Many children would have had this book as a present on Christmas Day 1938, so its 108 pages included some festive strips and references, such as on the cover.
The book featured a packed mixture of humour and adventure strips and prose stories. I suspect some were reprints from the weekly, as was often the practice of publisher Amalgamated Press. Here's a selection of a few of the interior strips, some festive, some not...
The Mountain Raiders strip was illustrated by Reg Perrott, a standout adventure artist of the times whose work still looks impressive today. Tragically, Reg's career was cut short with his death in 1947...
The Lieutenant Daring strip featured some pleasant artwork by Roy Wilson, but also sadly some unpleasant racist slurs, typical of the period...
I'm not sure who drew the other strips, but if anyone out there does know, please leave a comment.
Towards the back of the book there was an advert for the weekly Golden comic...
...and the back cover featured an advert for beef suet! A bizarre choice of ad in a children's annual by modern standards but quite common back then.
If you want to see what the weekly Golden comic was like, click on this link to see an old posting of mine...
https://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2009/12/vintage-colour-comics-golden-no125-1940.html
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I hope you've enjoyed this year's selection of Christmas comic pages. Thanks for dropping by. I'm taking a break from blogging for a few days now but I wish you all a Merry Christmas of slap-up feeds, and a Happy New Year!
A most excellent snowman, chap!
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas, enjoy the break.
With food rationing and WW2 in full swing, I can only imagine the hunger pangs those young readers would have been feeling when looking at that suet advertisment! I wonder if it was food rationing that was the catalyst for all those comic strips where the kids would often be seen tucking into a giant slap up meal as a reward.
ReplyDeleteKen.
Happy Christmas to all your readers!
Many happy returns Lew. Thanks for the christmas comics advent calendar again.
ReplyDeleteThanks everyone. Yes, Ken, that was part of it but the "slap-up feed" in comics appeared long before rationing. It was depicted as a big reward from the early days of comics. Such a large feed would be considered a luxury by the readers.
ReplyDeleteThanks for all the festive covers.
ReplyDeleteI hope you are enjoying your Christmas.
Happy Christmas
ReplyDeletelove Roy Wilson's work and funny ad! Monster Munch was an advert in the 80's on the back of fleetway annuals one year..
Thanks Sid, Peter. Hope you've had good Christmases too.
ReplyDeleteHappy holidays, Lew ! I don't comment half as much as I always intend to but your blog is one of the best around. I always look forward to seeing a new post. I hope you can keep it up during 2018. Sincere best wishes.
ReplyDeleteThanks, John. There will be some changes to the blog in 218, which I'll elaborate on more in a few days time.
ReplyDelete