What's new, Mister Magoo?

Pete Alvarado drew the Mister Magoo comic strip for its entire run. Alvarado was an award-winning animator, as well as a prolific comic book and comic strip artist. He died in 2003, age 83.

These strips are from the Scholastic paperback, WHAT'S NEW MISTER MAGOO?

Copyright © 1977 UPA Pictures, Inc.

Wally Wood comic strips for MAD

Wally Wood's genius for his parodies of other cartoonists is shown by the original art for a double page spread from MAD #68, published in 1959. Heritage Auctions recently sold the artwork for $12,540.50. Wood even did the lettering for this hilarious Gary Belkin piece.

I'm also including three more of Wood's comic strip articles for MAD. These are all taken from the TOTALLY MAD CD set.

Copyright © 1999 E.C. Publications, Inc.

MAD #68:

MAD #72:

MAD #77:

MAD #81:

Sambo's Bicentennial Coloring Book

It's been 34 years since America celebrated its 200th birthday, but we're bringing the Bicentennial back on this July 4, 2011 morning.

Bill Woggon, best known for his long-running Katy Keene feature for the Archie comic book company, had an art studio that did commissioned work. In 1976 he did this coloring book for the Sambo's chain of restaurants. Old coloring books are hard to find without having had crayons applied to them by the children for which they were intended, and I was happy to find this a couple of years ago intact and uncolored.

The Sambo's restaurant chain is no longer in business.