Number 1785: The abominable snowbots

Sunday mornings, Bellevue, Washington, 1958...and the arrival of the Sunday newspaper. Mom takes the Women’s section, Big Pappy takes Sports, and I grab the funnies. Life is good. In that Sunday comics section: Prince Valiant, the Phantom, Mandrake, Blondie...and Flash Gordon.

At the time I was not familiar with Mac Raboy’s former work on Captain Marvel Jr or Green Lama, both for comic books. But a few years later when I encountered those Golden Age strips for the first time I knew instantly who Mac Raboy was. He was the artist who drew Flash Gordon, and he did it until he died at the young age of 53, in 1967.

I don’t usually show Sunday pages...I’m a comic book guy, after all, but I found these pages online. I wanted to share them, as well as thank the anonymous scanner who uploaded them. They appeared originally in newspapers from July 21, 1963 to November 17, 1963.*

*That was the Sunday before the John F. Kennedy assassination, on November 22, 1963. That is not pertinent to the comic strip, but when I see anything close to that date I place it in context of my indelible memories of that time.

Posted in: Pappy Comics