A Stanley Story for Voting Day: Tubby in "Election Day," Little Lulu 39, 1950

In our ongoing attempt to make Election Day more enjoyable, we turn to the wisdom and resourcefulness of that great American, Tubby Tompkins.

As you go to the voting booth (or mail your ballot), take a moment to enjoy this delightful 1950 story by John Stanley and Irving Tripp.

Stanley rarely trafficked in overt political commentary. In this story, he suggests that the behavior of adult men, vying for powerful positions and public offices, aren't too far removed, in their behavior, from children.

Some behaviors learned on the playground continue to influence adults in the big, bad "real world."  This season's political circus is evident--and sufficient-- proof of this theory. Enjoy!

No post-story commentary today... just a friendly reminder to cast your ballot!

Of Mice and Mensch: Woody The Exterminator, from New Funnies 115, September 1946

One of the small rewards of Dell Comics scholarship is in spotting the myriad in-jokes and self-references in which the creators indulged themselves.

The writers and artists of Oskar Lebeck's Western Publishing staff delighted in putting one another's names--and caricatures--all over their comic-book stories.

These references, given the general lack of documentation available at present, have become the only way we have to determine who's who in the Western world.

Michael Barrier has been exploring this phenomenon in his on-going research for an upcoming book on Lebeck and his genial comics empire--a book I can't wait to read.

Naughty Nurses and Disillusioned Drunks: Stories from Linda Lark, Registered Nurse 2, 1961

PLEASE NOTE: With this post, I'm trying a new way to distribute the comics material on this blog. Please see the notice at the bottom of this post.

The text is full of spoilers, and is intended to be read after you've read the comics material discussed therein.

Please let me know if you like this new format--thanks! Look for this typographical roadsign at the bottom of this post:

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After he left Little Lulu, John Stanley attempted to create several new comic-book series for his then-foundering publisher, Dell Comics.

His old alma mater, Western Publications, had split from being the packager of Dell's best-selling comic magazines. They formed Gold Key Comics, and swiftly went downhill (in terms of quality) and uphill (in terms of sales and success).

For reasons yet unknown, Stanley chose to leave Western and produce new material for the struggling, rebuilt-from-scratch Dell imprint.

Stripped of their long-running licensed titles and characters, the new Dell scrambled to get something distinctive on the highly competitive comic book market.

Drawn + Quarterly Plugs The John Stanley 1940s Bibliography!

My pal Tom Devlin posted this very kind promo for the still-available, poorly-selling 1940s John Stanley bibliography. He says on the D+Q blog...

It's been said time and time again--Frank Young is providing one of the great internet services with his Stanley Stories blog. Trenchant commentary on all phases of the great John Stanley's cartooning and writing careers would be enough but Frank also does some serious detective work and constantly discovers new Stanley material in the nooks and crannies of the Dell catalog. Easily my favorite historical comics website.

Okay, so I titled this post "Late to the Party" because I'm at least three months late with this post to celebrate Frank's amazing achievement--A comprehensive bibliography of John Stanley's 1940s comics work. For me, this is one of the great comics nerd resources out there. Check it out. Go buy it... Do it!!

See the original post HERE--and, as ever, thanks, Tom!

Comics Within Comics: John Stanley's Little Lulu Fairy Tale Meta-Stories

The hundreds of spontaneous fairy-tales that occur in John Stanley's Little Lulu offered their creator a constant, reliable escape route from formula.

These playful comics-within-comics were, themselves, among Stanley's successful recipes for writing a popular monthly comic magazine.

When the two stories presented here today first appeared in print, in two consecutive 1951 issues of Marge's Little Lulu, the title was among the best-selling newsstand publications in America. Stanley was in a position of great potential pressure. He created stories that children and adults read in equal measure, and on completely different planes of enjoyment.

The responsibility might have psyched out anyone who stopped to think about it. Most likely, John Stanley was simply too busy with the work to take stock of his position. Lulu, by dint of its high circulation, was potentially as influential a magazine as Life, Time or The Saturday Evening Post. As a comic book, it, by no means, stood to change public opinion, or address crucial modern issues, as did those slick magazines. But it was as widely read, and its readership depended on its creative team to deliver the goods, month in, month out.

Another Tip Top Tipple: A Nancy and Two Sluggos (feat. McOnion) from 1959

As is evident from even a quick reading, John Stanley was a bit burned out on Little Lulu in 1959. He had every right to be. Fifteen years of steady work on the series (including the companion title, Tubby) had yielded some 7,270 pages of comics--at least 700 of those also illustrated by him.

Lulu was continued by others, who followed Stanley's example to the letter, but without a vestige of the soul formerly present in the characters.

Someone at Western Publications had the brilliant idea that John Stanley should continue writing stories about kids, based on licensed properties. Having wrested rights to United Feature Syndicate's characters from UFS itself, Dell published a plethora of comics with the characters from Nancy, Peanuts and Captain and the Kids.

They ignored Gus Arriola's Gordo, which might have made a successful comic book transplantation, and apparently avoided Al Capp's Li'l Abner, which was a wise move.

Nancy, as I've written here before, is really just Little Lulu sideways. One can sense John Stanley's frustration in still being asked to churn out stories about kids and the suburbs. A certain anger rises from the base of these stories. This anger breeds a brittle, edgy comedy, often laced with dark impulses, and peppered with open hostility from its adult characters to its children.

On the other hand, Nancy gave Stanley a complete break from the heavy rules and regulations of Little Lulu. Though he was too careworn to run wild with this new property, he did approach it with a certain venomous vigor.

Scavengers of Snacks and Sexual Status: "Tom and Jerry" from Our Gang 19, 1945

John Stanley co-opted the "Tom and Jerry" feature in Our Gang Comics in 1945. For a few precious stories, he converted it into a vehicle for an emerging, highly distinct and personal style of comic-book storytelling. The results were ahead of their time, and sadly short-lived.

Stanley worked on the series from early 1943, and inherited it from writer Gaylord DuBois with issue 6 of the MGM-themed anthology, Our Gang Comics. Stanley contributed increasingly assured, sharp writing and cartooning to this series until early 1946.

By then, another licensed property--the licensed property of his career--called on his full attention. Little Lulu's growing popularity, as an original Dell comic book series, kept him busy producing 52-page comic books on his own, from script to art to lettering, in a constant series of one-shot editions.

Before Lulu became a regular Dell comic book, Stanley had let go of much of the final rendering. Charles Hedinger came aboard in 1947, to be joined by Irving Tripp sometime in 1948.

It's a pity that Stanley had to abandon "Tom and Jerry"-- he was on the verge of hitting a smart, hip and modern sensibility to comic books. He wouldn't get this vibe back until the early 1960s. Flashes of the razor wit and keen observational comedy of Thirteen Going on Eighteen is seen in some 1945 T&J stories.