Saturday, 28 December 2013

#Canadian #ComicBook Publishers 1941-46

In December 1940 William Lyon Mackenzie King’s Liberal government had banned the import of American comic books, pulps, and “non-essential items” for the war’s duration. Unless you lived along the border there would be no Detective Comics, Action Comics, Adventure Comics, All-American Comics, More Fun Comics, or All-Flash Quarterly. There would be no Batman, Superman or Flash. Cyril Vaughan Bell, “a former Toronto sign painter” told Ross his Bell Features took full advantage of circumstances and “turned out a billioncomic books” between 1941 and 1946. 

[4] Three Aces, No. 58
Near the end of the war, with sales slipping, Bell reprinted old issues, slapped new covers and titles on them, and shipped them to England to be sold. Alexander Ross made no mention of the other major entrepreneurs publishing comic books in Canada during the war years; Anglo-American Publishing, Hillborough Studio, Educational Projects Inc., and Maple Leaf Publishing on the West Coast.

[5] Triumph Comics, n.d.

No comments:

Post a Comment