Comics UK

Important Health Warning: As a result of information received from Power Comics fan supreme Lew Stringer I have had to completely rewrite the first few entries in this thread which may have resulted in a number of apparent inconsistencies. My apologies for any confusion this might cause.

Here's the first episode of 'Percy's Pets' from Smash! no.1, widely attributed to the veteran artist Cyril Price.



...Unfortunately this series wasn't drawn by Cyril at all, in spite of confident assertions to that effect in Denis Gifford's British Comic Catalogue and Steve Holland's Index of Power Comics. Along with his own frequent use of pen-names this has led to a certain amount of confusion about Price's true body of work so that his name remains relatively unknown compared to many of his contemporaries. Consequently I hope to use the following thread to give some idea of the astonishing career of this ex-miner, which stretched from Comic Cuts in the early 1930s all the way to ground-breaking 1970s titles such as Cor! and Thunder.

- Phil Rushton

Thanks for that Phil. I recognised the style, but did not know that it was Cyril Price. I am looking forward to more examples of his work

Unfortunately, as Lew has pointed out, it wasn't one of Cyril's! I must admit that I still have trouble in differentiating between some of the humour artists who adopted elements of the Baxendale style for Wham! Smash! and Pow! - and with Price the difficulty is made even worse by his own natural versatility. For the record here's the second episode of Percy's Pets from Smash! no.2 (though, going by his mother's comment in the final panel, it sounds as though 'Percy' wasn't the original name of this strip's hero!).

The true artist is Stan 'Mac' McMurtry!



- Phil Rushton

'Georgie's Germs' is the other Odhams strip that Cyril is most closely associated with; and in this case he really did draw many of the episodes, in spite of the fact that it was originated by other artists (beginning in Wham! no.1 with Leo Baxendale himself). In fact this series has caused more confusion over the years than almost any other, with many people being convinced that it was drawn by Ken Reid - who never actually drew a single episode! (though he did subsequently work on the similarly-themed 'The Nervs' in the combined Smash! & Pow!).

For the first year or so Georgie's anthropomorphic microbes were illustrated in a relatively lighthearted manner by a rotating group of cartoonists which included Baxendale himself, Brian Lewis and Terry Villers, along with a number of others who are only recorded as members of the ubiquitous 'Kingleo Studio'. Unfortunately I don't have enough of the later issues to say when Cyril's first contributions began to appear but, as far as I can tell, these seem to have become more and more frequent until - at the time of Wham!'s merger with Pow! in January 1968 - he'd become firmly established as Georgie's main artist.

Here's the episode which appeared in the first combined issue of Pow! & Wham!





The odd thing is that, while I seem to remember this as the definitive version of the strip, a close comparison shows it to be noticeably different from the earlier Baxendale episodes. What's more, with its detailed rendering and nightmarishly grotesque atmosphere, I always struggled with the notion that it could have been drawn by the same artist as the much-more-Baxendalish 'Percy's Pets' - whatever the reference books might have said. I guess it's hardly surprising that so many people made the connection with Ken Reid instead.

- Phil Rushton

Here's one of Cyril's earlier episodes in Wham! (at least I think it's by him - please feel free to say so if anyone knows better! ).





...And for comparison here's a page from that comic's first year featuring a lighter, more 'Baxendalish' version (though not by Leo himself) (Oh yes it is! - see following comments by Lew Stringer and Nigel Parkinson! Shows how much I know! )



(Incidentally I really love those Sergio Aragones-style 'marginals' in the latter example. Does anybody have any idea who it could have been drawn by?)

- Phil Rushton

Those Percy's Pets examples are by Stan McMurtry (Mac), not Cyril Price. Cyril drew it for one of the later annuals though.

That 'lemon lolly' page of Georgie's Germs looks like Baxendale to me in places.

The reason some people think Ken Reid drew Georgie's Germs is because Pat Mills has said it several times in interviews, but he's confused it with The Nervs!

Thanks Lew! To be honest it's a relief to know that 'Percy's Pets' wasn't by Cyril after all as I was really struggling to reconcile the two styles - in spite of the fact that both Denis Gifford and Steve Holland's Power Comics Index state that it was drawn by him.

On the 'Lollypop' page I must admit that Leo would have been my first choice as well - though the lack of any signature made me think that somebody else must have been involved. Could it have been one of the sets that Mike Brown collaborated on?

- Phil Rushton (Learning as I go! )

philcom55 wrote:Thanks Lew! To be honest it's a relief to know that 'Percy's Pets' wasn't by Cyril after all as I was really struggling to reconcile the two styles - in spite of the fact that both Denis Gifford and Steve Holland's Power Comics Index state that it was drawn by him.

On the 'Lollypop' page I must admit that Leo would have been my first choice as well - though the lack of any signature made me think that somebody else must have been involved. Could it have been one of the sets that Mike Brown collaborated on?

- Phil Rushton (Learning as I go! )

I don't think Mike Brown was working for them at that early stage. It was around 1967 when he was involved.

Sadly, Steve's Power Comics Index contained a number of errors pertaining to humour artists. I think he also mis-credited Leo Baxendale with several Graham Allen strips. (I no longer have my copy of the index unfortunately as I loaned it to someone years ago and they never returned it.)

Steve definitely knows his stuff where adventure strips are concerned though!

Lew Stringer wrote:The reason some people think Ken Reid drew Georgie's Germs is because Pat Mills has said it several times in interviews, but he's confused it with The Nervs!

Another reason for the confusion might be Ken’s interview at the back of Savoy reprint of Fudge and the Dragon. The passage in which Ken enumerated quite a few but not all of his strips was followed by a comment of the interviewer saying “Ken Reid later recalled that his strips included the following: George‘s Germs (taken over from another artist)...“

Thanks Irmantas! I freely admit that I'm on a pretty steep learning curve here as Price is one of those artists I'd never really thought much about until I picked up a run of the Bristol Boys & Girls Evening World a couple of months ago. Consequently any and all corrections are heartily encouraged (Like Steve I've always been more of an Adventure strip fan!).

For what its worth I've tried to patch up some of the earlier posts in this thread to make them less misleading - though I quite like the way in which they now portray comics research as a constantly evolving project in which all received 'facts' remain subject to revision.

(At least that's my excuse...! )

- Phil Rushton

klakadak-ploobadoof wrote:

Lew Stringer wrote:The reason some people think Ken Reid drew Georgie's Germs is because Pat Mills has said it several times in interviews, but he's confused it with The Nervs!

Another reason for the confusion might be Ken’s interview at the back of Savoy reprint of Fudge and the Dragon. The passage in which Ken enumerated quite a few but not all of his strips was followed by a comment of the interviewer saying “Ken Reid later recalled that his strips included the following: George‘s Germs (taken over from another artist)...“

So even Ken himself got it wrong! Amazing. Ken took over The Nervs for about the last six months of the strip, but he never drew Georgie's Germs at all. I suppose the similarity in the subject matter caused the confusion.

According to Denis Gifford's British Comic Catalogue Cyril Price's last original strips appeared in 1970 with 'Tricky Dicky' in Cor!! and 'The Spooks of St. Luke's' in Thunder. Here are early examples from Cor!! no.3 and Thunder no's 2 and 3:







Assuming these really are all his work the last two are particularly notable for the fact that they were published posthumously - a month after he'd suffered a fatal heart attack on September 17th 1970! 'The Spooks of St. Luke's' is also remarkable for the way in which it anticipated a type of supernatural humour that became increasingly popular during the 1970s with comics like Monster Fun.

Going by the change in Tricky Dicky's appearance it's clear that Cyril was replaced by another artist at a relatively early stage. In the case of 'St. Luke's' however, I'm inclined to think he may have prepared a number a episodes in advance before the strip was taken over by Joseph Lee.

Of course, I could be wrong about all of the above...!

- Phil Rushton

Tricky Dicky and the Spooks certainly look like Cyril Price's work, although it's sad to see there is a very, very slight difference in his final pages, perhaps due to age or illness. It's hard to define what I mean. I'm not talking about the quality, as he was clearly pouring so much into those pages and they're full of detail, but there's something saddening about them.

Here's an early page of his from 1941:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Dq_anTEuFAY/T ... _cover.jpg

philcom55 wrote:

(Incidentally I really love those Sergio Aragones-style 'marginals' in the latter example. Does anybody have any idea who it could have been drawn by?)

I don't know why you think it's not Baxendale- that's a 100% Bax. No one else has ever drawn hands like that. Which issue is it from?

NP wrote: I don't know why you think it's not Baxendale- that's a 100% Bax.

That's probably my fault because I'm on record as saying Leo signed most of his pages for Odhams. Perhaps he was in a rush to catch the post that day and forgot, or perhaps they whited it out for some reason.

By the way Phil, if you like Cyril Price's work, the Wham! Annual 1971 has a lot of his stuff in, if you haven't already got it.