Bulls Eye #4 Pg. 26- Ghost Town Ambush Pg 5

This was a very interesting pick up for me recently and this is the third of four art posts from the story Ghost Town Ambush in Bulls Eye #4 from Mainline Publishing. My descriptions will all be interconnected starting with Pg. 29 then Pg. 25 and then this page, so please follow along starting at Pg 29.

Next, I wanted to research Harry Mendryks statement of the artwork possibly coming outside of S&K studios. Thanks to a little investigatory work I was able to figure out how to contact him. Harry is also frequently cited on the Kirby Museum website, so I figured he would be a great person to talk to regarding this artwork. Amazingly Harry stated that he was unaware that this artwork even existed. He was kind enough to get back to me on quite a few emails. I learned more about his statement of the artwork possibly not coming out of the Simon and Kirby studios and from what I understood it was based off the lettering characteristics, which were not characteristic of his research he had done into Ben Oda lettering. For those of you who are not familiar, Ben Oda was one of the main letterers for S&K studios. Furthermore, in our conversation he mentioned that the lettering was later known to be done by many others. Thus, my understanding is that this still could have come out of S&K studios but didn’t believe it was done by Ben Oda. Furthermore, he had not seen any other works done in this lettering style, but he also stated that he had not done exhaustive research into the letting done in this piece to see if it were done elsewhere. Thus, leading to my earlier statement in the first post discussing the importance of the Two Morrow book to be released in 2023. Additionally, Harry and I got into a topic of discussion related to the type of paper used for this piece. Early S&K work was known to be done on illustration board and it was during the Mainline period that it was done on paper. The pieces I have collected were done on paper, so it seemed to fit the history for the pieces.

I later went on to do my own research, which was based off handwriting at the top of my pieces. There you will notice that the B in Bulls #4 is very stylized with a loop at the bottom of the B. I figured if I could find that B on other pieces it might shed new light about the artwork if all were done by the same artist. It just so happens that I was able to find it on other pieces, but the other pieces I found were done by multiple artists. Thus, I am unsure if a printer would write it vs. someone at S&K studios. Any input regarding this topic would be much appreciated as I have yet to contact anyone from the Kirby Museum regarding the multiple title listings. The other pieces of original art where the stylized B showed up were Bullseye #1 Pg 24-25 (August 1954) "Bullseye, the Man”, which I found Pencils and inks attributed to John Prentice and Bullseye #3 (December 1954) “The Adventures of Sheriff Shorty” which I found Pencils and inks attributed to Leonard Starr.

Other identifying features that I would like to later research when the Two Morrows book is printed is the other handwriting at the top of the page if OA is included, the panel characteristics such as the wood plank paneling, the editorial notes where white out was used to cover up the markings as seen in my additional images of the top 3 panels, the fine line panels throughout the 4 pages that seem quite stylistically different from most other panels, and possibly more research into the continual use of the suns in the art.

My next and final post will discuss the topic of who I think might possibly have done the art and why. However, I am no expert so take everything in the next post with a grain of salt. Please tune in for the final installment of these postings, which will be Bulls Eye #4 Pg. 27.