Number 2533: Tilt!

Ogden Whitney does an excellent job of drawing buildings in crazy positions, bending rubber-like, and threatening. It is one of the reasons I chose this story. That, and the main character, Edward Courtney, in order to understand dreams that frighten him, visits a psychiatrist.

Dr Farraday makes snap diagnoses: “Every dream has a meaning — it’s a manifestation of something in the subconscious which is trying to break through.” Sure, okay Doc...but what about the old man, with that straggly long hair who is in those dreams? Dr Farraday brings him up, “The old man might be the key to the whole affair!” Edward denies knowing the old man, and as far as I know, not shown, the doctor may have said, “Our session is over for today. Please give me a check for $100.” I imagine that because it happened to me several years ago when I sought professional counseling.

The tilting towers in “The House on Magnolia Street” are from Adventures Into the Unknown #73 (1956).

Undercover Girl underwater

Undercover girl is tough. She can do what is necessary to solve a problem, thereby protecting the good ol' USA.

What a gal. Undercover Girl can also hold her own when it comes to fighting with other women. We know that because from what I have seen, Undercover Girl gets into a fight with another woman in almost every adventure (see the link below). In this adventure, though, she becomes not Undercover Girl, but Underwater Girl. She puts on a two-piece bathing suit and finds a missing ring on the sea bottom. That is after watching a shark kill a guy. She does not let dangers of the deep keep her from doing her job.

Ogden Whitney did his job. He was a comic book artist who over a long career drew beautiful sexy women and handsome heroic men. Some of his last work in comic books had him drawing the inimitable Herbie Popnecker. As much as I like Starr Flagg’s pulchritude, for me Whitney's depictions of Herbie were the highlight of his long career.

From ME’s Undercover Girl #5 (1952):

Number 2341: Boy Beetle, Herbie

This is a story about Herbie Popnecker, and how he found pop music stardom. He stuck a mop on his head, turned his name around to Eibreh Rekcenpop, then warbled a couple of songs to drive the girls wild! As pop stars of that era will tell you, it was not easy to compete with the Beatles. It was more of a long and winding road to stardom for most. But Herbie, errrr, I mean Eibreh, has some sort of irresistible charm about him. Herbie is so charming that he charmed a whole bunch of people into buying his comic book in the sixties, and even now it is seen as something still charming, even unique in comic book history.

In “Herbie, Boy ‘Beetle’” the Beatles really aren’t prominent; they appear in a few panels and then vanish, leaving the rest of the story to Eibreh and jealousy from established artists Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra. Just when you think the story couldn’t get any screwier, Dean and Frank assault Herbie by cracking objects over his head. That physical stuff never works on Herbie, who is impervious to harm..

Written for Herbie #5 (1964) by ACG editor Richard E. Hughes under the name Shane O’Shay, and drawn by the master of deadpan humor, Ogden Whitney. Herbie is, as always, a very unusual hero. And we love him, yeah yeah yeah.

Number 2267: Herbie goes through Hell Hades for good ol’ Peepwhistle Prep

In a comment for a 2012 posting, “Herbie and the Spirits*,” reader Kirk says, “I love the deadpan drawing style. It makes Herbie seem even weirder, and funnier.” A thought that might take me 100 words to express is boiled down to 14 words. Thanks, Kirk. You not only kept it succinct, but perfectly captured my attitude toward Herbie. Ogden Whitney, represented in this blog, was capable of drawing many things. Over his long career he had drawn superheroes, crime, horror, romance and even more genres I can’t think of right now. It seems only right that all of his skill as an artist came to a culmination in his team-up with ACG editor Richard E. Hughes, writing as Shane O’Shea, with his “deadpan” drawing style.

“Good Old Peepwhistle” has Herbie, at his father Pincus Popnecker’s demand, going on to higher education, Peepwhistle Preparatory School. He is invited to join a fraternity, Tappa Kegga Koke (ho-ho), until other frat members meet him. What else can I say except that Herbie is misjudged by people at first, but he’s more than capable of the most impossible tasks.

From Herbie #7 (1965):

*The “Spirits” story. Just click on the thumbnail.

Number 2261: Through the looking glass with Dr Wertham

What a curious story this is from Adventures Into the Unknown. A dad suffers a radiation accident and fathers twin prodigies, “talking like adults at one year!” The boys’ mother is shown fleetingly, in one panel, then vanishes from the story. The twins take to the Lewis Carroll poem, “Jabberwocky,” and work to decipher it. Bruce, the dad, consults a psychiatrist about the twins’ obsession with the poem. The psychiatrist he consults, Dr Bancroft, is the image of Dr Fredric Wertham, famous critic of the comic book industry, and author of the anti-comics book, Seduction of the Innocent. It is an inside joke, but it makes the tale curiouser and curiouser.

Ogden Whitney did the artwork for this atypical ACG entry, from Adventures Into the Unknown #13 (1950). Whitney would go on to draw dozens of stories for ACG over the years, culminating in his time on the brilliant oddball humor of Herbie, where likenesses of famous people appeared often. As far as I know, I believe this is the only time he drew Dr Wertham.