The Jungle Buzzard and the Ghost of Al McKean

This article from the January 1937 issue of Real Detective was too good to pass up. Although I can't seem to find a copy in my files, I think I reprinted this as part of my print-on-demand series, ca. 1994-1996.

Also supplying a short bit on Fred Lomax, who is mentioned the piece.

By coincidence, not long ago while exploring a funky old tomb in Aberdeen, I found the weird little dark cove where Al McKean is laid to rest.

And finally, a phone photo of the present Union Hall in McCleary, the site where McKean was shot.

Phone photo 416

Sarah's favorite sign

Suuri Kurpitsa

Finnish cartoonist Pauli Kallio invited several of us American Newavers into his amazing anthology series, Suuri Kurpitsa (translated = "Great Pumpkin"). I've included the cover of the issues followed by my contributions.

While many of us here in the states were messing around with cheap photocopy, Suuri Kurpitsa had slick paper production values and color on the covers. I couldn't decide what was more thrilling: having my work published in high quality hardcopy, or someone thinking enough of my comix to take the trouble to translate them.

Finland, by the way, has quite a role in Pacific Northwest history. Here in Grays Harbor County, you can see many Finnish surnames adorning the signs of business enterprises, especially in Aberdeen. Down in the neighboring Lewis County, the town of Winlock was basically a Finnish colony. Nearby Astoria, Oregon had a major Finnish neighborhood that was home to Maila Nurmi, also known to us Ed Wood fans as Vampira.

It would also be safe to place the Finns as among the most politically radical ethnic groups up here in the first half of the 20th century.

Anyway, I'm starting to ramble. So I'll slap myself in the face and start my morning chores now, like filling the porcupine with helium. No, that isn't a quaint euphemism for anything-- I really do have to fill the porcupine with helium. Otherwise he gets earthbound and cranky.

Gimmie Comics # 1

1st edition, June 1973, McCleary, Washington, 100 copies, white cover, 10 legal size leaves.

2nd edition, September 1982, Olympia, Washington, 25 copies, blue cover, digest size.

3rd edition, 1984, Gilbert, Minnesota, HSC, 25 copies, white cover, digest size.

Print-on-demand reprint edition, 1994, digest size.

1st Danger Room Reprint edition, July 2005, 5 copies, green cover, digest size.

I count this as my first underground influenced comic. The initial edition was hand cranked from a mimeograph. A few copies were in comic shops in Aberdeen and Tacoma, Washington. The Tacoma shop asked me what the heck I thought I was doing. A few of these were sold or given away before I destroyed the remaining 80 copies. So theoretically there are 20 copies out there in the world.

I don't even own a copy of the 1st edition, but my old friend Rex Munger lent me his copy many years later and I copied it, retraced some of the faint lines and reissued the thing with an intro. The 2005 edition has a rewritten introduction.

The graphics were carved into that gummy mimeo master with a stylus. Although not exactly a stellar work, you can see I was already interested in porcupines. There's the obligatory drawing of then-President Nixon as a Nazi. The victim in the New Hampshire pancakes page is a self-portrait. Actually, within a few years I actually was in a New Hampshire diner and deliberately ordered pancakes for breakfast. The artist on the last page is also a self-portrait. Apparently I had cut my hair short by the time I reached the end.