Morty Comix # 2503

 

Morty Comix # 2503 is a little guy, a microcomic. It was drawn on the birthday of our 13th president, Millard Fillmore, born Jan. 7, 1800. I tucked it into a loose bit of rubber moulding along the floor in a corner of the Post Office in McCleary, Washington. 

There are no less than five Morty Comix in secret places in the McCleary Post Office as of tonight when I checked my PO Box. A couple of them have been there since Spring.

Although there are parts of the world out there where I still see Morty Comix remaining where I deposited the art months ago, this place has the highest concentration of the little devils. So interesting how many public places have anonymous pockets where no one ever looks.

I used to just post them on the bulletin board there, but then I became aware someone was systematically taking my stuff down, ripping it up, and throwing it in the trash. It's the ripping it up part that intrigues me. Sometimes I think McCleary would've made a great locale for a Roger Corman-Vincent Price film. We have no shortage of weird people. Fortunately, I can prove I am not one of them.

When I was 9 years old our farm house outside of McCleary burned. It didn't burn completely, it was just gutted to an uninhabitable degree. So we lived in a mobile home for 8 glorious years. When I was in college I came back to the farm one summer, in 1975, and took down the burned house to salvage and sell the old growth lumber that built the dwelling in order to earn more $$ for school. I recall finding a dead mouse in a bottle and writing my college mate Lynda Barry about it. The rodent could see freedom but could not attain it. Something like that.

Anyway, in between the 1st and 2nd floors, where the pipes for the gas lights originally ran, I found this wood planer lying on its side. Someone had built over this thing. The blade is still sharp. I have this tool to this day. The last time it was used Woodrow Wilson was still President, I am guessing.

So, maybe someday someone will find a Morty Comix in the same way. A little time capsule art bomb. My challenge will be to find more difficult hiding places in 2013 and to make the distribution method more unusual.

Phone photo 2200

Creeeepy

Morty Comix # 2502

Morty Comix # 2502 was drawn on a cover of light slushy snow in a parking lot, Tumwater, Washington, Dec. 31, 2012, the very last Morty Comix until the New Year.

Phone photo 2199

Favorite Movie Quotes: Cat Ballou

"I've never seen a man get through a day so fast."

Phone photo 2198

Morty Comix # 2501

Morty Comix # 2501 was deposited in an empty distribution box for The Stranger on the Westside of Olympia, Washington

Phone photo 2197

Morty Comix # 2500

Morty Comix # 2500 was left, fittingly enough for this landmark issue, in an empty bin that serves as a distribution point for the Cooper Point Journal, student paper at The Evergreen State College. It was deposited on campus in front of the office of radio station KAOS-FM.

Although this building has been remodeled, I think the CPJ offices were located for a few years in the early 1980s where KAOS is now.

Phone photo 2196

Favorite Movie Quotes: Cadillac Man

"I'm Elvis, that's who I am. I'm back from the dead and I'm pissed."

Phone photo 2195

Morty Comix # 2499

 

In what amounted to a caper, Morty Comix # 2499 was placed in a strange nook at a Starbucks in Tumwater, Washington.

Phone photo 2194

Favorite Movie Quotes: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

"It's against Roman law to take one's own life. The penalty's death!"

Phone photo 2193

The Evergreen State College

Olympia, Washington

Comix Anniversaries in 2013

 

50 years ago, 1963: President Kennedy is assassinated. Lee Harvey Oswald, JFK's alleged assassin, is shot on live TV by Jack Ruby.  I was in grade school and later documented an eerie follow-up in a 2001 minicomic entitled LHO.

40 years ago, 1973: My first obscuro pre-Newave comic, Gimmie Comics # 1, is cranked out on a mimeograph.

30 years ago, 1983: I publish my first 8 page 14 cm. minicomic, Sasquatch Comix # 1. 1983 also marked the very first issue of Morty Comix, which I believe was sent to Hawaii. Other comix published that year: Limbolympia, Sasquatch Comix # 2-5, Retreads # 1, Bonafide Child Innocence # 1, Cranium Frenzy # 4, The Big Picture Picture Book, Outside In # 1-9, As I Recall the 'Sixties, Tragedy of Morty Prince of Denmarke Act 1. Plus there were a number of reprints (called "editions" by collectors) and contributions to various comix with others.

20 years ago, 1993: Most of the year was taken up with editing City Limits Gazette, where I served as editor from Feb. 1991 to Sept. 1993. Also involved with some exhibits, short contribs, a televised lecture called The Wild World of Obscuro Comix, a jam with Max Traffic called Flying, and another with Pat Moriarity in Big Mouth # 3. Bruce Chrislip records our mutual experience with Robert Crumb in Paper Tales # 1.

10 years ago, 2003: By 2003 this old dog was slowing down considerably. Cranium Frenzy # 10, at 60 pages, remains my most recent full length comic book. Will I ever produce another full-length comic? I don't know the answer to that.

2013, what to expect: I'm working on more creative ways to distribute Morty Comix and documenting the process on this blog. Once Ron and Louise are finished with me in the making of their NW cartoonist documentary Bezango WA it is my intention to fully return to my hermit existence here in the hills of the Washington Coastal Range and begin a new phase of my comix art. I have no idea where the lines will lead me.


The last couple years have seen me out and about as a cartoonist in classrooms, panel discussions, performances, conventions, and I even hosted a Mini-Comics Day here in McCleary (which was quite fun!), but we true Mossbacks can only take so much of the sunlight of attention and social interaction.


However, as we all know, Fate has a way of screwing up our plans and sending us places we never expected to visit. I'm enjoying this blog very much (thanks Sarah for making this possible when you set me up in 2010 with your technical know-how) and for now it remains a fun venue for creative expression and provides a medium where my old prehistoric photocopy work can find a new audience.     

Phone photo 2192

The Evergreen State College

Olympia, Washington

Morty Comix # 2498

Morty Comix # 2498 crawled into a little hidden crevice at a McDonald's in Tumwater, Washington very early one recent morning.

Phone photo 2191

Nadine in the morning

Inside the car, are those dome lights?

 Wait. No. The dome lights don't work.

 Those must the glowing eyeballs of Mr. Death, who IS SITTING IN THE BACK SEAT ON THIS BLACK ICE MORNING!!! 

 YAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRGH!

As it turned out Mr. Death merely wanted a ride to Oly and we talked movies. We both like Westerns. I hate it when he just shows up like this, but apparently he doesn't have a phone. Sometimes I wish I had the nerve to suggest he could use a breath mint. It's not like he's my friend or anything, but would you refuse him a lift?

Favorite Movie Quotes: Vendetta

"Mr. Macheca, I'm going to need some money-- to buy the jury."

Phone photo 2190

Deep Thinks Animation

A bite-sized animation by John Eades. This one is an adaptation of a one-pager I drew in the mid-1980s. If I'm not mistaken I think this first appeared in a comic published by Steve Lafler, and has been reprinted a few times in different places. Jay Kennedy even made a little sculpture of Morty based on this drawing.

Phone photo 2189

Loose caboose by the Fetid Lake of Doom

Olympia, Washington

Favorite Movie Quotes: Tombstone

"There's no normal life, Wyatt, it's just life. Get on with it."

Phone photo 2188

Dreamer in catnip paradise

A Question of Procedure

Question: Buster the Cat likes to eat. A lot. Do you know why this is like a parliamentary procedure we hear about in news coverage?

Answer: Because this is a fill-a-Buster.

Phone photo 2187

James Abbott mural

Brady, Washington