Return to the Wonderful WAGS of Oz

One thing I've learned in life is that you never stop learning.

No sooner had I put up my earlier post about the WAGS tabloid of Australia, when I received an email from Peter Hansen. Peter, a British comic historian transplanted to Canada, related to me his similar interest in WAGS and better yet, he had an extensive collection of that title. Even better, he had researched the background of WAGS publication. Rather than keep his insights for myself, with Peter's kind agreement, I'd like to share his research with you all.

"Wags really started in Buenos Aires in 1933 when Joshua B. Powers worked with Thomas Volney Boardman for the wire service United Press International, a kind of an American version of Reuters.

Powers quit and went back to the US to start up Editors Press Service selling US comic strips to South American papers and Boardman headed to Britain to work for Editors Press Service trying to sell US strips to British newspapers. American newspaper strips hadn't really made it to the UK at the time with the exception of "Mickey Mouse", but in 1936 a familiar sounding comic called OKAY COMICS went on sale in Woolworths stores and on market stalls around the UK.

The comic was made up of recycled US Sunday newspaper supplements with a new wraparound cover. Boardman & Powers? Don't know that we will ever know but it does sound like a hell of a coincidence. Maybe the comic didn't sell as the US comic supplements were full newspaper size and British comics of the day were half the size. Perhaps Powers decided to change the format and try again with a comic that matched the English comic size and a uniquely English sounding name WAGS which is the English vernacular for a bunch of Jokers.

However WAGS came about the British WAGS appeared on January 1, 1937 with 32 pages and ran every week until November 4, 1938 shrinking to 16 pages along the way for a total of 88 issues. Originally printed in the US with the J.B. Powers United Press imprint for export to the UK until issue #31 when it began carrying the imprint of TV Boardman. Eisner strips appeared in the British version from #16 (April 16, 1937).

Eventually the following strips made their debut over the time of the series:

Peter Pupp - Bob Kane (Issue #16)


Peter Pupp cover
WAGS vol. 2, #16
[image courtesy of Peter Hansen]
Tom Sherrill - Don De Conn
Hunchback of Notre Dame - Dick Briefer (issue #17)
The Clock Strikes - George Brenner (Issue #38) also Ed Cronin


The Clock Strikes
WAGS vol. 2, #36

Spencer Steel - "Dennis Colebrook" scripts and art, sometimes art by Bob Powell (Issue #24?)
Scrappy - Eisner (issue #39)
Sheena - Eisner/Powell (issue #46 November 1937) non de plume "Morgan Thomas". Mort Meskin soon takes over with later issues by Bob Powell from February 1939 (Volume 2 #38 in Australia).


The first appearance of Sheena
WAGS vol. 2, #38
[image courtesy of Peter Hansen]

Note the resemblance between the character in the above panel and a young Will Eisner!
Hawks of the Seas - Will Eisner as "Willis Rensie" (issue #16)
Count of Monte Cristo - Early issues Jack Kirby (from issue #64) as "Jack Curtiss", but most by Lou Fine as "Jack Cortez" from September 1938.


The Count of Monte Cristo
as reprinted in JUMBO #4 (Dec. 1938)
by Lou Fine
Yarko the Great - Eisner
Gallant Knight - Vernon Henkel


Gallant Knight
WAGS vol. 4, #16

(Modern) 'Planes - Les Marshall

A number of people have hinted that there was a falling out between Powers and Boardman but this isn't the case. T.V. Boardman's imprint came into force in WAGS on July 9th 1937 and OKAY COMICS WEEKLY (there's that name again) his own imprint hit the newsstands on October 16, 1937 and ran every Wednesday until February 26, 1938 for approximately 20 issues.


OKAY COMICS WEEKLY vol. 1 #1 (Oct. 16, 1937)
as reprinted in THE INTERNATIONAL BOOK OF COMICS
by Denis Gifford

OKAY COMICS WEEKLY was the first British reprint of original American comics including "Terry and the Pirates" whose publishing rights were owned by Powers.

Both used the Eisner/Iger shop and the WAGS pages ran as continuing weekly strips the same as the British comics. Finally J.B. Powers was a senior Director of T.V. Boardman Ltd. until his death in the early 1950's [note: Powers actually died in 1989], and Boardman and his family spent the whole of the war in Buenos Aires where he first worked with Powers, leaving a Tasmanian woman who had been with him since before the war called Dorothy Weir in charge while he was away. Boardman continued publishing until 1967.

When Eisner began printing his WAGS material in the US comics such as JUMBO COMICS whose first issue was completely WAGS material and to do this he bought the original WAGS plates back from Powers and printed the artwork for JUMBO the same size as WAGS to reduce costs, but it didn't catch on with US comic buyers and he gave up after 7 or 8 issues. Australians began printing American strips before the Brits with "Brick Bradford", "Mandrake the Magician" and "Buck Rogers" all making their debuts in 1935/36. So it made sense that the Herald & Weekly Times Group would approach Powers to print a weekly comic for the Australian market. Or perhaps they knew the Tasmanian woman working for Boardman?"

I would like to add a few comments and art attributions that didn't make Peter's list.

Both "The Diary of Dr. Hayward" and "Wilton of the West" likely first appeared in WAGS and briefly had Jack Kirby as their artist. And both features were doubly blessed as they were taken over from Kirby by the great Lou Fine.


The Diary of Dr. Hayward
by Jack Kirby
as reprinted in KIRBY: KING OF COMICS
by Mark Evanier

Another worthy strip premiering in WAGS was "Tex Maxon" drawn by longtime cartoonist/illustrator Munson Paddock.


Tex Maxon
WAGS vol. 4, #16

My sources generally agree that the "Dennis Colebrook" who drew "Spencer Steel" was an Eisner/Iger house name and not an actual artist. One artist thought to have worked under the pseudonym was Edwin Laughlin, who, in his short comic book career, is known to have worked on "Gilda Gay", a feature also drawn by Bernard Baily. "Gilda Gay" was a daily strip produced by Eisner/Iger for newspaper distribution and reprinted in JUMBO.

I'm not convinced that "Scrappy" was the work of Will Eisner. Both Jerry Iger and Bob Kane had already worked in a style similar to "Scrappy" and I'm inclined to believe one or the other drew it.


Bobby
as reprinted in JUMBO #4 (Dec. 1938)
by S. M. "Jerry" Iger
In a subsequent email, Peter explained the discrepancies between the British and Australian versions:

"Boardman and Powers start up WAGS on September 8, 1936 in Australia with 16 pages per issue. After 16 issues in Australia they start up WAGS in the UK with 32 pages per issue. After 15 issues of WAGS they replace some of the strips with Eisner/Iger material in issue #16 (8 pages B&W). So lets assume one of the syndicates dump Powers forcing him to go to Eisner/Iger. I know that the Eisner material in the Australian WAGS Vol 2 # 15 is the same as the UK WAGS Vol 1 #28. Chronologically the Australian issue would have hit the news stands approximately January 8, 1938 and the UK version of the same Eisner/Iger material would have hit the news stands in the UK on about July 16, 1937. So I now know there is about a five and a half month (24 weeks) lag in the Eisner/Iger material from the UK versus the Australian Eisner/Iger material.

Suddenly this all works!!!!

The UK WAGS initially printed 32 pages while the Australian issue initially printed only 16 pages. Looking at the copies I have here both of the identical issues of the Australian & UK comics have 24 pages, not 16, not 32. So it would seem that Powers lost 16 pages of syndicated material and was only able to supplement his comics with 8 pages of B&W material to make WAGS up to 24 pages. So if the WAGS in Australia carried on printing 16 pages of American reprints it would always be 12 weeks ahead for every UK issue printed. The Australian issue ended on June 7, 1940 after 197 issues.

If I look strictly at the page difference between what the UK WAGS would have pumped out in 1937 and what the Australian WAGS would have pumped out in 1937 the UK WAGS would have pumped out 1376 pages while the Australian WAGS would have pumped out 832 pages. Deduct one from the other and you end up at 22 weeks of 24 page issues which is five and a half months. The British version finished on November 4, 1938 only weeks after JUMBO #1 hit the stands in the US, and the Australian WAGS finished on June 7, 1940, so even if they went back to 16 pages in Australia after the UK WAGS folded they would only have about 45 weeks of reprint material available for the Australian issue which would have carried it to maybe October 1939 with their Eisner material in it. So the dates suggest to me that sometime in June or July 1938 Eisner/Iger bought the printing plates back from Powers and stopped supplying him and Powers used up his back stock up until November 4, 1938 then folded. I assume that Powers carried on with US reprints in Australia which had always been well established in Australia as opposed to the UK until the war act stopped the importation of paper into Australia in 1940.

I also suspect that the 16 issues of OKAY COMICS WEEKLY used up the back stock of the original US strips that appeared in the first 16 Australian WAGS issues, supplemented by Eisner covers and a British strip by Harry Parlet called "Larry the Lamb". I say this because OKAY COMICS WEEKLY came out on October 16, 1938, whereas Eisner/Iger came on board on April 23, 1938.

It doesn't make sense that Boardman would steal 16 pages of strips from Powers and then wait six months to run his comic. It seems more likely that they were partners all along and OKAY COMICS just reprinted the previously printed initial versions of the Australian WAGS issues.

If these things were not as rare as hens teeth and we had all of these issues we could prove this so it is just a theory right now. Oh well, maybe some day.”

Me again. This is GREAT information! Not only has Peter provided a detailed backstory of WAGS publishing history, he has also confirmed my guesses about the lag time between the British and Aussie versions and narrowed it down even more. The only fly in the ointment is that not every issue of the Aussie WAGS contained 8 pages of Eisner/Iger content. Of the three issues in my possession, two contain 7 pages and one issue has only 6 pages of their shop's material. This could alter Peter's timeline somewhat, but nonetheless, his thought process works in every other instance.

There is still more to be known about the features and creators that appeared in WAGS. Peter Hansen has provided a fantastic framework for that research and I welcome any other additions or corrections.

Uncovering and documenting the contents of this seminal comic is critical to comic book history. Not only was WAGS a wellspring of legendary talent and the original source of equally legendary features, but it expands the narrow focus of American comic book fandom to include a publication that bridged continents. The development of modern comic books were not exclusive to the U.S. and WAGS is key to understanding that concept.

Thank you Peter Hansen! Not only do you get a tip of the Comics Detective's deerstalker cap, but I do dub thee Peter the Great!

The Wonderful WAGS of Oz

(A special thanks to Frank Motler for help with the Denis Gifford portion of this post.)
_________________________________________________________

I chased this unicorn for over 30 years.

I’d heard it was out there. I’d seen fuzzy pictures of one. And once, I saw one in person--on a backboard at a comic book convention.

My unicorn was WAGS.

WAGS was the comic tabloid that achieved legendary status for its hosting the earliest efforts of the equally legendary Eisner-Iger comic shop.

The publication itself had a unique history. It was a transcontinental production: conceived, put together and printed in the U.S., but sold and distributed in Great Britain and Australasia.

The tabloid was the brainchild of publisher’s representative Joshua Bryant Powers. Powers, who had carved out a unique niche for himself as a man who represented American syndicates overseas, had a colorful past. A University of Texas graduate and WWI era flying cadet, he had once run the United Press bureau in Buenos Aires in the 1920s. He maintained his close ties to South America much of his life and reportedly acted as an agent for the Central Intelligence Agency on that continent.

Powers had founded Editors Press Service in the Thirties to do the above mentioned work of syndicating American newspapers, columnists and comic strips to foreign countries. (Editors Press may have also provided another service. It has long been suspected of being a CIA front.)

As a way of lowering the costs involved with four-color printing, Powers came up with the idea of the export only publication. Entitled WAGS--a name he came up with because he thought it sounded “typically English”--the paper was 16 pages of American strip reprints.

According to British historian Denis Gifford, the first issue went on sale in Australasia on September 8, 1936 and was an immediate hit. The British edition debuted shortly thereafter on January 1, 1937. The success of both publications prompted Powers London agent, T. V. Boardman, to split off and start his own reprint tabloid--OKAY COMICS WEEKLY.

Boardman had the British rights to some of the American strips and took them to start OKAY. This left Powers with a hole to fill in his publication, so he contacted a small outfit just starting out to produce material for him. Eisner and Iger had the first major client of their Universal Phoenix Features.

Gifford states that the first issue to carry the new UPF features was #17, dated April 23, 1937. What is not clear, though, is whether these strips appeared in both editions of WAGS simultaneously. From the date and issue number Gifford cites, he was looking at a British issue. Confounding the situation even more is the fact that the Aussie version didn’t carry a date, only a volume and issue number.

Aside from the facts above, there has been little information uncovered about the WAGS of Oz. Until now.

Thanks to the goldmine that is eBay, I have been able to purchase several issues of the Australasian WAGS over the past few years.

The earliest issue in my possession is volume 2, #13 (the issue number appears on the back cover). It takes a bit of work to determine the approximate date.

If the Aussie WAGS indeed began on September 8, 1936, then that should place this issue sometime in 1937. A few of the reprinted strips have a date of “4-11-37”, while Little Orphan Annie is dated “8-1-37”. Obviously, this issue appeared after that. If WAGS was a weekly, then one year plus 13 weeks after its September 8th start would place it in mid-December,1937.


WAGS vol. 2, #13
The cover features Moon Mullins, but is unsigned and certainly not by its creator, Frank Willard. My guess it is drawn by Eisner. The stock characters in the image resemble some of the earliest Eisner art I’ve seen and it’s unlikely he would trust a cover drawing to anyone else in his shop at this point of its existence.

Inside the front cover is a small indicia:


WAGS indicia
As already noted, the bulk of the tabloid is made up of four color reprints of various American strips. The Eisner-Iger shop provided 7 pages of content, all printed in black and white.

(Gifford reported that the shop supplied 8 pages per week, but the only other black and white printed strip in this issue was a page of John Hix’s Strange as it Seems and John Hix’s Scrap Book, neither of which was a UPF strip.)

Eisner’s own Hawks of the Seas leads off the new material. This episode is numbered with a “10” in the final panel. Each of the other UPF strips that carry a number are also designated with a “10”. This brings up the possibility that the UPF contributions are only ten weeks in--which would mean they began in about June of 1937. If so, that could mean that the Aussie version of WAGS ran the Eisner-Iger material two months later than its British counterpart.


Hawks of the Seas
Bob Kane’s Peter Pupp is a revelation to those who only know him as the early artist of Batman. Kane supposedly spent some time at the Fleischer Studio circa 1934 and that animation experience shows in this strip. Like Hawks and most of the other UPF features in WAGS, Peter Pupp was reprinted in JUMBO COMICS. Eisner and Iger had bought the printing plates from Powers and re-sold them to Fiction House.


Peter Pupp
Next up is the first of Don DeConn’s offerings in this issue. It is The Adventures of Tom Sherrill. The graphic technique DeConn used seems to be derivative of advertisements from that era. His geometric forms were rendered so similarly from panel to panel, that it’s possible he employed woodblocks or something akin to them.


The Adventures of Tom Sherrill
DeConn’s Puzzle Phun was illustrated with the same static graphic style. DeConn’s features were also reprinted in early issues of JUMBO COMICS and then he seems to have left the industry. The only other credit I can find for him was as the illustrator of a 1940 children’s book entitled, THE HUMPTY-DOTS, by Susan Holton.


Puzzle Phun
Like all of the contributors to this issue of WAGS, Les Marshall had worked on WOW, WHAT A MAGAZINE!, the seminal Henle publication that provided the original staff of the Eisner-Iger shop. Marshall’s contribution here was Modern ‘Planes, a one large panel strip devoted to that subject. Apparently that was also Marshall’s only interest, as every feature he is known to have drawn is a variation on this panel.


Modern 'Planes
Spencer Steel was credited to “Dennis Colebrook”, which was a shop pseudonym. In this case the likely artist was Eisner himself.


Spencer Steele
The final UPF strip is also one of the most interesting. It was The Hunchback of Notre Dame by the great Dick Briefer. Briefer‘s Hunchback appeared initially in WOW! in 1936, years before he brought Frankenstein to life.


Hunchback of Notre Dame

Subsequent issues of WAGS would feature other strips by other artists, but that’s a subject for a future post.

Eisner/Iger au Francais

I hadn't intended to revisit the Eisner/Iger shop anytime soon. After several posts about their WAGS work I figured to move on to other subjects. But a very recent addition to my very eclectic collection cried out to be shared.

The publication is entitled BILBOQUET, a curious choice since it refers to an ancient game of catching a tethered ball on a peg. Reinforcing the relationship, the tabloid's logo helpfully depicts the game's required equipment. The 8-page tabloid itself reprints various American comic strips, not unlike the British/Australian WAGS that has been the subject of several posts in these parts.


BILBOQUET #28
(Sunday, August 14, 1938)

This issue is apparently #28 and is dated (in French, of course) August 14, 1938. According to the smaller wording beneath the logo, BILBOQUET was published weekly and promised, "aventures" and "gaiete", which I assume you can figure out for yourself.

While BILBOQUET prominently featured the popular American strip "Jean Reid, l'audacieux"--literally, "Jean Reid, the Daring"--on its opening page (what's that, you never heard of "Jean Reid"? How about "Tailspin Tommy"?) it's the appearance of two lesser known strips that prompted my purchase of this in the first place.

(by the way, "Our Boarding House" becomes "Cap'tain Bilboquet", "Freckles and His Friends" mysteriously translates into "Grindeson Et Cie", in English, "Grindeson and Company", and best of all, William Ferguson's "Our Curious World" is bestowed with the refreshingly honest title, "Je Ne Sais Pas Tout" or "I Do Not Know Everything".)

The presence of the cowlicked haired youngster with large button eyes in the logo is the tip-off. That's "Scrappy", the Charles Mintz cartoon character that was the star of his own Eisner/Iger strip in issues of WAGS.

In full disclosure, I first found out about the "Scrappy" strip's BILBOQUET publication from Harry McCracken, former editor-in-chief of PC WORLD magazine, noted blogger and most significantly, the world's foremost authority on "Scrappy". McCracken's own acquisition of an album of collected BILBOQUET issues prompted his email to me a few years back asking if I had any details about the Mintz character's ties to the Eisner/Iger shop. Unfortunately at the time I had nothing for him, for it was several years before I bought my first WAGS and saw "Scrappy" among the other Eisner/Iger content.


Scrappy va au Guatemala
[Scrappy Goes To Guatemala]
If you look to the small notice in the bottom left panel, it grants the strip's copyright to "ag. francaise de presse" and not to Eisner/Iger's Universal Phoenix Feature's Syndicate, nor Editor's Press Service who handled its distribution, nor Charles Mintz, whose name is emblazoned on the strip in its WAGS incarnation.


Scrappy
WAGS vol. 2, #36
The same goes for "Les Boucaniers", the French name for Eisner's "Hawks of the Seas".


Les Boucaniers
[The Buccaneers]

The appearance of Eisner/Iger shop material in foreign language magazines has been known for a while. Most famously, Al Williamson wrote about the Spanish version of "Hawks" he read as a child in Columbia circa 1939, in his introduction to the Kitchen Sink book reprinting of the strip.

What is intriguing is that this French version appeared in 1938, not long after its WAGS publication. Since BILBOQUET was a weekly, it likely started in early February 1938, months before JUMBO COMICS hit the newsstands. Ironically, this means Americans were among the last to see the Eisner/Iger shop's output.

According to various Internet sources (caveat lector!), BILBOQUET only lasted into January 1939, at which time it was absorbed into PIERROT.

As always, dear reader, I welcome any further information on this subject.

DC VS VICTOR FOX: The Testimony of Iger & Fox

This is the second installment of testimony from the transcript of the legendary lawsuit pitting plaintiff Detective Comics, Inc. against upstart publisher Victor Fox (Bruns Publications) and his distributors for copyright infringement of DC's franchise character, Superman.

I'm going to step back and let Jerry Iger and Victor Fox speak for themselves, but I quickly want to say "Thank you" to all the folks who have contacted me over the past few days regarding my publication of this historic document. Once again, the thanks should go to the actual finder of the transcript; I only provide the forum for its viewing.

-- Samuel M. Iger & Victor Fox, defense witnesses herein referred to as The Witness
-- Asher Blum & Raphael Koenig, attorneys for defendant Brun Publications (Fox)
-- Samuel Fried, attorney for co-defendants Kable News Co. and Interborough News Co.
-- Horace Manges, attorney for the plaintiff Detective Comics, Inc.
-- Judge John Woolsey, herein referred to as The Court

[note: the "Mr. Stolz" referred to in the first portion of this testimony was the vice-president of Interborough News. The court was trying to subpoena Stolz to testify to his sending of a letter to various people connected with distribution for his company.]

__________________________________________________________

TESTIMONY OF JERRY IGER & VICTOR FOX


Iger, pg. 1

Iger, pg. 2

Iger, pg. 3

Iger, pg. 4

Iger, pg. 5

Iger, pg. 6

Fox, pg. 1

Fox, pg. 2

Fox, pg. 3

Fox, pg. 4

Fox, pg. 5

Fox, pg. 6

Fox, pg. 7
__________________________________________________________

COMMENTS

After wading through some preliminary side-talk, it doesn’t take long to realize that Jerry Iger’s testimony was crafted to bolster what Eisner had said earlier. As Wonder Man’s creator (à la Victor Fox), Eisner was tapped to carry the weight of the defense’s case.

The direct questioning of Iger hoped to establish the defense’s contention that Eisner had created “The Wonderman” in January 1938 and had presented his rough sketch to Fox at that time. This was crucial to their case. The implication that The Phantom was a common source for both Superman and Wonder Man was offered and just as quickly dismissed by Judge Woolsey, who seemed to be losing his patience.

The plaintiff’s attorney, trying to find an exploitable fracture between Eisner and Iger’s testimonies, elicited this humorously coy response:

Manges: When did you first read the script “Superman” in Action Comics?

Iger: After the question of whether we had copied the character in Action Comics called--what do you call him? I don’t recall. As a matter of fact, I very seldom read--I don't read all the comic books. We do read the comic books that we supply.

Iger got off relatively easy as opposed to the grilling that Eisner received. Things got a bit more interesting, though, when Victor Fox took the stand.

Almost overlooked in light of the shock of Eisner’s earlier testimony, were references to a proposed comic titled, KID COMICS. Under questioning, Fox goes into detail:

Blum: Did you take up this matter of this Kid Comics magazine with Mr. Donenfeld?

Fox: I suggested to him that I would manufacture a so-called tabloid sized comic magazine which would be twice the size of those ordinarily sold by other publishers of 28 or 32 pages, I don’t recall which, and I submitted this dummy to him and I said, “I want you to put this out for five cents, as a five-cent seller. There is no other one in the market for five cents. I would like you to distribute it for us.” He said, “Let me have the dummy. I will talk it over with my associate and we will let you know.”

This proposed publication (which was new to me) sounds quite a bit like Eisner/Iger’s JUMBO COMICS, which was itself a reworking of the material they had produced for J.B. Power’s overseas tabloid, WAGS. What makes this different is Fox’s suggestion to Donenfeld (if he is be believed) that it be priced at five cents.

Questions abound: was this proposal actually made to Donenfeld by Fox? If so, when? Was KID COMICS an earlier version of JUMBO with the same contents, or was it a later creation, containing new material?

In any case, KID COMICS was key to the defense’s position that DC was the real plagiarist:

Mr. Blum: Just a minute please, I am replying to the Court. He (Fox) verifies this affidavit in March, 1939, and he says, “I find that a number of ideas that were embodied in the dummy of Kid Comics which I left with Donenfeld are being used in a number of Donenfeld’s comic magazines; to wit, Action Comics,” and then he referred to two other magazines.

The Court: In other words, your position is switching around and claiming that in effect Mr. Donenfeld’s organization was plagiarizing something that they saw--I don’t know the names of the people that were on the stand yesterday--that were drawn and submitted to you; that is what you are claiming?

Mr. Blum: That is correct.

This startling accusation was apparently just a ploy to put the DC on the defensive. Nothing other than Fox’s words support the claim and to this point, no dummy copy of KID COMICS has yet been found.

Next installment, the plaintiffs speak.