Number 2329: Comics McCormick underwater

I believe this is the last Comics McCormick story I have to offer. There might be a couple more in some issues of Ed Wheelan’s Fat and Slat (published by EC Comics for four issues in the late 1940s), which I don’t have. Wheelan, long a favorite old-time comic artist of mine, wrote and drew these imaginative and funny stories of a boy’s obsession with comic books.

You can see more by typing Comics McCormick into the search engine for this blog.

Comics McCormick and the Waterman is from Comics’ only appearance in Cat-Man Comics, issue #28 (1945).

Number 2272: The Terrific Comics McCormick

Ed Wheelan was an old-time cartoonist with a newspaper comic strip, Minute Movies, which began during the silent movie era. He worked on other comic strips after Minute Movies was canceled. Wheelan drew new episodes of Minute Movies for Flash Comics, and followed Max Gaines, publisher of Flash Comics, into Gaines’s later endeavor, EC Comics, where he did Fat and Slat.

Wheelan’s style has a particular charm for me. He still drew in the style of an earlier time. It was not changed by him to reflect contemporary tastes of the 1940s.  “Comics” McCormick was a feature Wheelan did for two different publishers: M.C. Gaines (Educational Comics), and Frank Temerson (publishing comics under various names. In this case called Continental Magazines, publishers of Terrific Comics) where Wheelan’s work was shown. Obviously Wheelan was allowed to retain the rights to his character. “Comics” McCormick appeared in five issues of early EC Comics after appearing in five issues of Frank Temerson’s comics.

“Comics” appeared in Terrific Comics numbers 2-6, and today’s story is from the final issue, number 6 (1944).

For more “Comics” adventures click on the thumbnail:

Number 1474: The old timer

Edgar “Ed” Wheelan is one of my favorite old-time cartoonists, and I’ve featured his funny artwork and stories several times.

Wheelan had a successful comic strip, “Minute Movies,” which appeared in newspapers during the twenties and thirties. When he went into the comic books he even revived the title for his feature in Flash Comics, one of which I’m showing here.

It’s not within the scope of this blog to feature newspaper comic strips, although I do present their comic book reprints. But I’d like to at least bring attention to Ed Wheelan’s newspaper work, which was sadly neglected after the strip ended in 1935.

There have been some attempts to reprint “Minute Movies,” including this 1977 trade paperback by Hyperion Press:

And this squarebound 40 page “graphic novel” from Malibu Graphics in 1990 doesn’t use the name “Minute Movies” on the covers, but it is a reprint of a 1934 continuity from the comic strip.

These are hard to find nowadays, but if you’re interested they are worth having.

One of the best examples of the the strip was printed in the late Woody Gelman’s Nostalgia Comics, #’s 2 and 3, in 1972. Hairy Green Eyeball posted it in his blog in 2009, and you can find the links beneath the two stories I’m showing today. “Padlock Homes” is from a series in Harvey’s Champ Comics, and is from issue #19 (1942). The “Minute Movies” episode of Jack and the Beanstalk is from Flash Comics #38 (1943).

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Parts one and two of the 1933 continuity, “Serpents of the City,” from Nostalgia Comics. Click on the pictures.






Some comics work by Wheelan featured here last January:

Number 1413: Three Wheelan with Comics McCormick

We’re having another theme week this week, kicking off “Comical Comics Week” with Ed Wheelan’s funny Comics McCormick strips.

Writer-artist Ed Wheelan has been featured a few times in this blog. As a cartoonist he is a sentimental favorite of mine, even though I didn’t hear of him until his career was long over. It was in an early-sixties issue of Don and Maggie Thompson’s Comic Art fanzine that I read an article by Burroughs Bibliophile Vern Coriell about Wheelan’s magnum opus, Minute Movies. Just from the samples shown I became a fan of his old-fashioned style. Minute Movies was a popular strip in the 1920s, featuring a regular cast starring in comic strip versions of silent movies. It was inventive and entertaining. Wheelan joined the comic book ranks early on, although he never really changed his style to adapt to the different medium. He was still the bigfoot cartoonist he had been 20 years earlier. As far as I can tell he worked for these publishers during the forties: All American (Max Gaines, partnered with DC Comics), Harvey Comics, Et-Es-Go (publishers of today's postings), and EC Comics (Max Gaines after he sold All American to DC Comics).

Wheelan, who was born in 1888, was in his mid-fifties when he did these charming strips.

Comics McCormick (or “Comics” — Wheelan loved the old fashioned way of putting quotes around nicknames and slang) was a boy who collected and read comics. Unlike Supersnipe (another popular comic of the forties, done by George Marcoux, also a cartoonist from an earlier era), Comics McCormick’s excursions into the world of superheroes were fantasies, while Supersnipe took his Grandpa’s old red underwear and a mask and became a “superhero.” (Damn, now Wheelan has me using quotes.)

These three stories are from consecutive issues of Terrific Comics, numbers 2, 3 and 4 (1944).

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More Comics McCormick posted a few years ago by Pappy. Click on the pictures.