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In this month’s Wanted! feature we are concentrating on the "smaller" publishers, and, as you will see, there were a few "giants" in the bunch who decided to jump on the mystery-man bandwagon. Also, we look at the really small publishers who tried their hand at comic books. We will go in alphabetical order for the publishers with explanations on how a few are related to each other. So here we go! Columbia House Columbia House began as an offshoot of Eastern Color Printing Company and was run by Vince Sullivan, former employee of National Periodical Publishing (DC). Mr. Sullivan brought good talent to some memorable characters. Characters that we need text and visual information on: Marvello the Magician The Cloak (Spy Chief)
Dell Publishing Company Dell was in comics from their very inception, but it took them a while to get around to the mystery-man phenomenon. They also had a connection to United Features Syndicate with such characters as the Phantom and Mandrake the Magician. Later, Dell, the parent company, would have two split-offs, Whitman Publishing, which was a company in its own right, and King Features Syndicate, which also was a powerful newspaper syndicate. This is one of the most convoluted ventures in comic publishing. Characters that we need text and visual information on: Greg Gilday Characters that we need text information on: Blackwing Characters we do have information on: Mandrake The Magician (King Features Syndicate)
Eastern Printing Company As the name indicates, they were indeed a printing company, one of the biggest, printing rival companies’ books as well as their own. Characters we do have information on: Flintman (The Fearless Flint) And here is a company that put out only one book. That company was E. R. Ross. Characters that we need text and visual information on: Miss Shady Next up is a very small publisher Great Publications, on which we have no historical data. Characters that we need text and visual information on: Devil Dogs 3 Characters that we need text information on: Atlas the Mighty Pelican Publications only put out one issue of Green Giant Comics then folded up their comic book efforts. Characters that we need information on: Green Giant (need text info) Up next is Progressive Publications; we need information on the following character: Cosmo Mann (text info only) Characters we do have information on: Lady Fairplay And for our final company we look at another newspaper publishing company that decided to get into comics. United Feature Syndicates published a handful of books, mostly non-superhero fare, but they did produce a few costumed heroes. Also, they had an offshoot company called Hit Publications, which produced only one comic book series. For simplicity’s sake, we will list them along with the UFS characters. Characters that we need text and visual information on: Mr. Mist Characters that we need text information on: Little Giant Characters we do have information on: Mirror Man Join us next month as we wrap up our look at the oddball publishers with Street and Smith, Magazine Enterprises, and Fiction House, plus a host of others. With your help we can complete these publishers’ stables of characters. If we have omitted anyone on the above lists, please let us know who, what, when, and where, and we will add them to the companies’ listings.
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