Keskustelujen arkisto

(Email removed) (Mike Pohjola) writes:

> And secondly in their Quiz, they asked the color of Tupu's cap. (To
> Americans and other aliens: Tupu is one of Donald's nephews, but it's
> impossible to say whether he's Huey, Dewey or Louie)

I have always thought that Tupu=Dewey, Hupu=Huey and Lupu=Louie because
the similarity of the names is quite obvious. I based my web-quiz answer
on this assumption and it worked.

--
Ville Saari EMail: (Email removed)
Tallbergin puistotie 7 B 21 Phone: +358 0 682 2226
00200 Helsinki
FINLAND /dev/null: write failed, file system is full

David:

What made your Mickey/Horace-story different?
Naturally it was *Horace*. He's been really underused, and I'm
glad writers (and Egmont) are bringing him back. Michael
Gilbert did another good use of him on his 'hiccups' story.
(Also drawn by Noel Van Horn.)

The ending of your story was a bit predictable, but otherwise
it was great. I hope I can see your original script for it
soon on Gladstone-books.

BTW, in Aku Ankka 13-14/96 was a new Mickey-adventure drawn
by Ferioli. (D94133 - 'Swamp-Orchid')
Peg-Leg Pete (without the peg-leg, that makes him Black Pete, right?)
and Catfoot(?) are 'main villains' of this story.
And Goofy turned (almost) into Invisible Gir...um...Boy,
just like Mickey turned into Mister Fantastic on 'Plastic-Mickey'.
(I really miss Fantastic Four...it practically doesn't exist
anymore.)

/Mikko

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MIKKO:
"The ending of your story ("Digging Up Trouble" D93497) was a
bit predictable, but otherwise it was great."
Would you believe... it didn't originally end that way?
Originally, the story was a page shorter. You recall the
point right after the final explosion, when Mickey reveals that the
Amaturnite ore has been loosened from the rock; well, originally, he
excitedly prepared to show this ore to Horace, but then saw that
Horace appeared to be nowhere to be found.
We cut right away to Mickey delivering his necklace to Minnie.
"Aw, prospecting's easy," he says (as he did in the final story, too).
"It just takes fortitude, careful plannin', and BRAINS!" (again, as in
the final story). He turns to Horace, who we now see is covered in
bandages. "Brains like yours, eh, Horace?" "Aw, shut up!"
Egmont wanted an 8-pager rather than a 7-pager and figured it
would be good to establish that Horace didn't get rich, as he'd
planned, so together my editor (Anina Bennett) and I came up with the
final version of the ending. I liked it just as much, although I did
think it moved the climax (the explosion) a little far from the
story's actual conclusion.
I haven't actually used Horace since this first story -- I did
two stories ("The Egg Collector" and "A Mouse Against the World") with
Butch, three ("Mickey Mouse's Unjust Dessert", "Mouse of Wax", and
"The Cavern in the Shifting Sands") where Mickey's paired with Minnie,
and one ("Off the Beaten Track") with Mickey versus his neighbor
Muscles McGurk. The next one I do will have Mickey, Butch, and Goofy.
But then I'll be doing another one with Horace. Just wait for him,
he'll be back. After all, anyone with the "Horsecollar Touch" is such
an expert at EVERYTHING, that he HAS to be where the action is. ;-)

MIKE:
Butch is a character from some of the first Gottfredson
stories. In "Mr. Slicker and the Egg Robbers" (FG's second story)
Butch is a tough juvenile delinquent helping the villain, but turns on
him and helps Mickey send him to jail... only Butch is also put in
jail for being in the Slicker's gang. In a later story it's revealed
that Mickey helped Butch get a light sentence; he is freed, and
appears in 3 additional stories. And now 2 more. ;-)
Some of my MM tales have villains, by the way, and some don't.
But in only one of my first seven is Mickey really a detective, and
even there he isn't a detective in the boring 1960s way. And I have
no more detective-MM ideas kicking around, anyway.
Glad you liked my first Mickey! Just wait for more!

HENRI:
Actually Rota's story isn't very explicit other than
mentioning "Caledonia" and "Malcot Castle". I'm using "Walstaen
Castle" instead, like the translation of the earlier story, just so no
one will be confused (I don't think Malcot Castle exists either, but
I'll keep looking); then I'll add some more information about the
places, etc. so that the story has some authentic flavor that was
missing in the British version I'm working from.

RICH:
As it happens, I have the American edition of the Fethry
"Disney Encyclopedia" volume... and the editors in New York, or
wherever, got rid of Fethry's hair (making him bald) and called him
Donald Duck throughout the volume, even though he's wearing a
different costume and doesn't look like Donald even without his hair.
Clearly the editors didn't think anyone knew who Fethry was in this
country. Maybe THEY didn't know.
But I had recently bought Whitman's DD 215, one of those rare
American Fethry issues, at some toy store, and I knew. I was nine
years old, but I still knew SOMETHING had been done to that
encyclopedia!
The Index volume of the encyclopedia DOES mention Rockerduck,
though. Refers to a lot of Gottfredson stories in the text, but calls
Eega Beeva "Eeca Beewa".

David Gerstein
<(Email removed)>

RICH:

Funny you should mention the Disney encyclopedia. (Does anyone remember
Jiminy Cricket teaching all of you Mouseketeers how to spell
E-N-C-Y-C-L-O-P-E-D-I-A ?)
As a premium for ordering all of the books you received a Junior Woodchucks
Manual! See my article in Comic Book Marketplace # 27 (Sept. 1995). Since
publishing that piece I have heard from two other fans who also picked up
the Manual at flea markets and such for around $5. I wouldn't part with
mine for anything. There are other Italian "Manuals" that are currently
available.

I've seen the encyclopedia available in many used book stores for $2-4
each. There are a couple different editions available.

In a message dated 96-04-08 12:12:54 EDT Ron Edge wrote

>This is the kind of fascinating information I wish were easily and
>publicly available. I have never understood, either, where one
>comes up with the names of artists and writers for all the years
>of publishing when NONE of this was published in the Disney comics
>themselves. Is this information on sales public and easily available
>anywhere?

I can answer some of those questions. There are some sales figures put out
by Ayers and other circulation monitors, but since these were for
advertisers, they usually only contain figures for an entire publishing
group.
How do we come up with who drew or wrote what? By their styles. Every
writer, penciler and inker has an individual style and quirk. But studying
someone's style long enough, you can start to recognize their work.
For example: I love the work of Ken Hultgren and have read 100s of his
comics, I now can spot his Disney work. And I am reading his stories to see
if I can spot Al Hubbard's inking.
How do I know Hubbard did some inking? Well, this is another way to find
information. I heard about it from Jim Davis and Martha Hultgren, who were
there.
Both Mark Evanier and Don Arr (Christensen) kept somewhat records of their
writings. Other writers remember what they wrote. A couple of months ago, I
had a hour long conversation with Paul S. Newman, reading him stories he
might have written (he wrote 1 Uncle Scrooge).
Did you know that Jerry Siegel wrote a Junior Woodchuck story.
I can't tell writers by their styles, but some can.

Ken Gordon:
I'm sorry to hear about your health. Please keeep us up on how you're
doing.
Write orcall Randy Scott at Michigan State University (Library). They have
a large comics collection and know of the other University collections.

Mike Pohjola:
There are hundreds of people who have done Disney comics. Any particular
years or characthers?
Best wishes Steven Rowe

Hi again!

Mike P. wrote:

<<I'm no expert in knowing what something sounds like in English, but to my
ear Yussuf Aiper could sound like "Yes, a viper".>>

Well, I thought the history of obscure comics was more Don Rosa's line,
but I guess it's also mine. Let's hope I remember this right:
In the 1920's Billy deBeck, the cartoonist best known for the newspaper
strip "Barney Google" (continued today by his assistant Fred Lasswell, though
Barney's been displaced as the title character by hillbilly Snuffy Smith)
launched a second strip to fill out his Sunday page, a common practice in
those days. DeBeck's new strip was called "Parlor, Bedroom and Sink," and
initially starred a newlywed couple, but soon a baby was born and took the
lead role. Bunker Hill, Jr., nicknamed "Bunky," quickly developed into one of
those very young but very precocious comic-strip kids with an extensive
vocabulary (like Popeye's adopted son Swee'pea, or, more recently, Bill
Watterson's Calvin).
Bunky, most distinguished by his long nightgown and huge nose, was
always getting lost or separated from his parents. At those times, he
frequently would fall in with a low-life named Fagan, literally pulled out of
"Oliver Twist." (Even the different spelling may have been an error rather
than deliberate distinction: I believe the name was later spelled "Fagin,"
like that of his Dickensian original.) Fagan would also mangle the language,
particularly misusing the Brooklyn "youse" (which, like the Southern "you
all," is strictly a plural but not always recognized as such). Other
characters, including Bunky, would pick it up in which deBeck cited as "the
Fagan influence," and Bunky was fond of his sometime companion but has no
illusions as to his honesty. "Youse is a viper!" he would frequently say to
Fagan, and this sentence also became repeated many times, by many other
characters. Indeed, it became quite a catch phrase at the time, so I suspect
it's ultimately the source of Yussuf Aiper's name.

<<First of all, I liked the story very much and Horace was very refreshing to
see after all these years of Mickey and Goofy.>>

Don't I know it! One of the disappointments of the later Mickey Mouse
stories was the non-use of what was originally a quite extensive supporting
cast. I'm still not holding my breath for the return of Eega Beeva or Li'l
Davy, but the regulars like Horace, Clarabelle, Morty and Ferdie, Captain
Churchmouse, Captain Doberman, and even Minnie Mouse seem to have been all
but ignored as the stories focussed almost exclusively on Mickey and Goofy.
Similarly with the villains: (Peg-Leg/Black/ Dirty/Big Bad) Pete is one of
the best, but he was so overused I wanted to see some others. The classic
Mickey certainly had plenty: The Phantom Blot (who had his own book in the
'60's, but seemed to disappear completely before and after), Shyster, Eli
Squinch, Dr. Vulter and many others. For that matter, is there any reason
Mickey couldn't occasionally go up against Duck villains like the Beagle
Boys? (Donald's fought Pete a few times, so fair is fair.)

David Gerstein wrote:

<< Moby Duck, on the other hand, was a character who existed so that sea
stories could be done, but had no real integrity or depth as a personality,
and had no special talent for bringing out any type of reaction in Donald.
He ultimately failed, IMHO, because he lacked character strength and
usability.>>

Which is less about the character than about his writers' ability to
flesh him out and make him live, as Barks did with Uncle Scrooge. Of course
Barks (like Billy deBeck with Fagan) was inspired by one of the great
seriocomic writers of all time, Charles Dickens, but that alone didn't help.
Moby Duck's name was clearly a Herman Melville pun, and the character also
seemed to have aspects of Moby Dick's nemesis, Captain Ahab (being a sailor,
not a whale), so maybe a good writer (Rosa? Van Horn? Gerstein?) could give
some of the Melville depth to Moby.

Harry Fluks wrote:

<<Hm... why would Flintheart change his name? To make it sound more English?
Could be, when he left the Boer society to join the English speaking society.
>>

I wouldn't be at all surprised. Indeed, when I first encountered the
character as a child, he was calling himself Flintgold Glomheart, and used
several other variations (like Heartflint Goldglom) before appearing under
the name by which Scrooge (but not, at that point, I) had known him before.
He's clearly an old hand at name changes.

<<By the way: the Belgians call Dutch people greedy. Is this "international
knowledge"? If so, Glomgold *must* be over 90% Dutch. 8-)>>

No doubt similar to the reputation Scotsmen have to Anglo-American,
accounting for Scrooge's ancestry. Since at least one Gladstone story
confirmed that Glomgold was descended from a London cab driver in the 19th
century, I suspect he has *both* Dutch and Scottish ancestors, which would
(along with the likelihood of his buying a house in Duckburg after his
rivalry with Scrooge commenced) seem to explain everything that's been done
with him so far.

Rich Morrissey

MIKKO A. wrote:

> Naturally it was *Horace*. He's been really underused, and I'm
> glad writers (and Egmont) are bringing him back.

Coincidentally, Horace appears also quite frequently again in Dutch
stories. He has his own garage (he repairs cars), and usually features
in short (2 to 4 page) Goofy stories.

DON R.:
> The Dutch albums are going to start spotlighting my "Lo$"? Do you think you
> can get them to use the Gladstone coloring?

I think they already decided which version to use. But I only know what was in
the advertisement. I'll call the editor one of these days, when I have the time.

> And their ads imply that they'll even use my Gladstone covers?

Usually they compose a preliminary cover for ads like this. The real cover
could be quite different.

STEVEN R.:
> How do I know Hubbard did some inking? Well, this is another way to find
> information. I heard about it from Jim Davis and Martha Hultgren, who were
> there. [...]

This is very interesting information, which isn't in our database yet.
I know Alberto Becattini is working on a Gold Key/Whitman index (and
apparently, you're helping him with that), but it may take quite a while
before he's finished.
Do you by any chance have info like this in electronic form, which we can
(and are allowed to) use in the Disney comics Database?

> Both Mark Evanier and Don Arr (Christensen) [...]

Don Arr? Is that an alias for Christensen?

> Did you know that Jerry Siegel wrote a Junior Woodchuck story.

No, but he *is* listed as the writer of a lot of Italian stories.

RICH M.:

> Well, I thought the history of obscure comics was more Don Rosa's line,
> but I guess it's also mine. [Background of Yussuf Aiper]

Thank you very much, Rich, for this story! This was one of the
"unsolved mysteries" of this mailing list! I have been wondering about this
name ever since it was mentioned here.

> I suspect [Flintheart Golmgold] has *both* Dutch and Scottish ancestors,
> which would (along with the likelihood of his buying a house in Duckburg after his
> rivalry with Scrooge commenced) seem to explain everything that's been done
> with him so far.

Well... there was one (Egmont) story that shows young Scrooge and young
Flintheart being rivals in a grocery shop. There's no other way of explaining
this than by declaring the story non-canon...

--Harry.
Harry Fluks, Leidschendam, The Netherlands
"Wie ben ik? Wat doe ik hier? Waar is mijn Roddelflop?"

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