A joint interview was conducted In March 1983 with two of the greatest Disney legends, Carl Barks and Floyd Gottfredson (the fifty-year Mickey Mouse newspaper syndicated comic strip veteran). Each was asked to name the favorite story they had written. Gottfredson explained that his favorite was "Island in the Sky" (published from November 30, 1936 through April 3, 1937), the story based on a secret, futuristic atomic-power formula. Barks astonished everyone present when he, too, said, "The one I like best now after all these years in looking back over the whole chain of them that I did, was "Island in the Sky" (one of Susan Daigle-Leach's best coloring jobs leads off the album, Uncle Scrooge Adventures in Color #29). Gottfredson's and Barks' stories were totally different, of course, but that didn't lessen the impact nor coincidence of The Old Duck Man's little revelation! This historic moment was recorded and released six years later, after Floyd Gottfredson's passing at age 80. Carl Barks, meantime, who lived to be 99 years old, had launched into a new phase of his long career painting Disney duck oils for Another Rainbow at the time of the release of Mickey Mouse in Color, a huge, eight-pound national book-award winner in which a 45-rpm picture record is pocketed that contains the voices of the publisher as he asks questions, Floyd's reactions and Carl's brief monolog as he recounts his tale of an "Island in the Sky." (Various people in management at Disney have described MMIC over the years as "the finest single book ever published by a licensee" of the Studio. It was released in a limited edition by Another Rainbow and is, essentially, a book that is 50 percent Floyd Gottfredson, reprinting famous Mickey Mouse stories such as The Robin Hood Adventure, Mickey Mouse Outwits the Phantom Blot and Blaggard Castle, among other classic Sunday and daily newspaper strips; and the other half is strictly Carl Barks art featuring Mickey Mouse! Most notable are the color storyboards conceptualizing a complete Mickey animated cartoon Barks called Northwest Mounted, co-starring Minnie Mouse and Peg-Leg Pete. Though it was never produced, the effort precipitated Barks' move elsewhere in the Studio to work on Donald Duck cartoons (there he met Jack Hannah, eventually teaming up to draw the comic book, Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold). At this time in 1942, Barks' creation of his most famous comic book character, Uncle Scrooge McDuck, was still five years away. (A small quantity of the original Mickey Mouse in Color book is still available at the original issue price of $250. Please do not confuse the limited-edition book with the small trade edition, which does not contain the 45 rpm record or any of the art by Carl Barks. Only the limited edition books are signed by Gottfredson and Barks. Call Another Rainbow at [928] 776-1300 and ask for Helen; fax [928] 445-7536; write Box 2079, Prescott, AZ 86302; or email bdhamilton@mindspring.com

Also, relating to the USA #29 album: Carl Barks once commented that "modern art is so meaningless it can be anything you choose to call it." The pictorial cover art for this album, humbly but imaginatively recreated by yours truly -- with terrific color added by Susan Daigle-Leach -- was taken from Uncle Scrooge's image in the last panel of the second story, "Hound of the Whiskervilles," and is one of the publisher's personal favorite covers. Buy it. -- BH (extremely limited)
$35.00