Disney-comics digest #134.

[David A Gerstein]

	Dear Folks,

	I'll take you on one at a time.  (COME ON AND FIGHT!  WAAAK
WAAAK WAK WAK WAK!)


	News from Mark Semich... but plenty!
	==== ==== ==== ========= === =======

"This issue also has a review, by Dana "Duckburg Times" Gabbard, of
Alberto Becanti's "Disney Comic Book Index Volume 1", Joe Torcivia and
Christopher E. Barat's "The Donald Duck Comic-Book Index", and
"Malcolm Willits Collection of Mickey Mouse Paintings By Floyd
Gottfredson".  This review contains, among other things, info on how
to order the books and info on some of the great lengths that people
have gone to in order to discover the credits of the early Disneys.

If anyone has interest in either of these, I'd be glad to type them in.

Donald Duck 282 ... has a letter from David Gerstein in it!"

	Mark, I would love *nothing more* than to read those articles.
I have no way of getting the CBG here in Williamstown and it
infuriates me that they actually notice Disney comics only when I'm
not in range of a comic shop!!  ;-)

	Isn't that Beccattini?  Or Becattini?  Or Beccatini?  (I've
seen all three of those spellings, but never with two "n"s.)
Surprising that the CBG misspelled his name.

	What is DD 282 like?  I won't get it here for at least three
weeks!  Mark, pretty please (mince, coax) could you copy in as well as
the CBG articles *whatever* that letter was of mine, and more
important Gladstone's response to it?  I'm excited to know.


	Lost Library in English
	==== ======= == =======

	It's coming in summer *'94*, not summer 95.  We would have
gotten it sooner, except that Gladstone gets the Danish issues
shipped, not the Norwegian ones, and knew nothing about the story
until Byron Erickson told them last week!  They would have ordered it
long ago had they known about it, then had it in print not long after
its foreign printing (as with the recent WH story "Spotless Don"). 
Gosh, Don (and I mean Rosa, not Duck!), aren't you in just as much 
of a hurry to see your stories in Gladstone's issues as *I* am?  I
wish you had told them about the story soon as you knew the
code number Egmont had assigned it.

	(Not trying to chew you out... honest!  That's what I'm gonna
do when *my* Egmont story's art is finished!)


	Jack Hannah
	==== ======

	Mr. Hannah did half of "Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold," art
only, while Barks did the other half.  Hannah then did:

	"School Days," a pretty good story in WDC&S 37;
	"Santa Claus' Visit," another good one in a special giveaway
WDC&S made for toy stores -- NOT Firestone -- in 1943's Xmas season;
	and "Sleepy Time Donald," in WDC&S 78.  I requested this story
from Cris Palomino right when she told me she had two spare pages in
the back of DDA 29 (Disney Comics), did I have any favorites I would
like to see?  It appeared there, sure enough.

	The Xmas story is presumably lost to the ages.  The special
WDC&S was *unnumbered* and *not* distributed by Western, and is quite
scarce now.  I saw a copy at the San Diego Con for a large pocketful
of money which I wouldn't have spent if I had it.  The issue also had
original Thumper and Bucky Bug stories in it, both by Carl Beuttner,
and some Manuel Gonzales MM Sunday pages from circa 1941.

	"School Days" *does* exist and I'm trying to convince John
Clark to reprint it.  Maybe the 60th-anniversary DD is the ideal time
for this!!  I'll request it right away.

	And... nothing post-Len Wein about having a WDC&S cover
illustrate the lead story.  "School Days" is illustrated by a Walt
Kelly cover in that 1943 issue.


	My personal Rosa tradition
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	Whenever a Don Rosa comic came out, through my final year of
high school and now whenever I'm home at the time, it comes on a
Friday at the local comic shop.

	My favorite memories are of having a delicious Friday night
Jewish Sabbath meal of roast chicken with gravy and stuffing, then
sinking into my easy chair and reading the Rosa which I've purposely
hidden from a full reading until then.  Don, you know how I *can't
wait* to do anything (as you could tell at the convention no doubt)
and so this was HARD for me!  Up until this point, if the comic had a
Rosa cover, it leaned against the bookshelf in such a position that I
could see it from my spot at the dinner table.  And of course, my
brother waits impatiently for me to *finish* said comic so he can read
it.  (He's 15 now.)  If he finished dinner before me, he got it
first... which did indeed happen now and then.  Your biggest
competition, Don, is my favorite meal!  But if you tasted my mom's
roast chicken I think you'd feel it was a fine complement to one of
your stories read for the first, second or fifteenth time.


	Your friend,


	David Gerstein