Notes

In the course of reviewing several notes I made during important bureaucratic meetings last April, I came across these images.

Phone photo 102

City Limits Gazette: Sample Discussion

City Limits Gazette was a comix news/discussion publication originally started by Bruce Chrislip. I edited it from 1991 to 1993 and printed it biweekly. Here's a sample of a discussion on comix definitions from some old hands, April-July 1991 as we try to figure out who we are.

Phone photo 101

All these Halloween skulls and skeletons got me to thinking about Goose. You can read all about him in the attached Bezango column from Olympia Power & Light # 16 (June 30-July 13, 2010):

Phone photo 100

1994 Comix Catalog

Hey, I found some of the catalogs I sent out in 1994 during the print-on-demand phase. Notice I was also selling Dale Luciano's Dada Gumbo unsold inventory from the 1980s. Later I added many titles from Clay Geerdes' trunkload of Comix Wave minis.

Sarah and I have discussed republishing some of the older comix and selling them through this website as special editions. Any requests out there for particular titles?

Phone photo 99

Hanging Sparkle Bones

Bonafide Child Innocence #1

1st ed., 25 copies, February or March 1983, Olympia, Washington, white.

2nd ed., 30 copies, March 1983, Olympia, Washington, white.

3rd ed., 67 copies, June 1984, Gilbert, Minnesota, HSC, white.

1st Danger Room Reprint Ed., 5 copies, July 2005, McCleary, Washington, yellow.

All printings are in regular digest size.

This was my smartass jab at the at-the-time very popular stick comix genre. I had mixed feelings about publishing this in the first place, but someone had to say something. So I did. A few people quietly thanked me.

Actually I can fully understand the reasons why stick figure comix can be a good thing, especially when articulated by Matt Feazell, a great cartoonist who, by the way, accepted my critique most graciously and like a grownup.

Personally, my favorite in this genre can be found online, at the accidental art site, Stick Figures in Peril.

The originals of Bonafide Child Innocence were drawn either in Spokane, Washington, where I was born, or in Olympia, where we moved when I was a little squirt. The source of the drawings was a ledger my mechanic grandfather in Centralia, Washington kept. In it he has notations like "Model A Ford Pump," and latest date I can find is 1944. It measures 30 cm. high, and the back cover reveals it was one of the few things to survive our house fire on the farm in the mid-1960s. And it is packed with narrative cartoons I drew before I knew how to read.

Another childhood item I have acquired is a face drawn on wood. Actually, it was on a piece of furniture my Father had built, a coffee table with a box shelf. I remember drawing the face on this table and getting caught by my Mother, who informed I was going to be in Big Trouble once my Father came home from work. But in fact he was delighted. You see, they thought I was sort of "slow," since I wasn't talking, walking, eating, thinking, etc. at the same rate as other kids. So any spark of artistic expression was seen as, "Hey, he's not a complete moron! Yay!"

The incident helped spur me to draw more, but my Mom made sure that from then on I had paper. She even captioned some of the stories for me! See, now you can blame my parents for these comix.

The table was rediscovered almost five years ago after my Dad died and we were cleaning out the farm, preparing to sell the place. It was stashed in a corner of the basement, but not in very good condition. I managed to save the panel with the drawing on it, and here it is!

Phone photo 98

Hanging Ominous Mummy

You and Your Big Mouth #3

Pat Moriarity's series, popularly known as simply Big Mouth, featured Pat illustrating the stories of others-- including folks who who were primarily known as visual artists. Check out the list of writers on the cover.

And while you're looking up there, you'll also see a dead Starhead Comix logo. Between being contacted to write a story for Pat and actual publication I was surprised to see this title jump from Starhead to Fantagraphics. It's an incident Pat used to comic effect on the cover and in the first few pages.

Our collaboration centered on the fact I had apparently made yet another (failed) attempt at killing off Morty and walking away from comix. This was published in December 1993. By that time I was probably burned out from editing and publishing the biweekly City Limits Gazette (1991-1993).

It is a sad coincidence Barbara Billingsley, the actress who played the role of June Cleaver, died at the same time I was contacting Pat for permission to scan and post this comic. Yes, I really am a fan of Leave It To Beaver.

Pat remains very active in comix. You can find him online and he informs me signed copies of You and Your Big Mouth #3 are available. Pay him a visit.

Pat and I met for the first time last February at the Fantagraphics debut of Michael Dowers' Newave anthology. A nice guy with a face that radiates kindness. Hopefully we'll meet again, but I must say ever since Bruce Chrislip left Seattle I hardly ever attend cartoonist get-togethers.

Phone photo 97

Olympia, Washington