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How Walt Disney Used His Kansas City Library Card
E.G.Lutz from “Motion Picture News” October 2, 1920 When the word “Disney” is mentioned, it’s almost impossible to separate it from the craft of motion picture cartoons. Whether it’s used to describe...
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Amazing X-Ray Glasses And 9000 Other Novelties – Johnson Smith & Co.
Since 1914 – The 1940 #403 Johnson Smith & Co. catalog. With Chicago’s “C2E2” 2012 ComicCon (http://www.c2e2.com/) approaching this week from April 13-15 at McCormick Place, it seems fitting that...
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Howdy 7Up!
I became interested in pop bottles (I grew up in the Chicago area where we all said “pop”) and related stuff when I was about 12 years old. I had gone inside an old garage that was attached to a...
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The Motion-Graphic Ads Of Burma-Shave: 1927-1963
In a simpler time, when automobiles went slower and the pre-Eisenhower highway system in the United States was less developed, there was a popular advertising campaign that ran from 1927 until 1963. It...
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“Your Story in Picture Leaves Nothing Untold”—A Two-Volume Testament to the...
Anyone following the posts I’ve done for Imprint should be left with the impression that I get off on tasty examples of graphic art. Regardless of how well and even superior the reproduction of images...
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Fight Talk: A WWII Poster Campaign
The Second World War saw the participation of countless corporations steering and converting their talents and resources toward the war effort. At the end of the war, many of these corporations took...
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“Writers I Have Loved”—The Graphic Reflections Of Joshua Landsman
I’ve known Joshua Landsman for over 45 years. We went to the same junior-high/high school in Evanston, lllinois, and even worked on our school newsletter together. I was always in awe of his writing...
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Graphically Crazy Like a Nathan
I got to know Nathan Fox through Steven Heller and the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay program at the School of Visual Arts in NYC. Steve called and wondered if I could meet with Nathan to discuss...
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Watty Piper’s 1930 “The Little Engine That Could”
When I was a very young child (circa 1960), one of the first books I was given was a 1930 edition of Watty Piper’s The Little Engine That Could. I’ve loved trains since I was a kid and I’m convinced...
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R. Crumb’s Sketchbooks
Robert “R.” Crumb is one of my favorite artists. Underground cartoonist, designer, illustrator, “drawer”—they all seem like inadequate titles when attached to his body of work. There was a show...
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Winsor McCay Illustrates Temperance — or Prohibition?, 1929
While strolling through a used-books store in Los Angeles over 20 years ago, I spied the dust-jacketed binding of a book with a familiar illustration style. Much to my delight, I’d found a little-known...
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Many Happy (Tax) Returns: A Marxist Doctrine
With all of us looking at the Fiscal Cliff on the horizon, who better to explain things than Marx . . . . . . GROUCHO Marx. About 15 years ago, I traded my signed copy of The Groucho Letters to the...
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Graphically Seasoned Greetings!
Last year at this time, I did a post on past holiday cards that J.J. Sedelmaier Productions, Inc. has sent out over the years. This year I’m presenting some of the greetings the studio has RECEIVED...
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Thought You Had Animation Pegged? Not For Much Longer !
The drawing/image registration process is a fundamental aspect of film animation. If the images that are animated don’t have a shared foundation with each other, the movement that’s created by the...
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Covering Print Magazine, 1940-1953
The magazine we all call Print has had a half dozen different names since its inception in June of 1940. It was originally a limited-edition periodical that discussed the endless techniques used in the...
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Hirschfeld, Do Re Mi, and Peacock Feet
I’ve always loved Al Hirschfeld’s work. It seems so timeless and each image he created was always a treat to visually wander through—even without his playful “Ninas.” He had solidly established his...
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Illustrated Aviation Books By Assen Jordanoff
As a kid, whenever I’d visit my Grandmother’s house in Columbus, OH, I’d make a beeline to her bookshelf. It consisted of books on public health and education (she worked with the Ohio State Department...
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Hand Drawn Design from Cover to Cover
In 1927, Samuel Welo published his first edition of “Studio Handbook: Letter And Design For Artists And Advertisers.” But this collection of fonts, ornaments, logos and other ad elements was not only...
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Post-Modern Storybook Illustrations
I consider myself very lucky to have been exposed to children’s books as a kid that were published way before my time—it gave me a wonderful perspective on everything from design and illustration to...
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The Ages Of “21”
In 1936, the former speakeasy and NYC restaurant-club, Jack & Charlie’s “21” (what we now know as The 21 Club) published, “The Iron Gate.” Compiled as a self-promotional tool, this 194-page...
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