Canada, virtually every comic shop and comic collector is breaking the law if they own comics that depict crimes of any kind. This video does a pretty good job of explaining how this works: Well, just now the Canadian government's Justice Minister announced that several zombie laws are being removed from the books, including crime comics, challenging people to duels, engaging in "blasphemous libel" and pretending to practice witchcraft. Time to rejoice over challenging our enemies to duels, hoarding crime comics and pretending to practice witchcraft! It's a great time to be Canadian! http://globalnews.ca/news/3506330/criminal-code-changes-illegal-comics-duel-witchfraft/

That tends to be the case with a lot of these. I'll have to dig it out and double-check.

Was this the collection you purchased? If so, you got a pretty decent deal on some scarce books. Just spit-balling, but I'd suggest that the comics are worth double the sale price. http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-GOLDEN-AGE-ACTION-ADVENTURE-SUPERMAN-COMICS-ALL-CANADIAN-EDITIONS-SCARCE-/263011502520?hash=item3d3cb509b8%3Ag%3Acn4AAOSwYlRZIyhm&nma=true&si=bXVYNp1zV9AKhudURTsKbbjzdeU%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

I have several Canadian DC books in my collection and they seem to come up for sale relatively often. In terms of the main superhero imports during FECA, I would suggest that the Anglo-American Captain Marvels are more common than the DC superhero books from National Comic Publications of Canada. The trouble is that Simcoe picked up the rights to the DC books a bit later on. In my opinion, the Simcoe books are rarer than the National ones. There always seems to be at least a couple of DC superhero books available for sale. The Bell Features Timely superhero books (Blonde Phantom, Marvel Boy and Marvel Mystery Comics), as well as their Plastic Man comics, seem to be harder to track down than any of the DC reprints. That said, the Superior Timely reprints of Captain America Comics, Sub-Mariner and Human Torch are really tough to find. You might have to wait months or even a year sometimes for any of these to pop up. I once intended to work on the Blonde Phantom run and the Captain America Comics run, but they are so scarce that I've pretty much given up. I know that fellow boardie (and I assume fellow Atlantic Canadian) Tbone911t has been trying to put together a run of Canadian Detectives for a while. I'm not sure how he has been making out. One thing that's for sure is that the bulk of my FECA superhero books are DCs and I still manage to pick them up locally from time to time. For some reason I don't have any copies of Action or Superman though. I don't want to give anyone the impression that I have a large number of these books. I only have eight, but I've picked all of them up in Nova Scotia or New Brunswick in the past two and a half years and they are not my focus. I'll buy them if I see them, but I am not actively searching for them. Sadly, my Batman 52 is missing two centre wraps.

According to John Bell, the first Canadian giveaway comic was published in 1948 by Jack Boothe of Leaside, Ontario. As this comic is firmly in the FECA-era of the Canadian Golden Age, I hesitate to post it here. It's still an interesting look into the first of many giveaways to come. This was made as part of a membership drive for the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (which eventually became the NDP political party). Here is "Let's All Join the C.C.F."

"Heart of London" wasn't the only time that the National Gallery of Canada was associated with a Canadian giveaway comic. In 1972, the National Gallery curated an exhibition entitled "Comic Art Traditions in Canada, 1941-45." This was an outgrowth of Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert's The Great Canadian Comic Books project. The travelling exhibition focused on Bell Features artists and a mini version of Triumph Comics # 29 was printed and distributed to attendees.

Kromalaffing wasn't the first art exhibit catalogue/comic book hybrid giveaway in Canada. In 1968, Northern Miner Press published "Heart of London" (also available in French as "La Coeur de London"). Heart of London contains comic book style profiles of the artists who were involved with the art show of the same name, which travelled to various art galleries around Ontario as part of the London Regionalism art movement. Some of the artists involved include Don Vincent, John Boyle, Jack Chambers and Greg Curnoe (who died tragically in 1992 when a distracted driver plowed into a group of cyclists). Here are cover scans of both versions.