Tag: San Francisco Academy of Comic Art (page 1 of 2)

Help us Save Comics! CBS Sunday Morning and the Bill Blackbeard story

Caitlin McGurk, Curator of Comics and Cartoon Art interviewed by CBS Sunday Morning correspondent Luke Burbank

Big news! We are thrilled to share that, barring breaking news, this Sunday, April 9, the acclaimed and long-running staple of weekend television, CBS Sunday Morning, is scheduled to feature the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum! The segment is all about our famous San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection amassed by the great Bill Blackbeard – totaling over 2.5 million newspaper comic strip clippings and pages. Tune in at 9am ET to see familiar faces from the Billy Ireland! 

Bill Blackbeard’s story and unparalleled collection is the theme of our current exhibition, MAN SAVES COMCS! Bill Blackbeard’s Treasure of 20th Century Newspapers, curated by Caitlin McGurk and Ann Lennon. It is on display now through May 7, 2023. The exhibit celebrates the 25th anniversary of the arrival of this collection at Ohio State, and the many incredible discoveries that have been made since then. Check out a digital version of the exhibit here, and celebrate the exhibit with us in person at our event on April 22.

We need your help! Twenty-five years later, the process of unboxing, sorting, rehousing and cataloging this essential collection is still ongoing, and we are less than halfway through completing this work. Over 2,000 boxes of material from this massive collection remained uncatalogued and undiscoverable. We’ll be wrapping up Phase 1 of this enormous project, thanks to funding from the Hearst Foundation, and we’re now raising funds for Phase 2. We are seeking to raise $125,000 to be able to continue this critical work of rehousing and cataloging the collection. Thanks to an anonymous donor, we have already raised $75,000 and need $50,000 to reach our next goal. Check out our BuckeyeFunder campaign and consider a donation to support the completion of this massive undertaking.

DONATE NOW TO HELP US SAVE COMICS!

The collection documents more than a century of newspaper comic strips, many of which are the only surviving copies in the world. Creating access to these irreplaceable source materials and artistic commentaries on the social, political, and cultural happenings across time will offer unique insights to researchers while inspiring audiences for generations to come. Every dollar helps our mission to save comics!

Found in the Collection: E.G. Lutz (1868-?)

Although you’ve probably never heard of him- cartoonist, animator and author E. G. Lutz is the reason that 19 year old Walt Disney took an interest in pursuing animation. Lutz’s book Animated Cartoons: How They Are Made, Their Origin and Development, is credited time and again for being the book that Disney read that got him to think about starting up a business. However, little to nothing is known about E.G. (Edwin George) Lutz, though the impact of his writing and ideas is obviously tremendous.

Animated Cartoons: How They Are Made, Their Origin and Development, by E.G. Lutz. From The San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum

One thing we do know for sure about Lutz (and as always, we encourage our readers to contribute their own knowledge!) is that he was also a brilliant newspaper cartoonist, with some of his most interesting work appearing in the gorgeously illustrated Book of Magic, which was the special children’s section of the Seattle Post Intelligencer (where Nell Brinkley’s work frequently appeared as well.) This newspaper supplement featured full-color activities for kids, most commonly illustrated mazes and connect-the-dots featuring some of the favorite newspaper cartoon characters of the time (Happy Hooligan and Ignatz appear often).

E.G. Lutz’s pages typically centered around three basic themes- playing with food, anthropomorphized animals, and early optical toys. As with many of the items in our San Francisco Academy of Comic Art collection here at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum that we thank Bill Blackbeard for everyday, these old Book of Magic sections were inherently dispensable enough in their time just by being newsprint, but doubly so because most of the activities in them required cutting up the paper. Particularly those of E.G. Lutz’s, which we are thrilled to have beautiful in-tact copies of here in our collection.

Below are two samples of Lutz’s optical toys- complete with instructions, and a bolded WARNING! that reads “Do not paint or cut out pages until you have looked over the whole book. There may be something on the other side of a page that you will like better.” Which, I would argue is doubtful, as even grown-up librarians like myself find it hard to resist wondering what the illusion would look like in action.

E.G. Lutz newsprint optical toy illustration from The Seattle Intelligencer's Book of Magic, June 4, 1922. From The San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (click to enlarge)

A phenakistoscope:

E.G. Lutz newsprint optical toy illustration from The Seattle Intelligencer's Book of Magic, February 12, 1922. From The San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (click to enlarge)

E.G. Lutz newsprint optical toy illustration from The Seattle Intelligencer's Book of Magic, April 23, 1922. From The San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (click to enlarge)

Below, creative inspiration for food-play, should you be able to find that perfect yam at the market that resembles a baby seal. We are sure that Seattle parents were thrilled with their children’s sudden interest in fruit, but possibly not at the inclusion of orange peels in home decor.

E.G. Lutz newsprint cut-out toy illustration from The Seattle Intelligencer's Book of Magic, May 28th, 1922. From The San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (click to enlarge)

E.G. Lutz newsprint cut-out toy illustration from The Seattle Intelligencer's Book of Magic, April 9, 1922. From The San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (click to enlarge)

Lutz’s cartoons, typically anthropomorphic cartoons,  appeared in other papers as well, including the New York Herald and Philadelphia Press. We are lucky enough to have one piece of original art in our collection by E.G. Lutz, a fairly terrifying drawing of a cat with a drinking problem that can be seen below, although we have very little  information about it.

Original E.G. Lutz cartoon, circa late 1880s, from the International Museum of Cartoon Art Collection, The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (click to enlarge)

The forgotten E.G. Lutz was a jack of all trades, and it is unfortunate that not much is known about him. We strongly encourage any contributions in our comments section with more knowledge about his life and work, and feel he would be a great topic of research from animation to anthropology.

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UPDATE:

Blog reader, cartoonist and comics educator Ryan Claytor was inspired to make an animated gif of E.G. Lutz’s “Tigress and Her Cubs” to find out how it worked after reading our post! Check it out:

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