I've never been much of a comic book guy. I think it's one of those things that you have to be into as a kid to really understand them as an adult. That said, I am currently on the road and stumbled into a little book titled "Hot Rods & Racing Cars" ... <BR><BR>To read the rest of this blog entry from The Jalopy Journal, click here.
There's some cool shit there, bet there was loads of little minds scarred for life by them!!! Cool yellow roadster on cover / pic 16, love it.
If I remember correctly, these were the old "Charleton" brand comic books. I seem to remember 3 or 4 different titles. These were great to read some 40 years or so ago. I really liked them. I still have 8-10 of them around the house somewhere...
Silly rabbit. You should have built your collection before you posted this. Now you've just given yourself some competition. On the other hand, maybe you really have cornered the market and hope to drive up prices by posting this information, and then unloading on ebay... Crap.
Image 36 reminds me of a scene from the movie "Hot Rod" that Ryan posted on here last year, with all the roadsters running in a pack.
Open up and read an issue from Hot Rods & Racing cars. Take special note of the cars in a story: the main car will be one that was featured in Hot Rod magazine some time previous. One thing that stood out was the 2-page feature in the back: one I recall had a 'how-to' engine swap, a 352 Police Interceptor into a '54 Ford. (they were correct in reversing side mounts, trans mount, and the wiring details of 6 volt polarity vs. 12, but said to 'sledge the firewall 1" on passenger side'. Actually, if the engine is installed with bellhousing, and the tranny installed after, there is adequate clearance. But I wouldn't trade my Hot Rods & Racing Cars collection for 10 flatheads! (well, maybe)
Yes. Most work very unknown "b" artists.... meaning they were not in the running to do the big titles of the day. These comics were not big sellers like a mainstream superhero,western,detective or Horror genres........ The following of these were not huge.... There were many....but i really doubt anybody would know there names..... but Frank Frazetta might be one. Frank rose to great prominence,And had a very successful career in and outside the Comic Industry. And please remember..... the attitude toward these fine gentleman from other commercial artists was one of disdain... Some were referred as Schlock artists....You drew cartoons.. therefore you were not taken seriously... I have never felt that way about any of them....just the opposite. I had the pleasure of working with a fine long time Comic book artist in the late 80's...a Mr Don Heck........... I worked on a project.....prolly the last one he ever did before he passed.He was very nice to me.. but bitter about the industry. It's funny...everything old is new again.
Shhh, I was trying to keep them all to myself. Oh well, maybe my collection will get more valuable now.
....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these..... ....I will not start collecting these.....
my favorite artist was Jack Keller.His drawings were detailed and accurate.I'm sure he used model car kits as the "models" for his comic work.most of the cars in his stories could be recognized by kits available at the time
Damn, and I had blamed all of this on my locall "55 Chevy Gasser driving hero, Ronnie Ewing..................... I think I aged about 5 more years when I saw those. Pure car porn.................. Thanks...........
Those are very cool! But I don't ever remember seeing them,I read all the "CarToons" I could get my hands on though. N.N.
Those are pretty sweet. I'm just glad they've since found a better way of attaching wheels to cars. Every time there is a crash on those covers, wheels are flying off! Maybe that was the cause of some of those mis-haps. hmmmm
Hot Rods & Racing Cars was the longest running Charlton hot rod comic. 120 issues from Nov 51 to Jun 73. Other Charlton titles were 16 issues of Teenage Hotrodders from Apr 63 to Jul 67 which got retitled to Top Eliminator for 5 issues Sep 67 to Jul 68 which got retitled again to Drag N Wheels 29 issues 68 to 73. Another Charlton title Drag-Strip Hotrodders ran for 16 issues from the Summer of 63 to Aug 67 which got retitled to World of Wheels for 16 issues Oct 67 to Jun 70. Still another Charlton title Hot Rod Racers had 15 issues from Dec 64 to Jul 67 which was retitled to Grand Prix for issues 16-31. Charlton title Speed Demons ran for 6 issues Feb 57 to 1958 Hillman Periodicals put out Hot Rod & Speedway Comics for 5 issues feb 52 to May 53. Fawcett Publications put out 7 issues of Hot Rod Comics from Nov 51 to Feb 53. Ziff-Davis Publishing co put out 2 comics in 52 Hot Rod King & the other titled Speed Smith the Hot Rod King.There were many other comic book series that had an occasional hot rod theme which are fun to collect also. Last 2 are keeping the spirit alive today.
I really dig the cover art,.. looks like someone really did there homework, before putting pen to paper,...... Nice stuff and very cool !