Classic Comics Press Adds ‘Big Ben Bolt’ and ‘Cisco Kid’

Classic Comics Press is the little engine that could, a small operation that has produced lovely editions of many series, including The Heart of Juliet Jones and Mary Perkins On Stage. Publisher Charles Pelto and collections editor James Gauthier yesterday talked about those books and today, we continue to examine their plans. 

ComicMix: Irwin Hasen’s Dondi is quite unlike the others and is a forgotten gem. What’s the appeal for you?

Charles Pelto: I did it because of Irwin Hasen. Roy Thomas suggested I talk to Irwin and we instantly hit it off. Irwin is a hell-of-a-guy and after meeting him I wanted to do it for no other reason than to honor Irwin’s work. I would have liked to continue past Volume 2 but the sales just don’t justify it. But I was able to do two volumes, people seemed to enjoy it. And it’s too bad; the storylines in what would have been the third volume are some of Irwin’s best work.

James Gauthier: I remember growing up and reading it in the New York Daily News. Dondi was always a favorite. Since it has never been reprinted before I never had the opportunity to see the early strips from the 1950’s and so putting the books together helped answer many questions that I had. I always wondered how Dondi got to this country, how he came to be adopted and what his relationship was with Mrs. McGowan.

CMix: Irwin’s a terrific guy and quite the character. What’s his take on seeing these in print?

Pelto:  Irwin loves it. I happened to be there when Irwin saw the first copy and the look on his face was well worth the price of admission.

Gauthier: He was thrilled that people are able to experience the strip again, and it was great to be able to reprint the strip and see his reaction to it. So many of the great comic strip artists have passed away before they could see their work reprinted and preserved for future generations to enjoy. It’s nice that Irwin is still around to see them get reprinted.

CMix: You must be doing well since you’re expanding. What’s the market for classic comic strips from you and your competitors? Who’s buying these?

Pelto:  Well, I don’t know if I’m doing well. I’m paying the bills and getting ahead but it’s been tough. As long as sales help pay off production costs I plan to continue. We’re in the middle of another comic strip reprint boom which I’m proud to be a part of. Who knew a couple of years ago that we’d be seeing complete reprints of Terry and the Pirates, Buck Rogers, Rip Kirby, On Stage, Jet Scott(!), The
Phantom and more. It’s a great time to be alive, and I think that all us publishers, IDW, Hermes, Fantagraphics, and others are helping to keep this art form alive, at a time when its parent, the newspaper is dying or transforming into something else.

Gauthier: The market has tended to be fans of the strips who remember reading them when they originally ran in the newspapers. But we’ve heard from other comic strip fans who have seen the books for the first time and they can’t believe that they never knew fantastic strips such as Mary Perkins and Juliet Jones existed. We’ve gotten high praise regarding the great stories and artwork and we are very happy to be able to preserve the strips in this format and make them available not only to fans of the strips but to first time readers, as well. Unfortunately the continuity comic strip is a dying art form and what has come out up until now should be preserved for future generations to discover.

CMix:  Later this year, you bring out the first volumes of Cisco
Kid and Big Ben Bolt, two more oft-forgotten series. What can readers expect?

Pelto:  I’m starting both from the beginning. The Cisco Kid will come out the first part of 2011, Big Ben Bolt is scheduled for August of this year.

I think readers are going to be surprised when they see John Cullen
Murphy’s Big Ben Bolt. It’s not Prince Valiant and many are not going to believe it’s the same artist. Bolt has more of a Juliet Jones feel to it, much looser than his work on Valiant.

And Jose Luis Salinas’ work on The Cisco Kid is going to astound people. This man was an amazing artist and he does things with a comic panel that no one else would even attempt to do.

Gauthier: People who have never seen them will discover two more great quality strips to enjoy. Meanwhile, fans of those strips will get to relive some of the wonderful adventures that in some cases are being reprinted in the states for the first time.

CMix: I gather there’s been a problem with the Big Ben Bolt proofs and you’re working on using a set of proofs from Europe. Can you explain the situation and why this is important?

Pelto: Yes. I posted a week’s sample of dailies on the Classic
Comics Press website and was alerted to the fact that they were the dreaded ‘trimmed’ dailies. During World War II and into the fifties, it was common practice to offer two versions of proofs to newspapers – trimmed and untrimmed. Trimmed were used to save page space.
Unfortunately there does not seem to be a set of untrimmed production proofs available. Much to my dismay I’ve learned that is the situation in Europe as well. I’ve recently been contacted by a collector who may be able to help me but for Volume 1 it’s too late. Due to my contact with KFS I can’t delay the publication date so for Volume 1 I have to go with the material I have. Not a total catastrophe, still I would prefer to reprint the art in the manner the artist intended. 

Gauthier: Pretty much the biggest problem for anyone reprinting comic strips is finding good source material to reprint from.
Tracking down proof sheets or finding people with good quality newspaper clippings is very difficult, time consuming and expensive.
Most of the syndicates did not have the foresight to retain good quality copies of many of their comic strips because they never envisioned another possible use for them once they appeared in the newspapers. Many comic strips had very short life spans and it is very doubtful that any of them will be seen again by the general public. That’s a real shame, because comic strips are a spectacular American art form that we should try our hardest to preserve.
Pelto: Jim’s right, and it’s the reason I started Classic Comics
Press. When I first spoke to Leonard about reprinting On Stage, he thought I was crazy. Luckily we proved him wrong. There’s a long list of comic strips that I’d still be interested in seeing reprinted: Casey
Ruggles, Robin Malone, Rex Morgan, Mary Worth, Dateline: Danger, David
Crane, Tiffany Jones, Hopalong Cassidy, Friday Foster, Dr. Kildare…I could go on and on.

CMix: Beyond CCP, I gather there’s a connection with James other project, Homeworld Press’ series of prose novels featuring the teen hero Bishop Chance. Can you elaborate?

Gauthier: We were interested in publishing other books in addition to comic strip reprints and Charles decided that it would be better to do so under another publishing name so as not to confuse any potential buyers. I already had gotten several books ready for publishing and we decided to publish them under the Homeworld Press logo.

Pelto:  Along with comic strips, I read a lot of Science Fiction when I was a teen. I loved the Earl Dumarest books by E.C. Tubb and a couple of years ago I reread the 32 Dumarest books available. The last book sort of leaves it open as to what happens to Earl so through a friend, I contacted Tubb’s agent and bought the rights to Child of Earth, what was supposed to be the end of the long cycle. But Tubb tricked me and left it wide open at the end of the book, so maybe I’ll print number 34 if he finishes it.

CMix: Like the strips, you are using comic book and comic strip artists such as June Brigman and Roy Richardson (from Brenda Starr) or veterans like Frank Bolle to illustrate the books. How’d you select them?

Gauthier: I grew up reading illustrated novels and when I started writing I felt that this would be a great way to encourage kids to read. Frank Bolle had always been a favorite artist of mine and I was happy to hear that he was available to do the pencils for my first two books. I was fortunate to find that Bob Wiacek was available to ink Frank’s pencils and to do the covers for the first two books. When Frank and Bob were unavailable to do the illustrations for the third book I contacted June Brigman to see if she was interested in working on the project. I have been a big Brigman fan beginning with her work on Power
Pack for Marvel Comics. She did the all the artwork for the third book with her husband Roy Richardson and they also did new covers for the first two books when we needed to reprint them.

CMix: What’s the feedback been to the series and when will the fourth volume arrive?

Gauthier: I have had very positive feedback from my readers and so many are anxious to see the next book in the series. They are captivated by the characters and stories, and they all have great praise for the artwork. I try to write a story that not only appeals to kids but also is of interest to adults. There are many plot twists and surprises sprinkled throughout the book. Our biggest problem lies in making more people aware of the series and convincing them to try and give it a chance. They won’t regret it. The fourth book was just completed and I’ll soon send it to June and Roy. That is one of my favorite parts of the project. I give the artists a few suggestions as to what scenes I want illustrated and for the remaining illustrations I let them decide what scenes they would like to do. So it gives them the ability to influence what the reader is going to see. I’ve just finished the first book to a new series called A Pack of Trouble about two twelve year old brothers who get into a great deal of trouble when they acquire a magical pack of manga cards. The story was influenced by two of my readers who wanted to be in a future Bishop Chance book. There was no place to use them in the fourth book and so I wrote a new series with them as the main characters. Sal Amendola is currently working on the illustrations for that book. 

CMix: James indicated to me recently that Homeworld Press is looking into some classic literature. Charles, are you in a position to discuss these?

Pelto:  Well, at this point I really can’t go too deeply into it because we’re still working it out. It’s another one of those labor-of-love projects that harkens back to my days of reading science fiction and fantasy. I’m working on reprinting a series of books that have been out of print for quite some time that will be illustrated by a prominent artist that everyone is aware of. When we do announce the series I’m sure there will be those out there who will be saying to themselves – “Damn! Why didn’t I think of that!’ and others who will be thrilled no end.

CMix: Back to the strips, what’s your take on the current state of comic strips, both adventure and humor?

Pelto:  I don’t read the comics pages anymore. I’m a fan of the continuity strip and today’s gag-a-day funnies don’t grab me. The comic strip that I know and love is a thing of the past. I’m focusing on preserving as much of that past as possible before it all just disappears. Throughout the years, the comic strip was viewed as something you spent a few minutes with then went on with your day. It’s disposable art. But when you consider the talents of artists like Hal
Foster, Milton Caniff, Alex Raymond, and the artists who followed them in creating this wonderful art form, there is a real desire in me to make sure it all just doesn’t disappear. To think that just a few years ago, the only examples of a lot of comics strips could only be found in books like Brian Walker’s The Comics, or 100 Years of Comics, and now we have (or will have) complete run’s of Rip Kirby, The
Phantom, Buck Rogers, On Stage, and the like, it warms the cockles of my heart. 
Gauthier: I feel that the comic strips of today are in a very sad state. The story strips have disappeared almost entirely from the comics pages and we only get to see gag-a-day strips. In addition to that they have cut down on the number of comics that they carry and the size of the strip keeps shrinking. I’ve heard it said many times before and it is true, the current day comic strips are almost postage stamp size, which deters many people from reading them. Little by little the newspapers have stripped away most of the appeal of the comic section.
What newspapers today have forgotten is that the comics were created by Hearst and Pulitzer to help sell newspapers — and they did!
CMix: Guys, thanks so much for your time.

Pelto:  Thank you.
Gauthier: Thank you, it’s been my pleasure.