The Comix Files: Bruce Bolinger

Nicktown, Pennsylvania cartoonist Bruce Bolinger was a subscriber to City Limits Gazette in the early 1990s. He contributed a great logo that was topical at the time-- the US Postal Service wanted the public to vote on whether to have a stamp with young or old Elvis.

Bruce also agreed to be interviewed. In both contributions he supplied CLG with beautiful originals inked on Denril.

Through a series of events one could not make up, I received a cold call in this era from one of my cartoonist heroes from the 1960s Mad days, Don Martin, due to Bruce's doing. We had a very strange and funny conversation. His wife Norma got on the line as well. Too long to explain here, but maybe I'll make it part of a stand-up routine next time I'm invited to speak at a comix deal. 

Anyway, it was an honor to have a cartoonist as accomplished and talented as Bolinger on board CLG to give the joint some class.

City Limits Gazette at The Evergreen State College

Not very many academic libraries have a near complete set of City Limits Gazette 1991-1993,  and those that do probably don't have copies out on open stacks-- except for The Evergreen State College Library. 

Notice how the staff used logos by Max Traffic and Bruce Bolinger to decorate the holding box.

I'm happy to note that on the shelves CLG is neighbors with Vital Speeches of the Day and American Literary History. Hoit-de-la-Toit company!

As an added bit of trivia, CLG is shelved at about the same point where the TESC Library ghost was spotted walking into an invisible door in 1988.

City Limits Gazette # Nirvana Claw (July 1993)

Cover by the Zen Master himself Bil Keane, Richard Wayne and Leonard Rifas sign up, Dissmeyer and Datmyers, I defend Comics Buyers Guide, Small press cares by Andrew Ford, View of wank minis by Maximum Traffic, Not really a Westercon report by Bruce Chrislip, Bil Keane Watch by Kel Crum - Randy H. Crawford - Wayno, Satanism and Republicans in Thurston County, Kilodney update, Report from Yugoslavia by Sasa Rakezic, CLG reader profile of Bruce Bolinger, Other Sounds by Wayno, Comics Journal small press index by Gary Usher.

City Limits Gazette # Frisky and Little Mary, the doomed children of the "Grabby Elf" (Nov. 1992)

Logo by Clay Geerdes, Randy Reynaldo on the Fred question, Bil Keane Watch by Wayno, What's in and what's out for 1993 by Jeff Snee, Teenage Turtle filming in Astoria Oregon, CLG reader profile of Mike Culpepper, Tuck Petertil in the Oly art scene, Bil Keane Watch by Ricardo Nancy McJacksonstein, Bil Keane Watch by Jeff Zenick, William Dockery signs up, return of Factsheet Five?, Bruce Sweeney's Underground Station with logo by Bruce Bolinger, CLG reader profile of Bruce Sweeney with illustration by Gary Whitney, Comics Journal small press index by Gary Usher.

City Limits Gazette # Overwhelming sadness of the monkey trapped in the garage (Sept. 1992)

Logo by Mark Campos, Bil Keane Watch by Maximum Traffic, San Diego Con report by Ryan Eifert, Bruce Sweeney's Underground Station with logo by Bruce Bolinger, Comics and Wrestling by Jerry Riddle, comix reviews by Lynn Hansen, Yet another Bil Keane Watch by Ben Adams (of Minneapolis), Bob Richart likes Wow Cool and the work of Sam Henderson.

This issue included: State of beings # 13. Idaho.

City Limits Gazette # Albanian sponge (June 1992)

Logo by the incredible Bruce Bolinger, Bill Gaines dies at age 70, Robert Stike "Sick Stick" dies at age 41, Bil Keane Watch, Ben Adams (of Minneapolis) answers many questions, Lynn Hansen on Ronald Gabriel Vicens II "Gato", CLG profile of Jeff Nicholson, responses to the hobby question by Jerry Riddle, Jay Kennedy, Michael Stengl, Jeffrey Kipper, Max Traffic being Max Traffic, bad cover versions of Strawberry Fields Forever, Sun King, Taxman, Tell Me Why, There's a Place, Things We Said Today, This Boy, Ticket to Ride, Tomorrow Never Knows, Two of Us, Wait, We Can Work It Out, What Goes On, When I'm Sixty Four.