(Note,
the
image above is rather large so that you
can see details. Give it several seconds
to load the file. Then click the
pop-up.)
WILL EISNER
(1917-2005) • Original Spirit art
WILL
EISNER with Jules
Feiffer & Tex
Blaisdell •
THE SPIRIT • May 28, 1950 (and 1948*). Page 3 from “The
Good Old Days” (and page 1 from the Baseball Comics #2 story).
The mysterious
splash and the page preceding this page pictured a phone
ringing off the hook in Commissioner
Dolan’s police
headquarters office with no one answering. Was there
something wrong with Dolan? Had he been harmed or
kidnapped? Nope! As the 2nd page
immediately reveals, he’s not at work because he’s playing
hooky, at the ballpark, with Sammy.
*There’s an
interesting back-story to this “Good Old Days” story. The
bulk of it (minus the splash and unavailable 2nd page) was
originally created in 1948 for Baseball Comics #2.
Jules
Feiffer wrote
the story and Tex
Blaisdell drew
it under Eisner’s auspices. Will Eisner had
briefly started his own comic book line that year,
publishing Kewpies and Baseball Comics #1, with John Law #1
(a solo Eisner creation) and Baseball Comics #2 poised to
be printed, when he quickly pulled the plug. The comic
book market was congested in 1948 and the initial sales
numbers did not look promising for a start-up imprint, so
Eisner shelved the unpublished titles.
A portion of John Law #1 was
famously converted by Eisner into what became an all-time Spirit classic,
the 2-part “Sand Saref” story published in January 1950.
Five months after that conversion, probably spurred by a
deadline crisis, a 6-page story created for Baseball Comics #2 became
this “Good Old Days” Spirit story, with
new panels (the top half of this page) substituted for
Blaisdell’s opening panels, which would have featured a
storytelling manager named Pop
Flye instead
of Dolan.
Thus we have
with this page 2 a very
curious and unique original: a former
splash page with a new top half drawn entirely by Eisner,
in 1950, and a bottom half drawn entirely by Blaisdell in
1948. If you’re looking for something truly different with
a fascinating back-story, this is your page!
[And if you happen
to be a baseball fan as well as a comics fan, you get a
retelling of a genuine classic game between the Detroit
Tigers and Philadelphia
Athletics played
in September
1907, featuring Ty
Cobb, Sam Crawford and other
greats.]
Medium/Size/Condition: Brush,
pen, and ink on Bristol board measuring 13.75 x 22 inches
(34.9 x 52.8 cm. The top half is pasted on top of what is
presumably Tex Blaisdell’s never-seen splash page
introductory panels (a future X-Ray machine will reveal
all). White-out and some scraping around the lower half
where there had originally been a border. The original is
in excellent overall condition regardless of the large
paste-up.
Further reference: Much
other Eisner art, plus out-of-print graphic novels,
Spirit comic books and magazines,
signed serigraphs,
his Famous
Cartoonist
Button, and numerous other
Eisner-related items are accessible from our sister
store Steve
Krupp’s
Curio Shoppe. Just type his name (or The
Spirit) into our search bar.
Provenance: The Will Eisner estate is
exclusively represented by the Denis Kitchen Art
Agency, an affiliate of Steve Krupp’s Curio Shoppe and
Gallery. This drawing is warranted to be an authentic
original created by Will Eisner, and sold on behalf of
his estate. Note: Image is © Will Eisner Studios, Inc.
Reproduction for commercial purposes requires
permission. |