During my first twenty years as a collector of comic art, I thought that I was too old to care about Disney characters and concentrated on super heroes (primarily D.C. golden age characters). But when I was in graduate school, I saw a cel of Peter Pan for sale at Collectors Book Store in Hollywood, CA, where I had been going for those two decades to buy old comics. I liked it because Peter Pan's clothes were green (always my favorite color). I bought it for $125, a lot of money at the time, since you could buy a near mint copy of any issue of Batmas from No. 21 thruough 30 for $25 at that time. I thought the Peter Pan was just a random purchase but, of course, I soon thereafter started buying all the Disney cels and drawings that I could find -- they weren't that readily available then. Within the first couple of years, I started finding publicity drawings from Silly Symphonies (and from Mickey Mouse cartoons as well) which I thought were the greatest comic-related drawings that I had ever seen. One day, Howard Lowery, who then worked at Collectors, showed me a drawing of the Robber Kitten -- a character I had never seen or heard of before that moment. Although it was just a model drawing, showing the front and back of the character, I instantly fell in love with the drawing and the character -- a splendid kitten dressed like one of the three muskateers. The drawing cost me only $65, but from the time of that purchase, I wanted every Disney publicity drawing and every piece of art from the Robber Kitten that I could find. That was 27 years ago. I now undoubtedly have more art from the Robber Kitten than anyone in the world, and most people still don't even know of the character, let alone care about art from the humble 1935 cartoon. But I still love it. Since I have also realized that this group of art represents virtually every aspect of the making and marketing of a Disney cartoon frm the 1930s, as well as most aspects of collecting comic art in general, I intend to use these images to illustrate my knowledtge and thoughts on these subjects, for what that is worth. I know this is a somewhat pretentious little project (which I will work on as time permits), but if anyone is put off in any way, they can simply continue to ignore this great character, Disney art in general, and anything I might have to say. I hope that at least some of you find this of interest.
