City Limits Gazette # snoodlebee clapsaddle (May 1991)

Snoodlebee Clapsaddle was the name of a character I invented in the 1970s and have used sopradically over the years, such as in Cranium Frenzy # 7 (1994). Sometimes the name is spelled as Snoodle B. Clapsaddle.

Logo by S. Minstrel, Jay Kennedy defines underground comix, Jim Ryan creates a Ryan/Willis image, the WSU comix collection covered by the Lewiston Tribune.

City Limits Gazette # bezango (March 1991)

This issue of CLG might've been my first use of the word "Bezango" in print.

An innocent mention of King Features editor Jay Kennedy and his connection with Family Circus artist Bil Keane is the first fine line crack in the dam that will soon burst.

I provide a brief synopsis on the comix career of Ronald Gabriel Vicens II, better known as "Gato."

Bad cover versions of And I Love Her, And Your Bird Can Sing, Ask Me Why, Baby You're a Rich Man, Baby's In Black, Back in the USSR, Ballad of John and Yoko, Because, Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite, Birthday, Blackbird, Blue Jay Way, Can't Buy Me Love, Come Together, Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill.

Dog Boy drawing by Steve Lafler.

Gato's final letter

City Limits Gazette # ... (March 1991)

News on John E., a Walt Rodgers drawing, Bruce Chrislip's Cartoonists City column, Clay Geerdes responds to Chrislip, bad cover versions of Across the Universe, All My Loving, and All You Need is Love. The very last sentence on page 4 is a bit chilling since my fellow listed major WSU Library comix collection donors are no longer with us.

Artpaper: The Activist Librarians

Chris and Jan put this together for the December 1989 issue of Artpaper. Today the idea of an academic library comic collection is taken for granted. Public libraries are even giving workshops on how to make your own books-- Newave style. And little library zine collections are everywhere.

But back in the 1980s this was still considered a bit on the edge. The comic art librarians are mentioned in the last part of the article, taking special notice of the amazing Randall Scott, Michigan State University librarian and, I'm happy to say, one of the gang who subscribed to the old City Limits Gazette. Jim Danky, the Wisconsin librarian (an co-editor of Alternative Library Literature) in this piece, was especially helpful to Jay Kennedy when the Guide was assembled.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 14

Sunday began with Bruce braving the 39 degree morning and taking me to Ohio State University's Cartoon Library, which was of course closed. Apparently the Library will be, or is, moving to Sullivant Hall (pictured).

Included in the Library's holdings is the collection of our late comrade, Jay Kennedy. But this isn't the only home for his comix. Back in the 1980s, Jay donated many comix and rare items to the Washington State University Comix Collection when I was there organizing the holdings.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 2

One of the big factors in my decision to accept the invitation to attend SPACE 2011 was the opportunity to finally meet so many people who had I known for 1, 2, even 3 decades only through correspondence. The recent passing of several of our comix comrades like Jamie Alder, Mike Roden, Steve Fiorilla, Jay Kennedy hit me hard. These were people I was hoping to meet in person some day, and I figured eventually our paths would cross. I waited too long for "eventually" to happen.

But we are not getting any younger. To put it diplomatically, I knew I needed to do this while so many of us are still above ground. And what better place to see so many comix people from our old Newave/Obscuro network at one time than SPACE?

Bruce Chrislip and I loaded up his car and headed north to Columbus on Saturday morning.

Above: on the trip to Columbus.

Upon arrival we were issued and assigned a table which we shared with Mike Hill and Maximum Traffic/Buzz B./Borpo Deets.

One of our neighbors, I'm happy to say, was Colin Upton, who came all the way from Vancouver, B.C.. Together we constituted the only Pacific Northwest presence at the expo. He is a good conversationalist with an understated, wry way of observing life's foibles.

Another person I got to meet right off the bat was Morty the Dog regular reader D. Blake Werts, who helped me make an emergency run to the closest available computer so I could print out a script for the next day's reading. I really appreciated his company and it gave us a chance to visit a little.

If there is any down side to events like this, it is that I don't get to really spend a lot of time with any one person. But names do get associated with a face, a voice, a personality in person. A human connection is made. And that's worth a lot.

Above: Bruce, Colin, Blake.

Colin's new book, The Collected Diabetes Funnies, is a good example of how technology has made it possible for us photocopy comix artists to graduate to a more sophisticated format. I was astounded over and over at what high production values I was seeing in the physical publications. As you can see, Colin has not fallen into the lure of life beyond black and white. "Color," he told me, "Is for the weak"-- a quote I enjoyed so much I asked him to repeat it a couple times.

One Normal Guy Talking With a Nut!

1st edition July 1985, Pullman, Washington : Kage Comics. Letter size cardstock stapled at margin.

2nd edition, 1985, Pullman, Washington : Kage Comics. Letter size cardstock stapled at margin.

Available as a reprint-on-demand title, 1994, regular digest size.

Clint Hollingsworth originally published this in a format that makes it difficult to scan, so you Morty the Blog readers are stuck with my posting the digest size version, which is unfortunate given the amount of fine detail work by Brad Foster. Also you'll need to extra enlarge the images to read the thing.

My personal copy is the 2nd edition and it is pink. I don't know if Clint used different colors in his printings. As a note to you bookpeople, Newave collectors tended to regard printings as editions, something that was more or less institutionalized in the network by Jay Kennedy in his Official Underground and Newave Comix Price Guide.

Clint's original editions included some extra material: Foster's short pieces "The Button" and three whimsical illustrations, and my story "A Glimmering Ray of Despair." These extras were all excluded from the print-on-demand version.

This was a very enjoyable jam with one of the most prominent artists associated with the Newave comix movement. Sending this thing back and forth between Washington State and Texas was like a long game of chess with a master. We made attempt after attempt to trap each other in this visual gamesmanship.

Brad and I are from the same generation and shared a somewhat parallel development as cartoonists, growing up with shared influences. We also, and I think I can speak for Brad here, found the Newave network to be a great outlet for our artistic freedom and expression. An outlet that was fairly unique at the time.

With those things in common, the differences were in the details. And we had fun with those differences in this jam.

Newave Reader

1st edition was available as a print-on-demand title, I bet there are probably 100 copies out there.

Special Micah edition, December 28, 2001, 3 copies, parchment cover.

In attempting to put together a history of the Newave comix movement, I gained permission from various participants to reprint essays and interviews. The inside cover lists the original sources of the material from Jay Kennedy, George Erling, John E.'s interview with Jim Ryan, Tim Corrigan's interview with Jane Oliver, and my own writing from City Limits Gazette and J.R. William's Fun House.

Clay Geerdes, on the other hand, didn't want me to reprint anything of his. Instead he generously provided me with a wonderful essay just for this book. It was later reprinted in the recent Fantagraphics Book, Newave! the Underground Mini Comix of the 1980s.

Clay was very enthusiastic about this project and wanted me to make it a series. If his health had held up I think he would've been happy contributing original writing to each issue. As it was, I felt very fortunate to have this great document where he looks back and really ties things together.

Likewise, I think I could've roped Jay Kennedy into providing original essays if this title had been a series. It would've appealed to his frustrated librarian side. Once again, I'm lucky to have what I have here.

Including the great George Erling was a no-brainer if you want to study the history of Newave. Jane Oliver was an important figure to include since she was one of the pioneers in making this boy's club less of a boy's club. And the incredible Jim Ryan was always one of my favorite artists to come out the Newave, one of our very best.

Giant-Size Mini Comics

You can find my reprinted work in issues #1 (August 1986, edited by Larry Marder), #3 (December 1986, edited by Jay Kennedy) and #4 (February 1987, edited by Paul Curtis). Published by Eclipse Comics.

To be selected for this series by three editors of this caliber was exciting but also, for some reason, sort of intimidating. For a lot of readers of mainstream comic books, this was their first exposure to the world of Newave/Obscuro/small press comix.

Richard Krauss has a nice summary of the four-issue run of Giant-Size Mini Comics over at his Midnight Fiction website.

Dog of Dawn, Dog of Dusk

Another one of the delayed comix I created and printed in 1985 (like Cranium Frenzy #5), but held off from releasing until early 1986.

1st edition, 1985, 50 copies, yellow cover, enlarged digest size.

2nd edition, 1986, 30 copies, salmon cover, enlarged digest size.

Print-on-demand, 1994, regular digest size. I don't know how many of these are out there, but I imagine they outnumber the first two editions combined.

1st Danger Room Reprint Edition, June 2005, 5 copies (4 red cover, 1 green cover), regular digest size.

I'm not sure what this means, but of all my works this was a favorite for Jay Kennedy and Lynn Hansen, and both of these gentlemen are no longer in the world of the living. Jay liked "The Maze" so much he included it as the concluding piece in Giant-Size Mini Comics #3 (Eclipse Comics, Dec. 1986). "The Maze" is a very simple tale, perhaps too simple, but the message it packs still rings true to me.

Page 17 has a nod to the dog characters of my Newave comrades Steve Lafler and Bruce Chrislip.

The face on page 18, panel 1 was, I think, burned into the paper with a soldering gun. Panel 5 was a recognition that my friend Bob Richart (a fellow librarian who I worked with at WSU and later at WLN) introduced me to the history of dog butting, a very real sport played in Medieval France.

Page 19: Notice in panel 2 Bob Richartolovskii says "Hot Damn! A Morty Dog!" I believe this pretty much confirms Jim Ryan's theory that Morty is species, not an individual-- like a collie, a beagle, a poodle, a Morty Dog. This would explain why he seems to always come back from the dead after being killed.

Page 20+: I was laughing pretty hard when I was drawing the Cosmo Bear portion of the story. At the time, it seemed cute bears with balloons and rainbows were all the rage, as popularized by the Care Bears. I was probably laughing the hardest at page 23, panel 1 as I was drawing. OK, OK, so I have a sick sense of humor.

The final page on the back cover is a quintessential Morty ending, incorporating several devices I liked to employ: A Shakespeare quote, a metamorphosis (the hands), Morty surviving an attempt at being offed by his creator, and the main character drifting away as the viewer remains stationary.