Today in Comics History, July 22: Happy birthday, Sonny Liston!

Born on this day in 1930 (possibly; there's no official record; see Wikipedia): Sonny Liston, pro boxer and heavyweight champion of the world. An inductee into the International Boxing Hall of Fame, many sports journalists and analysists consider him among the top boxers of the twentieth century.

Despite that, Liston is also infamous for losing his title in 1964 to Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) and his failed attempt to win back the title from Clay that ended in just over two minutes. But listen, you probably heard about Liston's most ignominious defeat at the fists of Pablo Popsicle, the Cuban champion. Sure, you all read it in the papers, right?


from "Herbie Beards Castro!" in Herbie #1 (ACG, April 1964), script by Richard Hughes as Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton
Silly names aside, you may be forgiven if you think this is a serious sports story so far. But all bets are off when Sonny sports a disturbing prescence in the audience while he's training:


You know, of course, this means war.


Herbie easily defeats Sonny, and he didn't even have a foreign object (i.e., a lollipop) in the ring!


And that's why Pablo Popsicle was, for a time, heavyweight champion of the world.

Happy birthday, Sonny Liston!

Today in Comics History, August 10: Happy Hirthday, Herbert Hoover!

This is an expanded and updated version of a post originally published February 22, 2010.

Born on this day: Herbert Hoover, inventor of the vacuum cleaner! I'm bettin' he's in lots of comic books, huh? I bet everybody knows who he is, right, Bruce Wayne in your snappy green hat? Say, where do you buy a green hat?


from Batman: Scar of the Bat one-shot (DC, 1996), script by Max Allan Collins, pencils and inks (and colors?) by Eduardo Barreto, letters by Todd Klein

Today in Comics History, June 7: Happy birthday, Dean Martin!

Born today in 1917: Singer, actor, comedian and comic book star Dean Martin! Let's all raise a glass of something alcoholic to toast ol' Dino and celebrate his appears in the comics!


house ad from DC comics dated October 1953

Today in Comics History, April 15: Let's make fun of Nikita Khrushchev on his birthday!

This is a much-expanded and updated version of the post previously titled "Khrushchev asserts his hatred of dogs," originally published April 15, 2015.

Born on this day in 1894, so you just know he's out of touch: Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev, head of Communist Russia, shoe-banger, subject of a song by Elton John!


from "This Godless Communism" in Treasure Chest of Fact and Fun v.17 #16/322 (Pflaum, April 12, 1962), creators unknown

Today in Comics History, January 22: Happy birthday, U Thant!

Born on this day in 1909: Thant, Burmese diplomat and the third Secretary-General of the United Nations, from 1961 to 1971. (The "U" is an honorific.)

And when there's something weird in your neighborhood Red China, who's U (Thant) gonna call? Herbie!



from "Sahib Herbie!" in Herbie #5 (ACG, October 1954), script by Richard Hughes (as Shane O'Shea), pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton
Not a Lot of People Know This Dept.: Since 1977, U Thant has been commemorated with the (unofficial) naming of a tiny island in New York City's East River: U Thant Island. You can see it especially well if you take the 42nd Street exit off the northbound FDR Drive: it'll be immediately to your right across from the UN Building.


Thant isn't using it much anymore so I have (very unofficially) claimed it as Bully Island. In the summer I paddle out there in my little coracle, have a picnic lunch, read comic books in the sun, and fiddle with my ham radio set — you can easily see the antenna in the photo above. It runs on real ham!

Happy birthday, U Thant!

A Month of... Celebrities in Comics, Day 6: Herbie, The Love God

Whenever those periodic questions about "who would beat whom?" come up in the superhero community, I always pick one of two possible champions: Bugs Bunny or Herbie Popnecker. They've never, ever been defeated, whether fighting Hitler or Yosemite Sam. But Herbie has a slight edge over the wabbit in at least one area. Bugs may have his attention diverted by a beautiful lady rabbit (or, indeed, a robot or witch dressed as a lady rabbit), but Herbie is the perfect asexual creature. We can only hope one day that he reproduces using mitosis.

That's why it's always surprising to see girls go gaga over the Uncanny Herbie. Why, even Jughead pretty much has only Ethel chasing after him. But it's what happens when the cruel, cruel Mr. Popnecker drags the reluctant Herbie to the movies just to see Frank and Dino. No, not Frank Flintstone and Dino the Dinosaur, as A Man Called Flintstone would not be released to the silver screen until 1966. Also: his name isn't Frank, no matter what Wilma says.


Panels from "Herbie, Boy 'Beetle!'" in Herbie #5 (American Comics Group, October-November 1964), script by Richard E. Hughes as Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton
Okay, in between those panels and these next ones a whole lotta weird stuff happens (as it does in Herbie comics) involving a theatre saboteur with a big red clown nose doping up movie popcorn to make you whistle through your ears, and that's not just because of the size of a "large" popcorn being even to feed a family of four over a period of six days. No, let's just skip to Herbie trying to escape a rampaging mob by putting a mop on his head while meanwhile the "Beetles" play their hit song that has all the gals swooning in the aisles and peeing their 1960s capri pants.


Now, even though Ogden Whitney has delivered a near photo-perfect depiction of the actual Beatles, I'm not counting them as today's celebrity of the day as they are clearly a parody named "The Beetles." Over in England, Brian Epstein curses and waves his fist at American Comics Group because he cannot sue them, as they have cunningly disguised their target of tomfoolery so well by changing a vowel.


Oh, and teens come runnin' for the great taste of Herbie Popnecker.


Tracking down the Man with the Red Nose (oh yeah! I already forgot about him!) pop sensation Herbie, now calling himself Eibreh Rekcenpop, crashes (literally! look, it's right there in the sound effects) into the dressing room of Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, who you can tell are today's guest celebrities because I've put their names in bold. I challenge the idea of Dino and Frankie sharing. a dressing room, as no one single dressing room could possibly contain Frank's mafia connections and Dean's drinks, but comics are sometimes forced to take a storytelling shortcut, so let's give it an official TV Tropes-style handwave and get on with the story.


Frank and Dean immediately snap into action and do what they do best: attacking Herbie. Ouch! That's gotta hurt...well, you know, it looks like invincible Herbie wasn't thrown off by that at all. As Robert Evans might say, the kid stays in the picture ARHGHHH (gets dragged off stage by giant hook)


Herbie has Martin and Sinatra (Marnatra?) lead him to the Man with the Red Nose (oh yeah! That guy!) but they're too intimidated to face off against him themselves. Chickens! Frank Sinatra is a big chicken! Dean Martin goes cluck-cluck-cluck-cluck! Buck buck buck buck buck! (is ushered offtage by a pair of burly goons telling me Mr. Sinatra would like to have a few words with me)


Then Herbie tosses the Man with the Red Nose (oh, don't tell me you've forgotten about him already) into a giant movie theater corn-popper, where he is then sold in giant buckets to the Alt-Right (aka Nazis) protesting Rogue One by buying tickets, entering the theater, buying popcorn, throwing away the popcorn, not going into the movie and going home. That'll show those precious snowflakes! (Precious Snowflakes Figurines™ is actually a registered copyright of Hallmark).


So all's well that ends with a guy being smothered to death in a popcorn popper, and without the moptop wig, Herbie's sexual attractiveness to the opposite sex is transferred back over to Dean and Frank, who spend the next six months in traction after being trampled by teens. Then, Herbie's dad adds yet another folder full of information to the case of Child Services v. Popnecker. Seriously, that guy is so emotionally abusive to his son, Bruce Banner's father looks up at him as a role model.


Look, Mr. Popnecker is just a jerk, that's what I'm saying.

Bear Attack! Month 2014, Day 19: I Know Why the Caged Bear Springs

Panels from "Pincus Popnecker, Private Eye!" in Herbie #12 (September 1965), plot by Richard Roesberg, script by Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

Bear Attack! Month, Day 10: Next up on PBS: Ken Burns's Animal Civil War

Panel from "George Washington's Teeth!" in Herbie #8 (March 1965), script by Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

Today in Comics History: General Cornwallis is bopped by this here lollipop

Panels from "George Washington's Teeth!" in Herbie #8 (March 1965), script by Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

More Cow/Bull Month, Day 6: Cows should not wear lipstick

Panels from "George Washington's Teeth!" in Herbie #8 (March 1965), script by Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

See that girl, watch that girl, diggin' the Jubilee Queen

Okay, so yesterday I was telling you all about Queen Elizabeth II's appearances in the DC Universe, and how she usually wound up getting saved (as have us all) by Batman. Yes, I know yesterday I also covered some of her appearances in Marvel's Captain Britain comic, but hey: that's Marvel UK, so it doesn't count. There will now be a slight pause for me to be pelted with bricks by fine folks such as Dez Skinn, Steve Dillon, Brian Hitch, Dave Gibbons, Alan Davis, Alan "My Name Is Also Alan" Moore, and Neil Tennant out of Pet Shop Boys. So I think maybe I'd better stick to what I know: 1) comic books and 2) wearing elegant hats...



Speaking of Marvel now, some comic book history sites will tell you that this comic is the first appearance of Queen Elizabeth II in comic books:


Cover of Marvel Mystery Comics #47 (September 1943), pencils and inks by Alex Schomburg

But they are wrong with a capital WHIR. Well, at least partway: this is actually King George and his wife Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon...we know her a Britain's beloved late Queen Mother and the...well, Queen's mother. And she can go get her own comic book. She didn't even have the good grace to appear in a story with Namor or the Torch...instead, she's teamed up with Timely's Angel, who not even Stan Lee remembers anymore. Then again, the story did feature a villain named Count Lust, so Frederick Wertham was all over that thing.


Panel from "The Unwilling Corpse" in Marvel Mystery Comics #47 (September 1943), pencils and inks by Gustav Schrotter

No, to find what I think might be the first appearance of Queen Elizabeth II in a proper comic book(y-type of periodical), you have to stretch waaaaaay across the newsstand to grab that copy of MAD without your mom seeing. It's only 1956 so it's still costs one thin quarter (cheap!):


Cover of MAD #27 (April 1956), pencils and inks by Jack Davis

Can't find Her Majesty? Well, just find the sparkling bare bottom of baby New Year '56 and look to the immediate right:



MAD skewered every real life personality during its glorious heyday (i.e., when you were reading it at the age of ten), and our pal the Queen was no exception. Here's a beautifully illustrated comic strip by grandmaster Wally Wood which addresses a problem Prince Charles still probably has today:


from "Comic Strip Heroes (Taken From Real Life)" in MAD #48 (July 1959), script by Frank Jacobs, pencils and inks by Wally Wood

I'm assuming the resemblance in the second panel between Charles and a certain "What—Me worry?" mascot of said magazine was purely coincidental.

Here's another caricature of Elizabeth in the very next issue:


from "Family Magazines" in MAD #49 (September 1959), script by Arnie Kogen, pencils by George Woodbridge

But if you think MAD doesn't count as a comic book once it passed ish #23, then, as far as I can find, Queen Elizabeth II's first comic book appearance was one of the greatest comics of all time, and it's quite a doozy!


Panels from "Herbie and the Loch Ness Monster" in Herbie #3 (August 1964), script by Richard E. Hughes as Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

The Queen was a frequent and frequently amorous guest-star in Herbie...but then again, who didn't love Herbie? Communists, I tell you. Rotten dirty red commies.


Panel from "Clear the Road for Skinny!" in Herbie #18 (June-July 1966), script by Richard E. Hughes as Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

Which is not to say that QE2 was always portrayed the same within Earth-Herbie's internal canon:


Panel from "Almost a King!" in Herbie #22 (December 1966), script by Richard E. Hughes as Shane O'Shea, pencils and inks by Ogden Whitney, letters by Ed Hamilton

I'm not quite certain what's up with the Queen's diction there. Perhaps she was just trying to tell him he was only supposed to blow the bloody doors off. Whatever: we salute you, Herbie and American Comics Group, for giving us the world's most accurate and authentic portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II!

Oh yeah, I promised you some stuff about Marvel Comics, didn't I? Ehhhhhh, here's Deadpool.


Panels from Deadpool v.4 #43 (November 2011), script by Daniel Way, pencils by Carlo Barberi, inks by Walden Wong, colors by Jorge Gonzalez, letters by Joe Sabino

Deadpool is in London for some reason or another (c'mon, you don't read Deadpool for internal logic, do you?) and he's stolen and is driving a Peel P50, the world's smallest production car. You (or at least I and all right-thinking people) may recognize it as the car that Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson drove through the BBC Television Centre building:



I promised you the Queen and Deadpool and here they are...well, the Queen is slightly off camera and she's not talkin' crazy like Deadpool always is, but take my word for it.



Deadpool has taken the Queen hostage, and as usual he really doesn't have a plan worked out in advance:



But he's good at pulling out an idea from his sleeve, or wherever it is he keeps his plans:



As Deadpool is captured, the Queen runs for freedom...but wait: there's been a switcharoo! Ya gotta love those things.



Of course it turns out that's Deadpool dressed in the Queen's frock and the Imperial margarine crown, and he's left the Queen tied up in civilian clothing. Now, here I'm thinking that he missed the very slapstick opportunity to put Queen Elizabeth in the Deadpool suit and have her head-bashed by the security guards. And then we could have a short entry in the next edition of The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe for DEADPOOL II (Queen Elizabeth II)



Now you think an appearance where she's undressed and tied up by Deadpool would be Queen Elizabeth's weirdest Marvel Comics appearance. And you'd be wrong. Let me introduce you to X-Men: True Friends, aka "The One Where Kitty Vows to Kill All the Nazis."



Here's the pitch: Shadowcat and Phoenix (Rachel, not Jean) have been castaway in time, winding up in Scotland in 1936, where they team up with bone-clawed Logan to fight against Baron Strucker and the Shadow King. What, you couldn't fit the Red Skull in this one, Claremont?


Panels from X-Men: True Friends #1 (September 1999), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Rick Leonardi, inks by Al Williamson and Sam de la Rosa, colors by Shannon Blanchard, letters by Tom Orzechowski

Any time you're in a pub quiz and you get asked about the great loves of Kitty Pryde's life, be sure to pinch yourself, because you're clearly dreaming. But if it really is happening, after you manage to answer "Peter Rasputin" and "Pete Wisdom," don't forget the other great lost love of Shadowcat's life, Alasdhair "Not Peter" Kinross. Oh, and of course Lisabet is the young Princess Elizabeth. Who else could it be? Gosh, isn't she relentless cute? Don't ya just wanna punch her in the face?



Check it out:the future Queen is swearing!



Why, that can't be right! The Queen would no more swear than would Betty Cooper!



Of course, meanwhile, enter...NAZIS!


Panes from X-Men: True Friends #2 (October 1999), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Rick Leonardi, inks by Al Williamson and Jimmy Palmiotti, colors by Shannon Blanchard, letters by Tom Orzechowski

Well, of course, Wolverine etc. etc. etc. yadda yadda yadda too early for Captain America etc. etc. etc. big fight back to the future. And of course, then Kitty finds out just who "Lilabet" was:


Panes from X-Men: True Friends #3 (November 1999), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Rick Leonardi, inks by Al Williamson, colors by Shannon Blanchard, letters by Tom Orzechowski

Of course, it wouldn't be Claremontean High Drama without dueling speech balloons on the penultimate page...



Duck, Liz! Those speech balloons are crowding up on you! They're gonna getcha! Oh yeah, and that symbolic final "The End" panel. Man, the X-Men was soapy in those days, weren't it?



So, in summary: Queen Elizabeth II in comic books! May you reign sixty more years, Your Majesty! (Sentiment not necessarily valid if your name is Charles.)