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ecgt

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Everything posted by ecgt

  1. ecgt
    Next up, "Kromalaffing" from 1984. This was an exhibition catalogue given away at the ChromaZone/Chromatique's "Kromalaffin" art show held at Toronto's Grunwald Gallery. This an art show focused on comic book creators and was curated by Michael Merrill (who was involved in creating several obscure Canadian comics during the era). The catalogue includes comic strips and sketches from a venerable list of alternative comic creators from the era, including Americans like Harvey Pekar, Charles Burns and Art Spiegelman, as well as Canadian artists like David Boswell (of Reid Fleming fame), Chester Brown and Peter Dako (who did "Casual, Casual"). Part comic book, part art exhibit catalogue, this one can be pretty hard to track down for a reasonable price. Here are some images from a current eBay listing.
  2. ecgt
    How can one talk about comics during the later Canadian Silver Age without talking about Chester Brown? The next two giveaways that I will show feature some of Brown's work. The first is a giveaway that was a tie-in with the documentary film of the same name, "Comic Book Confidential." This was published in 1989 by Sphinx Productions.
  3. ecgt
    Guess it works in the USA and Canada only then?
  4. ecgt
    I've never heard of a store owner stapling comics either, but I can't say I'm surprised. Looks like the same appraiser has looked at comics on ARS before:
  5. ecgt
  6. ecgt
    No need to wait. Here's a link from the PBS website: http://www.pbs.org/video/3001207738/
  7. ecgt
  8. ecgt
    Those are K.G. Murray comics from Australia. https://www.comics.org/series/34624/ https://www.comics.org/series/34626/
  9. ecgt
    Glad to be able to brighten your day! Those Super Shamou shorts are a lot of fun.
  10. ecgt
    Here's a convoluted and confusing giveaway that happens to have a Canadian and American version. In the mid-1950s, UK comic creators Norman Williams and Geoffrey Bond (as Alan Jason) created historical comics within the pages of "Eagle." Eagle is probably best known for its character Dan Dare. One of their comic strips was called "The Baden-Powell Story." Jump ahead to 1970 and all of a sudden their strip was reprinted in both Canada and the USA as a giveaway comic by each country's respective national Boy Scout organization. Each of these giveaways had different titles and covers, but had the same interior art. The USA version is called, "Adventures of a Scout: The Life of Baden-Powell," while the Canadian giveaway is called "B.-P.'s Life in Pictures." Admittedly, it took me far longer than I had originally hoped to figure out the history of these two giveaways. Here they are:
  11. ecgt
    I hesitate to call this four page mini-pamphlet a comic, but it certainly is comic-like. This is a really bizarre giveaway from the United Church that came out of Toronto and is an attempt to guilt church-goers into giving the church more money. This is from the late-1960s. For your entertainment, "If Your Church Envelope Could Speak."
  12. ecgt
    The next giveaway comic that I have been able to identify from BC is "The Great Chicken Caper" published in 1983 for Clark's Chicken Coop. The art is by Ron Norton, owner of the of Shuster Award winning shop "The Comic Shop," which is one of the oldest comic book stores in Canada. The story was by Bruce and John Clark, who owned the restaurant in question. Thanks to fellow board member, Reverend, for bringing this one to my attention a few months back and providing the pictures.
  13. ecgt
    Juggernaut's addition to the list of "Pacific Rescue" and "The Sea Pirates," coincidentally anticipates what I intended to show in my next post. One of the bizarre things about the giveaway era is that the output of comics from British Columbia all but disappeared. This is bizarre because of the fact that Vancouver's Maple Leaf was one of the dominant Canadian comics publishers during WECA and that by the early 1970s, Vancouver became a hot spot for the Underground Comix movement due to the work of Rand Holmes, George Metzger, Brent Boates and Bob Hunter for Georgia Straight. When the Canadian comics industry ceased to exist in the mid-1950s, the Canadian Fishing Company of Vancouver hired Walt Disney Studios in Anaheim to create a series of comics in order to promote its "Seal" brands of Tuna and Salmon. The only other comic from this series that I am aware of is "The Silver Treasure Hunt" which was published circa 1955. There may have been other comics commissioned from Disney at the time, but the fact that the Canadian Fishing Company had to commission work from Disney goes to show just how limited their options were in Canada at the time. If you have any others, I'd love to see them!
  14. ecgt
    Thanks for all of these pics, Juggernaut! I appreciate the upgrades on a few scans I have on file. I also am very happy to see a French copy of Skoodi (as I was unaware it existed). I had not added Arctic Comics due to the fact that it has a cover price, but given that it is a souvenir comic (from Nick Burns of Super Shamou fame), it's worth adding to the pile. Cheers!
  15. ecgt
    Super Shamou actually had it's own series of television shorts on the Inuit Broadcasting Corporation (IBC) in the late 1980s as part of the television program "Takuyaksat." One of the reasons why I have become so enamoured with the property is that the television shorts are mostly in Inuktitut (with a little bit of English). Filmed in and around Baker Lake in what is now Nunavut, Super Shamou was part of the IBC's attempt to maintain cultural autonomy in its broadcasting, rather than allowing the Canadian North to become another market for English television programming. IBC was the first Native language television station in North America and still exists to this day. Here are links to a couple of Super Shamou shorts from "Takuyaksat" starring Peter Tapati in the title role. They are super cheesy! http://www.isuma.tv/ibc/super-shamou-1a-1987 http://www.isuma.tv/ibc/super-shamou-2a-1987
  16. ecgt
    Certainly, there were numerous Canadian giveaways during the Canadian Golden Age, but after the industry collapsed in the mid-1950s with the closure of Canada's last Golden Age comic publisher, Superior, giveaways didn't really disappear. These two "Our Vacation in Ontario" comics are the earliest examples of Canadian giveaway comics that I can identify being published during and after the collapse of the Canadian comic book industry. They were published in conjunction with the Government of Ontario's Department of Travel and Publicity. I believe that the first issue was released in either 1955 or 1956 towards the end of Minister Louis-Pierre Cécile's tenure. The second issue was released circa 1958 during the tenure of Minister Bryan Cathcart. I have no idea who the artist(s) are.
  17. ecgt
    In 1982, the Public Legal Education Association (PLEA) of Saskatchewan commissioned (at least) six comic books by Robert Bedier, Mary Tastad and Helen Ross. All of these comics were funded through a "Summer Justice Grant" from the Department of Justice in 1981. What is particularly interesting is the subject-matter and the fact that these comics were designed for an adult audience (to the extent that the credits pages call these "picture books"). These comics are so rare that I do not have any scans to post here. However, thanks to Richard Graham at UNL, some are available in PDF format. From what I have been able to document, this group produced the following comics (with links to PDFs where available): 1. Break and Enter 2. Discrimination in Housing 3. Drinking and Driving http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/comics/id/217/rec/2 4. Renting http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/comics/id/216/rec/1 5. Sexual Assault and After http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/comics/id/215/rec/1 6. Wife Abuse
  18. ecgt
    In 1976, this Don Inman comic called "Superkids" was published by the Canadian government's Department of Energy, Mines and Resources in conjunction with The Office of Energy Conservation. There is a French version called "Les enfants formidables." A PDF of the comic has been made available by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, which houses one of the largest number of government comics in the United States thanks to the hard work of Professor Richard Graham, who is a former Eisner Award judge. For your interest, here's a link to the comic: http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm/ref/collection/comics/id/227
  19. ecgt
    I was pretty sure that the KFC/Taco Bell on Quinpool was where the Town and Country was located. Thanks for confirming. Since your mother worked for Ernie Edwards, this could be a good opportunity to find some of these books. I own Colonel Sanders # 1 and Colonel Ernie # 2. The horrible looking Colonel Sanders # 2 in my post is the only example I have been able to find and I've never seen a Colonel Ernie # 1. Let me know what you find out.
  20. ecgt
    Captain Al Cohol wouldn't be the last superhero designed by the government for the Canadian Territories. Late in the Canadian Silver Age, the federal government published "Super Shamou" in conjunction with the Inuit Broadcasting Company in 1987. Created by Barney Pattunguyak and Peter Tapati, the comic features the art of Nick Burns, who published several other comic books about the Arctic in the 1980s. Unlike Captain Al Cohol, Super Shamou teaches Inuit children about the dangers of sniffing solvents to get high. This is probably my favourite Canadian giveaway comic. Two versions exist: one in English/Inuktitut and the Other in French/Inuktitut. Half of the comic is in English or French and ends at the centre wrap. Flip over the comic and it is reprinted entirely in Inuktitut. The Inuktitut translation is by Micah Lightstone. Here is the English/Inuktitut version from my personal collection.
  21. ecgt
    In 1973, the Canadian government commissioned four comics to be given away in the Northwest Territories. These four comics were published by Arctic Comics and featured the eponymous superhero "Captain Al Cohol" and was provided to Inuit children as a lesson about the horrors of alcohol abuse. The story was by Art Sorensen with art by Phil Clark and Dale Austin. Making it difficult for collectors is that these were generally only available in the Northwest Territories and that the four issues are not individually numbered, which leads to confusion. I recently had a chance to look at all four at Library and Archives Canada and they are impressive books. Here are scans of the first two in the series, as well as a splash page.
  22. ecgt
    This trend continued well into the mid-1980s (which is properly part of the Canadian Silver Age, as defined by John Bell). Here is a comic that was published in 1985 by Graphikel Inc. from Quebec. The creators included Claude Gagné, Gabriel Lalonde and Francine Vernac. This comic was published simultaneously in English as "Hello! Hello!" and in French as "Allô! Allô!" This was a giveaway from Bell Telephones intended to teach children about how to use the technology. Seems a bit dated now!
  23. ecgt
    During the 1970s, McCarron and Edmiston became the kings of Canadian giveaway comics. At the same time, there continued to be one-off groups publishing their own giveaways. Here is an obscure one from 1979 from Delta Web Graphics called "Small Business...The Soul of Your Community." It was commissioned by The Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
  24. ecgt
    By the early 1970s, Ganes' comic output essentially ceased. He became an outspoken critic of the Pierre Trudeau government and was also highly critical of the Conservative government too. One of the last examples of Ganes' work that I have been able to find comes from this book, "The National Dilemma and the Way Out," published in 1975. Ganes provides the illustrations.
  25. ecgt
    Here's a Canadian giveaway that is from 1965 and was published in conjunction with the "Canadian Wildlife Service, National Parks Branch." I suspect that this is a Ganes book, but without additional information I cannot verify this beyond a reasonable doubt.