Another all-Carl Barks issue except for the cover, a Bob Foster layout with art by Don Rosa. One of the best things about the cover is the color by Jo Meugniot, who, at her best, gave our Susan Daigle-Leach a run for her money. This very professional cover is funny, beautifully drawn and well-designed with a layout that works. Barks’ 21-pager, “Back to Long Ago!” (from Uncle Scrooge #16, December-February 1957) reveals that Scrooge McDuck learns he was Matey McDuck in a previous life (a notion that was popular in the media then). Add three Uncle Scrooge fillers by Barks and you have a “whole” book.
Aside-note of trivia: since the Internet is something like outer space -- unlimited -- maybe some readers will enjoy the following diversion that uses space written by Bruce Hamilton, former publisher of the Gladstone line of Disney comics, Series I and II, which ran both before and after Disney Comics’ three years:
“I’m probably one of few fans who finds such an arcane subject as the UPC codes on comic book covers interesting. I was fascinated and disturbed to learn when we got the license to publish Disney comic books (and had worked a deal with Curtis to distribute them) that we were compelled to run those irritating UPC price-codes on all our front covers. “Ridiculous,” I fumed. “The great Dell books did not have them. They would have disturbed the designs of the covers,” I quacked. “I’ll run ours on the back cover!” But Curtis was adamant, so I went directly to several of the nation’s regional distributors and asked if they cared. They replied, “Why should we care? Paperback books put them on the back covers.” So I went back to Curtis, put my foot down, and they relented. But the “experts” -- and there are always some of those guys around -- said I would regret the decision because it would mess up future advertisers’ ads. “Nuts,” I said, and I designed the covers so ads already laid out could simply be reduced a little in size. That was the direction Series I Gladstone comics went, and I never regretted it. We even left room on the back covers to run some very funny reprints of daily Donald Duck strips written by …BobFoster!
“But the UPC codes were only for national distribution, not for copies to go to Direct Market comic shops. The codes were a key to identify unsold comics from grocery stores, newsstands, etc., that were to be returned for refunds. To make sure comic shops -- who got bigger discounts for buying theirs “non-returnable” -- didn’t slip any comics into the system for refunds, the UPC code was left off their copies. But that meant leaving a “hole” in the cover art. So what many readers must have thought was a nonsensical reason, all their comic shop or subscription purchases had a rectangular box in the corner with nothing in it except a black and white drawing -- usually of the title character -- in some funny pose, nonsense art. Only Gladstone (and later Disney Comics … probably because of that zany Foster guy) decided to occasionally “play around” with the art that had to fill up those little rectangular boxes.
“For many issues of Disney’s Uncle Scrooge, the same drawing of Donald Duck was repeated month after month. Monotonous stuff. Suddenly, someone got a bright idea. If the corner happened to fall against a black background, why not make the art in the box solid black? Then, in theory, it would vanish -- black filling in a black hole on the Direct Market copies. So they did just that on Uncle Scrooge #248 and #274. The only slight problem was that it didn’t completely vanish because the box was filled in on a different plate in the printing process. Still with me? If you own either of these issues -- #248 or #274 -- pull it out and take a close look at the lower left-hand corner. Hold it so the light reflects off the surface. You can see two shades of black, one being the second plate where the UPC box should have been! Isn’t that interesting? Hmm. Disney also could have done it on US #270, but forgot. Tsk. Near the end of their run, however -- better belatedly than never -- they started having fun with the box, putting in gags featuring Uncle Scrooge (see issues #276, 277 and 278). My personal favorite is on US #279, where the image of Scrooge was dropped in favor of a clam with eyeballs! The games we publishers and editors play.” Bruce Hamilton , 12:30am, Sunday, June 27, 2004
And, in case you’ve forgotten we’ve been talking about Uncle Scrooge #279 as an offered commodity, it is available for sale.
$9.00