Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

Whites of Their Eyes, Rowland Wilson‘s book (1962) which collects his early cartoons, is the subject of this and a couple of other recent posts. (Part 1 & Part 2)

Bill Peckmann has been kind enough to share some scans with us, and I’m ravenous enough to hurriedly post every scrap of Mr. Wilson’s work. I came into animation fully aware of his great work, which I’d often cut from many of the magazines in which they were published. I think I’d first met him, rather briefly, at my short stint inbetweening at Phil Kimmelman’s & Ass. I had little more than the opportunity of telling him how much I admired his work. I worked on a number of Schoolhouse Rock pieces (Lucky 7 etc.) that he’d designed. Later on, I got to know him a bit better through my association with Dick Williams. I also knew his daughter, Amanda, through animation circles at the time. She worked on Raggedy Ann, where I was a supervisor. My connection, in real life, was limited, but my appreciation for his work great. Here’s Part 3 of Whites of Their Eyes.

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Does it get any better than this cartoon?

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Here are some photos taken in 1970 at Focus Design Studios.
They are of some of the crew that produced and work on
Rowland’s early TV commercials, like Utica Club’s ‘Mountie’ beer spot.

This is Sid Horn, producer and Phil Kimmelman, director.

Dante Barbetta, Roger Mejia, Gerry Dvorak and Victor Barbetta.

Victor Barbetta

Bill Peckmann

from Bill Peckmann: I’m sticking this drawing on the end because
it was done about a year (1969), before the photos were taken.
It’s one you’ve posted already quite a few years ago, but
maybe this photostat might be of better quality?

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I’ve split the drawing up and used George Griffin’s notes to mark up and identify the people within the caricature and to make it a bit easier to read.

The Mountie ad starts at 3:31.

Another Rowland Wilson ad starts at 0:31.

- Several years ago, I’d posted Bill Peckmann‘s xeroxed copy of Rowland B. Wilson‘s 1962 book, Whites of Their Eyes.

Bill has now sent me new scans from the book, itself, and they’re worth posting in this better state. I hope you enjoy the diversity of Rowland’s style in the wide range of cartoons he’d done by 1962.

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In 1981, nestled in their idyllic abode in the cartoonist’s and
illustrator’s haven of Westport, CT., Rowland and Suzanne Wilson
had their own British invasion…

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…It was colleagues and friends of Rowland’s that he had
worked with previously at Richard Williams Studios in London.

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Following the visit to Rowland’s house, everybody dropped by
to see Row in his room at the PK&A Studios that he shared
with Bill Frake (Standing far left) and myself. Mark Mayerson (standing far right)

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The following pencil sketches are by RBW, from about the same
time period as the visit. They were done for ‘Tang’ commercials,
Rowland designed the characters and did the BG’s.

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- Bill Peckmann sent me a host of scans today of the book which collects the comic strip Buck O’Rue as drawn by Paul Murry and Dick Huemer. The book was written by Richard P. Huemer and Germund Von Wowern.

Paul Murry was noted for his work on Mickey Mouse comic book adventure stories. Here is a small sample of that work:

Here are two examples of Murry’s Mickey Mouse art,
a cover and the first page of the story.

. . . and if you go here you’ll find another post we had featuring more of his work.

Here are Bill’s comments:

The book collection of the comic strip ‘Buck O’Rue‘ was just released. The short lived strip was done by ‘moonlighting’ Disney greats Dick Huemer and Paul Murry back in the early 1950′s.

‘Buck’ would get a super duper glowing review from me if only I knew how to write a good one! So I’ll let the book speak for itself.

There are a couple of points about the book that I would like to mention. It is a heartfelt labor of love by the authors, Richard P. Huemer, Dick Huemer’s son and knowledgeable comic’s editor/historian Germund Von Wowern. The book is three hundred pages of great information, photos and of course, the strip itself, dailies and Sundays!

Here are the introductory pages:

Book Cover

Title Page

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Table of Contents

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Foreward by Don Peri

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Besides the collected daily and Sunday strips of ‘Buck’ in this huge 300 page book, there are also many wonderful pages with bio’s of, and art from Mr. Huemer and Mr. Murry.
Here are a few samples, and what treasures they are!

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Okay cowpokes and cowgals, it’s time to set the stage for adventures of ‘Buck’…

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…and introduce the cast of characters…

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And here’s a sample of the strip . . .

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- Bill Peckmann continues to send me treasures. Here’s a calendar by Fritz Bumgarten with illustrations that werer taken from some of his many children’s books. The guy has a beautiful stle that feels like the work of many of the Disney Silly Symphonies and the early features. That Albert Hurter feel.

The calendar’s cover

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The back cover of the calendar.

As mentioned, these 12 months’ worth of images were culled from illustrations taken from some of the books by Fritz Baumgarten. Here are the covers of some of those Baumgarten books in Bill Peckmann‘s enormous collection.

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A couple of years ago I’d posted some cartoons from Rowland B. Wilson‘s 1962 book, Whites of Their Eyes. (You can see two of them at: part 1 and part 2.) However these posts were from a xeroxed copy of the book and the quality was a bit shabby.

Bill Peckmann now has a copy of the book and has sent me new scans of these great cartoons. Bill writes:

It’s kind of hard to believe that this 1962 collection of Sat. Eve. Post, the New Yorker and Esquire gags are from the beginning, formative years of Row’s early career. He was only 32 years old when this book came out. Most of us would be happy to top off a career with this kind of exceptional work.

The book’s dustcover

The actual book’s embossed hard cover.

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Here is an upbeat ’1984′ happening. Two legends in their own time, Carl Barks and Rowland Wilson, got to meet each other for the first time in Carl’s home town of Grants Pass Oregon. It was definitely a mutual admiration society!

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left to right, Gare Barks, Rowland, Carl and Suzanne Lemieux Wilson.

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The Barkses were then kind enough to introduce us to their good friend,
cartoonist Russell (Broom-Hilda) Myers and his wife.

L. to r. Gare, Mrs. and Mr. Russ Myers, Carl, Suzanne and Rowland.

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L. to r. Bill Peckmann, Russ and wife, Carl, Suzanne and Rowland.

- Last week I started scans of the 1972, Rowland Wilson book which featured his character, Tubby. Bill Peckmann sent me scans from the second in the Tubby series of books called Tubby and the Poo-Bah.

To see Part 1 of this book go here.

Here’s the remainder of that great children’s book
which begins where we left off: pages 32 & 33.

pg.46

pg.47

pg.52

pg.53

pg.58

pg.59

pg.64

Inner Back Cover

To complete the post, Bill Peckmann sent some photos from Rowland Wilson‘s California studio. He had a series of small figurines which he used to help in the design. Bill writes:

“Rowland also had a way with an X-Acto blade, he was a master model builder and mixed media sculptor! These are studies he did to help him realize his cartoon characters.”

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Should you want to see my post of the first Tubby book go here.

- I love shots of animation people at various functions. It’s particular fun when you know the people and the pictures show them from a different time and place. Here are a few that nicely fill the bill.

- Ralph Bakshi was in touch after seeing the Fleischer model sheets that I posted. He sent me a photo from the early 1960s.

(L to R) Al Chiarito, Vinny Bell, Arnie Levy, Nick Alberti, Bill Ackerman

Candy Kugel had a couple of other photos from two events. The first two are from a Lcl 841 u-nion meeting. Candy and I tried to ID the people in the photos, and we’ve named a number of them. If you notice an error or can name some others, please just drop a note in the comments.

(L to R) Cliff “Red” Augustin, unknown, Izzie Klein,
Marsha Kaplan (seated), Johnny Gentilella, Gordon Whittier,
female center unknown, unknown, unknown, unknown,
unknown woman seated, Nick Tafuri

Johnny Gentilella (L), unknown fem, Pepe Ruiz,
unknown, unknown, Gordon Whittier, Unknown fem.

Other photos are from an exhibition of animation art and screenings from the different commercial studios in NYC. This was held in April 1952.

Pauk Kim was the artistic designer of the exhibition.

This is Lu Guarnier in front of a sign which lists
all the studios at the time that participated in the
exhibit of cels and artwork – and a screening of spots.

Rose Eng (?), Anne Eng (Fred’s wife), unknown visitor, Fred Eng

Francis Lee

Pablo Ferro

Lu Guarnier

And at the very same time these animators were being
photographed at the animation function, I was holding up
my twin brothers and older sister dressed in my cowboy garb.

Among Candy’s photos was this one of an inbetweeener,
Fred Diamond, at his desk in Famous Studios. I thought
it interesting to see what the setup looked like at Famous.

Finally here’s a picture of Assistant Animator, Gerry Dvorak, who painted baseball cards in his early days, then went into pictures of snow leopards.

This is Gerry posing with Mickey Mantle at Mantle’s hotel room.
They’re holding up Gerry’s baseball card painting of Mantle.
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- A while back I posted a Jesse Marsh piece contributed by the indomitable Bill Peckmann from his wonderful collection of material. Now, just in time for the release of the new book on Marsh’s Tarzan strips, Tarzan: The Jesse Marsh Years – vol. 8, Bill has sent me a stash of new strip pages.

Here from ‘WD’s Christmas Parade’ No. 1, 1949, are the
illustrations Jesse Marsh did for the
text of the 4 page story, ‘So Dear To My Heart’.

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We’ve already posted the polar bear story from this 1957 Dell comic book ‘Walt Disney’s The Nature of things’. Here is the Prairie Dog story from that issue.

Cover of this 1957 magazine.

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In the 1960 Sunday New York Journal-American funny papers we find Jesse doing the strip ‘Walt Disney’s Treasury of Classic Tales,’ meaning Marsh was adapting Disney’s live action feature length films.

Unfortunately, this is not a complete collection but just a few of the strips to show what two of the adaptations looked like.

Just the series titles: TOBY TYLER and NIKKI, WILD DOG OF THE NORTH
is enough to send “Baby Boomers” like me into a nostalgia tail spin.

I remember reading this strip on Sundays in
the NY Journal American: Puck the Comic Weekly.

- In 1972, Rowland Wilson published another book featuring his character, Tubby. (We’ve posted the first here.) Bill Peckmann surprised me with scans from the second in the series, Tubby and the Poo-Bah. Here’s what Bill had to write:

Here is Rowland’s ‘Poo-Bah’ book. Lots of good news here, Denis Wheary‘s copy is almost in mint condition, the spine seems to be laying very flat for the scanner and RBW is really getting in the groove on this his second ‘Tubby’ book from 1972!

I would also say that the editors let Rowland run with this like the art directors did in his early print ads and TV spots and because of that, we all came out winners!

Here’s the first half of the book. The second half will come next week.

The book’s cover

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This double page spread is beautiful in it’s simplicity. The three levels
of foreground, middle ground and background are very neatly realized,
especially the up front wave swell with it’s sculpted boy and boat,
all those different shapes singing!

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Bill Peckmann followed up this first half of the book with this:

Suzanne Wilson and I were admiring Rowland’s deft handling of water in ‘Poo-Bah’ and she was kind enough to send me these two ‘Mermaid’ pieces that RBW did. Add ‘em to your collection!

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- I love getting these out of the blue emails from Bill Peckmann, followed by a flurry of great cartoon scans.

Here’s the latest and his comments prior to sending:

I just came across this 1979 book of mine, a collection of animal gags, all collected from past New Yorker cartoons, it has a bunch of our favorite cartoonists in it, Rowland B. (only 1 gag of his, but it’s a good one not seen before), 4 Peter Arno’s, 3 Whitney Darrow Jr.’s, 6 Charles Addams’, and of course the author/editors Gahan Wilson and George Booth, plus many more, all rib ticklers

With not one, but two legendary magazine gag cartoonists editing this 1979 collection of animal gags, what else can I say but enjoy!

Here’s a small portion of their pick of the litter.

The book’s Cover

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Many thanks to Bill Peckmann for the scans.