Lou Peters illustrations from 'The Lunchbox Cookbook', 1955 (flickr link)

A mystery continues...

Please follow this link to my flickr set:
'Lou Peters illustrations from The Lunchbox Cookbook, 1955'
(33 images)

I found this little old 'cookbooklet' in a thrift store not too long ago, and took a shine to the cartoony mid-century illustrations.

Searching for more info about the artist, the only thing I found was Ward Jenkins' blogpost, 'The Versatile
(and Unknown) Lou Peters', and Ward's accompanying flickr set.

In those other images, Peters displayed a greater range of drawing styles, often showing a considerably more realist look than what you see here.







This book was part of a series published by The Culinary Arts Institute.
I've seen a few others, but not with
Lou Peters artwork.
(I didn't like the other books' artwork nearly as much, either)

So who was Lou Peters?

Was that the only name used by this artist?
Was Lou Peters a man?

If you have answers, please share them.

Leave a comment here, at my flickr set - - or maybe better still, with Wardomatic, who seems just a tad more hell-bent for an answer than I am...






























































Please follow this link to
my flickr set:
'Lou Peters illustrations from
The Lunchbox Cookbook, 1954'
(33 images)

Excerpts from Elson-Gray's Primer & Book One Readers, 1930 editions (flickr link)

Please follow this link to my flickr set:
'Excerpts from Elson-Gray's Primer & Book One Readers, 1930 editions'
(54 images)

I've posted some images from the first set of beginning reader textbooks that introduced the characters 'Dick and Jane', who - - for better or worse
- - would influence a generation.

Basal readers like the Elson-Gray series were considered 'state-of-the-art' educational tools once upon a time, and they received wide use in American schools for several decades.

Eventually their typical neglect of phonics, coupled with an unnatural narrative structure would turn popular opinion, and they were deemed to be an inferior method for teaching reading skills.



Flawed? Perhaps...
...Clichéd over time?
Most definitely - - but nevertheless, the scenario and structure propagated by
William H. Elson and
William S. Gray became an archetype.

There's a dearth of info available about the various illustrators for these 1930 editions.
Anything you can share on that subject is much appreciated. Please leave a comment or drop an e-mail.

Please follow this link to my flickr set:
'Excerpts from Elson-Gray's Primer & Book One Readers, 1930 editions' (54 images)

Cover Gallery: 1950s and '60s Men's Magazines (flickr link)

- Please follow this link to my flickr set:
A 'Cover Gallery' of 1950s and '60s Men's Magazines!
(50 images)

The images there may be considered Not Safe For Work, but they're so very tame as compared with today's standards.

What's not tame are the garish colors, the bold graphic design, the saucy & silly titles and lurid cover blurbs of another era.

- - The cover girls are of another era, too.

Dating from 1957 - 1969, with the bulk of them falling around 1967, the mags in this batch are seldom classy, sometimes seedy, but always an eyeful.
Check 'em out!





































- Please follow this link to my flickr set: A 'Cover Gallery' of 1950s and '60s Men's Magazines!
(50 images)

Frederick Richardson illustrations for Holton-Curry's Third Reader, 1914 (flickr link)

In the first part of the 20th century, Charles Madison Curry and Martha Adelaide Holton wrote and edited a large number of readers, primers, and other books intended to foster reading skills in young school children.

Illustrator Frederick Richardson (1862-1937) began his career in newspapers.
He had a regularly featured spot in Saturday editions of the Chicago Daily News for his political cartoons and social commentary.

Richardson left newspapers behind in the early 1900's, and spent the next thirty years providing illustrations for magazines and children's books.

- Please follow this link to my flickr set of 26 images from a 1914 edition of the Holton-Curry Third Reader!





















- You can read can read from a 1916 edition of this book online, available at Google Books, as well as others in the Holton-Curry series of Readers.

- Likewise, several books containing Frederick Richardson's illustrations can be read online, available at both Google Books and at The Online Books Page.

- More specifically, the book 'East o'the Sun and West o'the Moon
with other Norwegian folk tales' may be previewed at
Childrens Library.Org

- Two Richardson illustrations from native American 'fairy stories' may be viewed at the Violet Books - Golden Era of Book Illustration website.

- A couple of standard 'fable' images show up in a blog post at Graphic Tales from Ulcer City.

Vinyl Gallery: Vintage classical album cover graphics (flickr link)

- Please follow this link to my flickr gallery of vintage graphics from 70 classical album covers!

Recently I posted several images of LP covers, and at one point I mentioned Alex Steinweiss, the pioneering graphic designer who first had the idea of 'album cover art'.

Prior to his efforts for Columbia Records beginning in 1939, the covers to multi-disc 78-rpm 'album' sets of records were fairly generic - - often referred to as 'tombstone' covers, a featureless square with just a plain square label of text.

Steinweiss' ideas and the bold visual language he created soon caught on, the idea became the norm, and eventually the sky was the limit for the manner in which the cover image on a record could be used to represent the music within.

The gallery of cover images that I've posted at flickr are mostly from the 1940's and 50's, and all are from albums that are some flavor of classical music or classical vocal.

I love the broad strokes and bold colors, the manner in which the artists work with the economy of the printing style available to them, and how that all changes over time.

There are several examples of Steinweiss work in the genre - - which are always fun to see - - but I suppose at this point I get more excited by the examples of other designers working in the field; often under-represented, with innovations of their own.

Certainly some of them are Steinweiss imitators, but given the context of the era, let's just call them 'followers, fellows, and the next wave'.

- Please follow this link to my flickr gallery of vintage graphics from 70 classical album covers!

One note: I'm an enthusiast, I'm not an expert.
I'm excited to share these images for the enjoyment of the graphics, and share what little information I have.

PLEASE feel free to share your own information regarding any of the cover art designers, the musical performances and performers, your own memories / experiences with these records and what it is that makes them special.

Thanks!

Updated 3 paperback galleries at Flickr!

More fun and trashy old paperbacks have turned up in recent travels over the past few months, so I've added scans of some of them to a few already existing 'cover gallery' sets I have posted at Flickr.

Check 'em out!

(Click on links to open Flickr sets on a new page)

- 2 new titles, 5 new scans added to
Cover Gallery: 1940's Paperback Mysteries - - A couple of cool '40's Dell mysteries, with a crime map and end papers!

- 2 scans added to
Cover Gallery: Paperback Mysteries, etc., - - the 1950's and '60's
('Kill Me In Shimbashi' and 'The Peking Pornographer')

- 42 new images added to
Nostalgia for the Scholastic Book Club, circa '60's & '70's, making the set 3 times larger than it had been...












... now including cover scans and illustrations for 'juvenile lit' titles such as: 'Firestorm',
'The Mystery of The Old Violin', 'Snowbound In Hidden Valley', 'Mystery of The Piper's Ghost', 'Wipeout', 'Goofy Foot', 'A Horse Of Her Own', '100 Pounds of Popcorn' and others.

"She's Bunny, 'The Queen of The In Crowd!'" - 1960's 'Teen' comics from Harvey

"She's Hip! She's Mod! She's Boss!"

During the Swingin' Sixties, Harvey comics jumped on a bandwagon and produced their own version of an 'Archie' knock-off marketed towards teen-age readers.

Bunny was a happening young super-model, "The Queen of the In-Crowd", who ran with her own pack of groovy and fashionable friends.

The formula might have borne a closer resemblance to 'Millie The Model',
'Katy Keene', or others of that crowd more so than 'Archie', but with an added dose of the type of fanciful and fetishistic
'playful obsession' scripting found in the other standard Harvey kiddie comics like 'Little Lotta', 'Richie Rich', 'Little Dot' and others.

As with the Riverdale crowd and other 1960's stars of 'teen' comics, Bunny comics managed to give some sort of low-rent fun-house mirror reflection on fads, fashion and pop culture of the era.





(Click on the image to ENLARGE this detail from Bunny #9, ⬇ a friendly jab at
'Archie' comics in the form of a 'Riverdrip' sweatshirt.)

Though you'd never find creator's credits in any Harvey Comics publications, Bunny comics were originally written by Warren Harvey (a son of one of the company founders) and featured artwork by prolific comics illustrator Hy Eisman.

Other artists who worked on the series at different times include Sol Brodsky and Howard Post.

















I've gathered several stories for your perusal from some of the assorted issues I have.
Just click the links and enjoy the read! ⬇⬇⬇



⬅ 'Marc's Happeninged House',
from issue #5 (1968)
⬇

(page 1)
(page 2)
(page 3)
(page 4)
(page 5)
(page 6)
(page 7)












⬅ 'The Zoople Ads',
from issue #6 (1968)
⬇

(page 1)
(page 2)
(page 3)
(page 4)
(page 5)
(page 6)
(page 7)
(page 8)
(page 9)
(page 10)









⬅ 'Orbits With
The Soular System',
from issue #7 (1969)
⬇

(page 1)
(page 2)
(page 3)
(page 4)
(page 5)
(page 6)
(page 7)
(page 8)
(page 9)
(page 10)








⬅ 'Avant-Garde Love',
from issue #10 (1969)
⬇

(page 1)
(page 2)
(page 3)
(page 4)
(page 5)
(page 6)
(page 7)
Plus a text page: Bunny interviews avant-garde film maker Sandy Spicesplice!









⬅ Bunny with little sister Honey in 'The Gloomers Rage',
from issue #11 (1969)
⬇

(page 1)
(page 2)
(page 3)
(page 4)
(page 5)
(page 6)
(page 7)
(page 8)
(page 9)









⬅ Bunny with British rock group The Beagles in 'Lotus Bogus',
from issue #16 (1970)
⬇

(page 1)
(page 2)
(page 3)
(page 4)
(page 5)
(page 6)
(page 7)
Plus a text page: Bunny learns about Yoga, Hinduism and Meditation from Frederic of
The Beagles!





- Please also check out my 'Bunny' flickr set!

Over at flickr I've also gathered images of some of the colorful covers to Bunny comics
(complete with terrible puns), pages of reader-submitted fashion ideas for Bunny and her buddies
(accompanied by a zoovy-licious array of
ultra-mindbashing descriptive adjectives) and a few other bits and pieces.

Follow this link to the flickr set
'Bunny comics: Covers, Fashion Pages, and more!'











See also:
- A Bunny article at
Don Markstein's Toonopedia.

- - and another at Lady, That's My Skull with a link to a flickr slideshow presentation of issue #4's wigged-out 'Yvoorg Nam' story!

- A MASSIVE entry from Scott Shaw regarding issue #12 and some Bunny background at his Oddball Comics site.


- - And PART TWO of *this* post:
'Sooper Hippie, Fruitman,
and Bunny's Back Pages'



ADDENDUM, 2.02.09: Found some more!
From 1967's issue #3, follow link to read a new post - -
Bunny, Queen of the In-Crowd in 'Watermelon Sellin'!