BLAST From The PAST...

Okay, so who remembers these PINK PANTHER bars from NESTLE'S?  (I've got the DINKY car as well - two versions - one with a big rubber wheel in the middle and one without - must  post them on the blog sometime.)  Y'know, I can still recall what this bar tasted like - wish Nestle's would reissue it just so I can check that my memory's correct.

Anyone else remember a favourite chocolate or candy bar which is no longer around?  Let's hear from you.

 Click here to see Fry's 5 Centre. 

PART TWO Of CICELY MARY BARKER...

Copyright relevant owner

Presenting the final six pictures by CICELY MARY BARKER from The LITTLE PICTURE HYMN BOOK.  Enjoy the serenity and tranquillity that these illustrations epitomize, and try to recall what it was like to be a child of another, far different era.

(Click here for Part One.) 

CICELY MARY BARKER - The FAIRY And FLOWER GIRL - PART ONE...

Copyright relevant owner

Way back in the early '80s, I was at a Christmas Fayre in my old primary school and acquired a small publication called The LITTLE PICTURE HYMN BOOK.  For no other reason than one of accuracy, I should perhaps mention that it was a Christmas Fayre on behalf of the church across the road from my old house, but was held in the school at the bottom of the same street for reasons of space.  (The Fayre was bigger than the church building could easily accommodate, you see.)  Not that it's important, but I'm fuelled by a compulsion to be as precise as I can when relating these small matters of personal history.

Anyway, the book had attracted my attention because it was illustrated by CICELY MARY BARKER (1895-1973), a celebrated artist of fairies (and flowers), much in the mould of the Cottingley fairies photographs which had so entranced Sir ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE back around 1917-1920.  The little book had a distinct charm and, through its colourful illustrations, conjured up a long-vanished era when children were children - and not the fractious, obnoxious creatures they are today. One of the hymns in the booklet was "All Things Bright and Beautiful" which, in my previous primary in a different neighbourhood, my class had sung every morning just before the start of lessons.  I only had to hear (or read) a few lines of the hymn and I was transported back to practically the dawn of my childhood, so how could I resist buying the book for my very own collection?

Sometimes, when lying in bed at night, with nothing to read and bored out of my skull, I would dig out the book from my bedside drawer and look at the pictures - and sometimes even read "All Things Bright and Beautiful" to myself to help remind me of my childhood days so many years before.  When we moved to a new house in 1983 and I found myself repeating the experience in my new abode, I couldn't do so without wistfully remembering doing the same thing in my old room in what seemed another life away.

Amazingly, just over four years later, we moved back to the previous house - where I still reside nearly 25 years later.  Now, whenever I look through my little book of an evening, not only do I remember doing so in the same room of the same house over 30 years before, I also recall doing so in the other house while looking back on the one I now reside in - almost as if I'm observing myself through a window, watching myself through another window as I contemplate myself in the room in which I now sit looking back on the past.  Yeah, I know, it's a difficult one - you'll have to think about it for a moment.

So what's the point of all this philosophical rambling?  Merely this: I wanted to explain the reasons why I now unleash upon you the first six of twelve colour illustrations by Cicely Mary Barker from The Little Picture Hymn Book.  Looking at them, don't you feel like a little kid again, playing under the hot Summer sun in the grassy green fields of your childhood when you thought you'd be a child forever?

 Someone tell me that it's not just me.

(Click here for Part Two.)

BEANO And DANDY SCANS And SCAMS - The TRUTH REVEALED...

The CHIMERA-POSNER book

I run this blog because I'm a fan - I don't consider myself an expert - on anything!  There are some things I know a little about, some things I know a lot about - but absolutely nothing I know everything about.  It's the same with most people.  Even those who write detailed and informative articles on some subject or other have to check their facts with other sources as they go along.  If I'm not sure about something, I usually say so - and I'm never dogmatic when there's an absence of proof or room for doubt.

Now, at the risk of boring regular readers, I find that I must return to an earlier topic, but bear with me - hopefully it'll be instructive.  Recently, someone posted scans of a facsimile of The DANDY on their blog.  I left a fairly innocuous comment along the lines of: "Shame you don't have an original copy from which to scan, instead of a mini-facsimile."  Well, blow me down if that didn't open a can of worms.  The indignant blog owner replied that the scans weren't from a mini-facsimile, but rather the 1978 CHIMERA-POSNER volume, D.C. THOMSON FIRSTS.  Let's take a look at the scan he posted, shall we?

Scan from site which claims image is from D.C. THOMSON FIRSTS

Click on the above image - then enlarge it and study it.  Now look at The Dandy cover below, which was actually scanned from the book that he claims his images were sourced from.  This is from my own copy of the book so there's no room for doubt - and it's because I can finally show conclusive proof that I've returned to the subject.

Scan from D.C. THOMSON FIRSTS book

As you can see, the Chimera-Posner book used a different source - one that has a tear in the cover and hasn't had an outline added to the lettering in the upper-right corner of the page. Now study the following pic, scanned from a mini-facsimile in my possession, and compare it with the cover taken from the other blog - apart from some scuffs on the first image, the two are identical - even down to the positioning of the staples.  (I've left a margin on the spine so that you can check for yourselves.)

Scan of mini-facsimile



When I pointed this out to the blogger, he claimed that someone else had supplied the scans and informed him they were from the Chimera-Posner book.  Really?  I just don't buy it.  It's hardly a mistake one could easily make, given the clear differences between the two sources.  The simplest and most obvious explanation is that the blogger is lying.  As someone else has since pointed out, he once lifted scans from another blog without permission, and only sought retroactive consent once he'd been caught out.  (If he's running true to form, he probably claimed to have been sent the scans by someone who hadn't revealed where they were from.)  Is this what lies behind his denials?  Has he been lifting scans from other blogs and mis-attributing them to other sources in a bid to escape detection?

This blogger is a member of a comics forum to which a detractor of mine also belongs, and says that he has had many a discussion with said person in the past, so the pair are certainly not total strangers.  This detractor turned up on the other's blog claiming that the facsimiles contained in the book had also been issued separately (which I have never disputed - the late comics historian DENIS GIFFORD had some in his collection), and that the blogger was therefore correct in his original assertion that The Dandy pages did indeed come from the 1978 C-P book.  The above scans confirm the erroneous nature of his claim.

Scan of SUNDAY POST's BEANO facsimile from other site

I had also pointed out to the blogger that The BEANO scans he had featured on another post were missing four pages and had come from a facsimile given away with The SUNDAY POST a few years back, not D.C. Thomson Firsts.  The blogger originally disputed the page count, saying that several 'experts' had confirmed his statement, but has since admitted, grudgingly, that I was correct after all.  So much for his un-named 'experts' - or was he lying again?  Also, contrary to what he currently appears to be suggesting on his blog, The D.C. Thomson Firsts book printed the full 28 pages of The Beano, not 24 - and a different source seems to have been used for the facsimile given away with The Sunday Post.

Scan from D.C. THOMSON FIRSTS book

So - the verdict is in.  The blogger has been consistently wrong - but blames others for supplying him with misinformation.  His honesty, however, has already been demonstrated to be highly suspect.  My detractor - who fancies himself as a comics 'expert' - in his eagerness to spite me by endorsing the blogger's inaccuracies, has demonstrated that he doesn't know what he's talking about in this instance.  The fact that he only responded to the blogger's two posts on which I had commented - in order to disagree with me and take a dig - seems highly suggestive of his motivations.

The above scans prove beyond doubt or dispute that I was right all along.  If only the blogger could have contented himself with a gracious 'thank you' - instead of a bitter tirade against me for merely trying to be helpful - both he and his forum chum could have been spared the resulting damage to their credibility.

MOONFLEET - A CLASSIC FOR ALL AGES...

You've probably seen the 1955 movie, MOONFLEET, starring STEWART GRANGER - very atmospheric, but massively abridged and with a completely different ending.  If you haven't read the book by J. MEADE FALKNER, treat yourself without delay.  Don't be put off by the fact that it's described as a 'children's classic' - that only means there's no bad language or sex scenes.  It's an absolutely terrific read and definitely a classic - but adults would certainly enjoy it too.

"Ah, sweet boyhood, how eager are we as boys to be quit of thee, with what regret do we look back on thee before our man's race is halfway run!!

Now ain't that the truth!

FANTASTIC COVER GALLERY PART FOUR...

Copyright MARVEL COMICS

And here we are again, folks - with the latest batch of groovy FANTASTIC covers from the swingin' '60s. Let's not waste any time wading through waffle from me and get straight into them. Amen, brother!

MURGATROYD The MAGPIE...

Copyright relevant owner

"One for sorrow, two for joy..." - I'm sure you can finish off the rest of the theme by yourselves.  Remember The SWOTS & The BLOTS from SMASH! comic?  Well, describing MAGPIE as the Blots' equivalent to the Swots' BLUE PETER is perhaps the easiest way to state the difference between the two programmes.  The easiest maybe, but far from the most accurate - I never really bought into the myth that Blue Peter was designed with middle-class kids in mind.

There wasn't much difference (if any) between the Magpie and Blue Peter offerings - the contents were pretty much interchangeable, and it was obvious that THAMES TELEVISION was merely following the formulaic format of the BBC's yearly publication.  Only the pics of the presenters distinguished the two books, with Magpie featuring (initially) SUSAN STRANKS, PETE BRADY and TONY BASTABLE.

Magpie was first broadcast in 1968 and was intended to compete with its BBC counterpart, though it tried to be more "down with the kids, innit".  What can I say?  Well, the latter is still with us - the former disappeared, never to be seen again, in 1980.  Here are some piccies from the second book, just to give you a taste of it.

  

The EAGLE TAKES FLIGHT - And CAPTAIN PUGWASH SETS SAIL...

Copyright relevant owner

EAGLE #1 - a landmark in British publishing history.  However, nowadays, not many people know that not only did the new comic launch the career of DAN DARE, it was also responsible for unveiling another swashbuckling 'hero' to the waiting world - none other than CAPTAIN PUGWASH!  Yes, that's right - JOHN RYAN's master of The BLACK PIG first appeared in the premier issue of MARCUS MORRIS's and FRANK HAMPSON's 1950s masterpiece - the Eagle.

This comic was the top-selling title of its day - and arguably the most famous adventure weekly that Britain ever produced.  Even today, a dedicated fan club exists to commemorate the glory that was Eagle.  And just think - it would probably never have existed if not for horror and crime comics of the '40s giving rise to a desire for more 'wholesome' periodicals for young and impressionable readers.  From every fire a Phoenix rises - although in this case it was a Phoenix in the form of an Eagle.

Anyway, enjoy the front and back covers of the first edition - along with the debut of ol' Captain Pugwash, Britain's best-loved pirate. 

"HERE'S ONE I MADE EARLIER..."

Copyright BBC TV

BLUE PETER, non-British readers of this blog may be surprised to learn, is not a German porn channel, but rather a popular children's television magazine programme which first hit our screens in 1958 and is still running today.  (Making it fifty-four years old come October.)

Surprisingly, it took a whole six years for the first-ever Blue Peter Book (never called an annual until near the end of its run) to appear in shops, which it did in the latter part of 1964.  This first book was published by LUTTERWORTH PRESS, which may explain the uncharacteristic use of advertising in a BBC-associated publication.  (The naming of AIRFIX model kits would surely never have happened on the TV programme.  [See page at foot of post.]  That's why SELLOTAPE was always referred to as "sticky-back plastic" and FAIRY LIQUID bottles described as "washing-up detergent containers".)

The second book in the series was published by the BBC themselves and, sure enough, a feature on model aeroplanes described them only as "plastic kits", with no mention at all of the manufacturer.  The books tended to follow the format of the TV programme (no surprise there) and had a variety of articles, stories and illustrated adventures.  All rather 'twee' actually, but not without a certain undeniable charm.

The main presenter of Blue Peter was CHRISTOPHER TRACE (body-double to CHARLTON HESTON in the 1959 BEN HUR movie), assisted first by LEILA WILLIAMS and then ANITA WEST.  Both are largely forgotten now, obliterated from public consciousness by Chris's third female co-host, VALERIE SINGLETON.  Perhaps if the books had been around when either of Valerie's predecessors were presenting the programme, they would be better remembered today, rather than just as curious footnotes in the programme's history.

When JOHN NOAKES joined the show in 1966, things really started to move, as he soon became a daredevil action-man prepared to tackle practically anything.  JAMES BOND could've taken some tips from John Noakes, believe me.  When Christopher Trace departed the line-up after nine years, ex-Dr. WHO assistant, PETER PURVES, took his place and the dream-team was complete.  To those who lived through this particular period, nobody has ever come close to emulating the magic that Val  John and Peter (and Lesley) created between them.

Here, then, is a brief glimpse at the first-ever Blue Peter Book, to whet your appetite and give you a look back at more innocent time in kids' publishing.  We shall never see its like again - more's the pity.

   

SUPERMAN COMMEMORATIVE STAMP...

Copyright DC COMICS

Talking of stamps (as we were in the previous post), here’s a nice item by the U.S. POSTAL SERVICE – a First Day Issuance SUPERMAN stamp from September 10th, 1998 – along with a Commemorative replica edition of ACTION COMICS #1 featuring the first appearance of CLARK KENT and his alter-ego.  Unlike the mini DANDY replica which consists of only twelve pages from the original comic, the USPS facsimile is a complete and unabridged, standard U.S. comic-sized issue.  The only thing missing is the 1938 price of 10 cents on the cover.  You’ve got to hand it to our American cousins – when they do something, they do it properly.

 

“Up, up and awaaaaaay!”

STAMP THIS OUT AT ONCE...

Characters copyright relevant and respective owners

The new ROYAL MAIL Comic Stamps Presentation Pack, released on the 20th (yesterday) is a nice little set to have in one's collection.  I bought mine in the afternoon from my local Post Office and was told they only had a couple left.  Priced at £5.10, an abridged, mini-facsimile of The DANDY is included so, if you haven't purchased yours yet, I'd advise you to get your skates on.  In the meantime, here's what you're missing...