Disney-comics digest #584.

[9475609@arran.sms.edinburgh.ac.uk]

      Dear Folks,

      DON ROSA said that foreign stories are selected for Gladstone 
comics like this:  "John Clark will flip through foreign comics until he 
spots a story that he CAN'T READ, but seems to have some interesting 
action. Then he orders the story... If it turns out [upon its arrival at 
Gladstone's office that] the story sux, it's too long a process to start 
from scratch..."
      Well, this is indeed how Gladstone chooses SOME stories, but not 
the ones that **I** work on.
      You see, I can read German, so if I see a good story in a German 
Egmont or Oberon reprint, I ask John if I can work on it.  He gives me 
the go-ahead, and I do a translation straight from the German -- even on 
Egmont stories which were originally written in English, since it's a 
lot easier that way than waiting for Gladstone to order the story and 
send it to me.
      So when you see a story I've worked on, all of you can be sure 
that **I** picked it FOR Gladstone, knowing very well what was going on 
and whether the story "sux" or not.  (Of course, to each their own 
opinion.  I picked "A Case of Too Much Money" thinking it a good story, 
and Augie didn't agree with me!)
      Some examples of this process can be seen in

      THE PREVIEWS LISTINGS:
>- Catman vs. the Masked Marauder
      I personally chose this story for Gladstone upon reading it in 
German (see below for more on this).  It is a first-rate superhero 
parody a la several famous ones that have predated it, with very good 
art by Colomer Fonts.  There's even a scene of DD burning some of HDL's 
comics like a 1950s Werthamite.  I had him saying, "in thirty years, the 
kids will thank me for this."  Heh, heh.
      I also gave the villain some very-carefully-researched Cockney 
dialect, which I am virtually sure that Disney will delete.
>- Naturepark Ranger, by Mau Heymans (Dutch)
      And here's an example of one of my MAJOR SLIP-UPS.  I was so 
jubilant upon having just sold a lot of German translations to Gladstone 
(including the Catman story) that I went ahead and translated this one, 
too, without checking to see if Gladstone had ordered it already or had 
someone else write an English script.  Well, they'd done both of those 
things, and my own version -- titled "By Hourglass Piqued" -- will never 
see the light of day.
>- Cover [of WDC&S 592] pencilled by Barks and inked by Van Horn
      The cover shows DD and a nephew, both painting adjacent floors of 
the house, having both painted their way to the same doorway and gotten 
stuck there, surrounded by painted floorboards.  Since the Dutch have 
inked a lot of abandoned Barks covers before, I bet there must be a Daan 
Jippes cover with this same gag.  Harry?
>Matti Eronen:
>Carl Barks Surviving Comic Book Art
>- production limited to 500 copies
>- $24,95
      I suppose this is a new book?  Does it say anything about page 
count?  I'm curious.

      BLACK PETE:  HOW OLD?
>It says that Pete is 60 years old on 15. april (today).
      Er -- today's 15 February, or I miss my guess.
      15 April is the day that Pete first appeared in the Mickey Mouse 
daily comic strip... but this was ***65*** years ago, in 1930.
>Then it says that his first appearance was 15. february 
>1925.
      That's his first ANIMATED appearance (and as far as I'm concerned, 
the REAL first appearance).  This is an accurate date, and someone else 
"pegged" (heh, heh) the cartoon "Alice Solves the Puzzle".  He was 
called Bootleg Pete in that cartoon.  He was always called Pete, and 
specifically Pegleg Pete as early as 1926, although that was only one of 
several nicknames he had (the other one of the era being "Putrid Pete").
      Pete also made more than 11 pre-Mickey cartoon appearances.  The 
count of 11 comes from John Grant's encyclopedia of Disney animated 
characters, but Russell Merritt and J. B. Kaufman (in their recent book 
_Walt in Wonderland_) have more accurate information, including story 
synopses for all missing Alice cartoons (something Grant did not have).  
I'm going to be buying that book soon, and I'll give you a correct 
number of pre-MM Pete appearances then, gang.
>It's not as bad as in 1973, though...
      That celebration was in fact fifty years of the Disney Studio 
itself.  The same logo appeared on some Whitman comics of the time.
      Pete was also the villain in some DD, Goofy, and Chip 'n' Dale 
cartoons, which I guess the Extra issue doesn't list.

      My first story with Pete will be going back to basics by pairing 
him with Sylvester Shyster.  More on that soon.

      Back tomorrow...

      David Gerstein
      <9475609 at arran.sms.ed.ac.uk>