In the late 1910s Sidney Smith developed a formula of the daily strip that would make The Gumps one of the most popular comics of the 1920s & himself one of the richest cartoonists of his day By the end of the decade Sidney Smith's The Gumps had secured a huge & loyal audience with a decade of melodrama adventure mystery & comedy So devoted were his readers in fact that they regularly wrote in to offer advice for his characters' love lives & business decisions & they generally treated the characters as friends & family members In 1928-29 with the launching of what would be his most famous story " The Saga of Mary Gold" Smith's relationship to his readers would be tested as never before Its heartbreaking conclusion would change comics forever Here for the first time since the story made headlines across America in the spring of 1929 IDW reprints the saga that Hogan's Alley magazine called " One of the Ten Biggest Events in Comics History"
- a tale that has lost none of its power to captivate readers in the 21st Century LOAC Essentials reprints in yearly volumes the rare early daily newspaper strips that are essential to comics history seminal strips that are unique creations in their own right while also significantly contributing to the advancement of the medium
...

By the early 1930s Cliff Sterrett had transformed Polly & Her Pals into the world&s premier surrealistic comic strip Polly debuted in 1912 as one of the earliest "pretty girl" strips but it was in 1925 that Sterrett entered his peak period developing a new style replete with Art Deco decorations abstract backgrounds & distinctive surreal perspectives
- all within the context of a down-right hilarious situation comedy Sterrett&s Sunday pages (also being published by The Library of American Comics) have long been hailed as individual masterpieces but his daily strips
- due to their rarity
- have eluded archivists for the past ninety years
- The discovery by The Library of American Comics of syndicate proofs for some early 1930s dailies
- plus new information about Sterrett&s involvement with a Maine-based artist colony
- fills a major hole in comics history The strips reprinted here
- the complete year of 1933 dailies
- show Sterrett at his most inventive building gags upon gags within one- & two-week continuities culminating in a spectacular holiday story in which the entire cast
- Polly Maw & Paw Perkins cousin Ashur Neewah & the rest of the outrageous Perkins household
- is transfigured into living breathing Christmas dolls









...

In 1939 Vincent Trout Hamlin had been writing & drawing the successful Alley Oop for more than five years In Alley Oop Hamlin created a unique concept marrying his fascination with dinosaurs & prehistoric times to a rollicking style of storytelling & drawing that was simultaneously serious fantastic & loaded with slapstick The series was set in the kingdom of Moo & starred Alley Oop the club-wielding caveman his girlfriend Ooola friends Dinny the dinosaur & Foozy (who speaks in rhyme) plus Oop's rival King Guz & Guz's Queen Umpateedle Yet Hamlin knew that the strip's horizons in Moo were limited So it was in early 1939 that Alley Oop & Ooola see a mysterious box & to the utter amazement of Guz & his minions promptly fade from view followed by the caption Dear Reader you must now say goodbye to Moo you are to follow Alley Oop in this strangest of many strange adventures
- V T Hamlin Oop & Ooola had entered a time machine & were now living in the modern day 20th Century! Their host was the inventor of the time machine Dr Elbert Wonmug! No change of such magnitude had ever occurred in a continuing newspaper strip & readers responded enthusiastically With every time period in history available as a backdrop Alley Oop became even more popular This volume features Oop final Moo adventure followed by his trips to the 20th Century & ancient Greece where he & Ooola share adventures with brave Ulysses the lovely Helen of Troy & the mighty Hercules VT Hamlin would send his characters everywhere & everywhen
- but the classic Alley Oop begins with the stories contained in this volume The book is introduced by Michael T Price who first met V T Hamlin in the 1960s & remained friendly with him for the rest of the cartoonist's life Price also composed the musical score for Hip Pocket Theatre production Alley Oop

...

Much attention has been paid to Herrriman’s Sunday full-page comics yet it is in the daily Krazy Kat strips that the cartoonist most frankly illustrates many of his major themes especially the shifting nature of social identity The 1934 strips reprinted in this book fit anyone’s definition of “essential” They show Krazy Kat at top speed ever-changing endlessly inventive with language that sparkles with double meanings & more in lines such as “his malady drills me to my sole” The year

Includes:: homages to old jokes & bricks followed by playful references to sex drink & even drugs The daily Krazy Kat strips are often Herriman’s most personal works & standouts in this year include Krazy Kat’s attempt to write a memoir & the Kat’s quietly waiting for the last leaf of “ottim” to fall (a tender scene that finds echoes in Charles Schulz’s drawing Linus admiring the last autum’s leaf stubborn spirit) It could also be argued that the daily is more accessible to the new reader Herriman biographer Michael Tisserand provides an insightful introduction LOAC ESSENTIALS reprints in yearly volumes the early daily newspaper strips that are essential to comics history seminal strips that are unique creations in their own right while also significantly contributing to the advancement of the medium The strips are reproduced one per page giving readers an immersive experience similar to the one newspapers readers had may decades ago—reading the comics one day at a time

...

These never-before-collected strips represent an essential transition point that would forever change the direction of adventure comics Lyman Young’s Tim Tyler’s Luck was a successful series set in exotic locales before Alex Raymond signed on as Young’s assistant It’s in these 1932-1933 strips as Raymond assumed greater & greater responsibility for the drawing that he developed the prototypes for Flash Gordon Dale Arden & Jungle Jim & the style for which he became famous a year later LOAC Essentials reprints in yearly volumes the daily newspaper strips that are essential to comics history seminal strips that are unique creations in their own right while also significantly contributing to the advancement of the medium The strips are reproduced one per page giving readers an immersive experience similar to the one newspapers readers had many decades ago—reading the comics one day at a time ...

The New York Journal of Books said that the first volume of LOAC Essentials (Baron Bean 1916) "sets the standard for archival & reprint quality" The Washington Times wrote that it&s "beautiful It showcases Mr Herriman&s developing style & his move toward a combination of absurdity surrealism & art deco" LOAC Essentials Volume 6 presents the second year of George Herriman&s much-lauded pre-Krazy Kat masterpiece These strips are nearly a century old & are reprinted here for the first time ever ...

Three amazing firsts hit the newspaper strip pages in January 1929 the introduction of Buck Rogers as a Sunday the debut of Edgar Rice Burroughs&s Tarzan as a daily strip & the first newspaper strip art by Hal Foster It was Foster who illustrated all 60 episodes of ERB&s seminal Tarzan of the Apes & now LOAC Essentials brings you all of Foster&s first comics work reproduced from ERB&s syndicate proofs In addition this book

Includes:: The Return of Tarzan Beasts of Tarzan & Son of Tarzan each drawn by Rex Maxon All together the first 300 daily Tarzan comics ever produced all together in a single affordable package!

...

Collecting the works of one of the most important female cartoonists of all time Tippie will appeal to comics readers students of women&s studies & dog lovers Edwina Dumm was the country&s first female full-time editorial cartoonist & one of its first female syndicated comic strip creators Tippie is truly a Library of American Comics Essential providing a crucial reading experience & offering perspective on the early work of women in the field Here you&ll find a delightful & enlightening year of comic strips starring the lovable shaggy dog named Tippie; his companion the mischievous young boy named Cap Stubbs; & Cap&s wise Grandma The strip which ran from 1918 to 1966 started as a gag-a-day comic but by the mid-1940s was clearly a continuing saga about homespun life in a small town LOAC Essentials reprints one year at a time the daily newspaper strips that are essential to comics history in a format that preserves as closely as possible the original reader experience By reproducing the strips one per page in an oblong format it allows us to have the experience of reading the comics one day at a time Each volume contains seminal strips that are unique creations in their right & also contributed to the advancement of the medium along with panel-by-panel annotations About the Author Edwina Dumm (1893-1990) was a newspaper cartoonist from 1915 until her retirement in 1966 She was also the country&s first female full-time editorial cartoonist Her most famous feature--known as Tippie & Cap Stubbs--ran under various titles throughout the decades She also created other canine features including Sinbad for Life magazine & Alec the Great ...

LOAD is a miniature game of epic clashing action! In LOAD players take control of mighty group of heroes separated in 2 teams clashing in head-to-head fights all in an attempt to wreak enough havoc on their opponent’s base & force them to surrender! Your army ranges from lowly creeps to powerful heroes each with their own roles to fulfill It is up to you to use their unique skills & abilities to best your foes on the open field In LOAD you will coordinate attacks daringly step through dangerous forest to reach other lanes & assist your heroes all in attempt to reach opponent’s base & secure victory In 30-90 minutes you will use abilities of your heroes by rolling dice to damage opponents heroes & base Heroes are represented by 32mm scale models & Lane creeps by 28mm scale models that are moved around the board to establish tactical dominance 2-6 Players 30-60 Min Playing Time Age 13 ...

In the near future nuclear Holy War has decimated North America & humanity's last stronghold is the dome metropolis of New Vatican City When vampires attack the Church turns to a clone of Jesus Christ Himself to protect them! But all is not as it seems for the Test Tube Messiah as he's drawn into a web of betrayal bloodshed & seduction! ...