ROY CRANE launched Washington Tubbs II on April 21, 1924. The strip would begin in the traditional 'gag' cartoon format popular at the time, but would quickly blossom into America's first high adventure comic strip. It would define the genre and inspire an army of gifted creators to pick up pen and nib and dare to travel the same road with Crane. A road filled with danger, exotic locales, close escapes, horrifying calamaties, raging love, betrayal and heart-stopping cliff hangers. With Wash Tubbs, the adventure strip was born, and with its companion Sunday strip, Captain Easy, Crane created the seminal comic book hero.

C O N T E N T S

A FLOURISH OF TRUMPETS:
Roy Crane and the Adventure Strip
(July 24, 2002)
R.C. Harvey

ROY CRANE is undoubtedly the most unsung of the cartoonists who shaped the medium. His historic achievement was to set the pace for adventure strips in the thirties by showing the way in the twenties. Many of those who drew the earliest adventure strips were inspired and influenced by his work. We recognize the milestones in the history of comics that mark the accomplishments of such creators as Chester Gould, Noel Sickles, Ham Fisher, Zack Mosley, Milton Caniff — even Mel Graff. But we forget that Crane preceded them all onto the stage they later filled with their presence. And most of them, as they felt their way in developing adventure storytelling skills, looked to Crane for hints about how to do it. {Read article...}

I N   P R I N T

All of Crane’s Wash Tubbs and Captain Easy (1924-1943) has been reprinted in eighteen quarterly volumes (1987-1992) by Nantier, Beall, Minoustchine Publishing, N.Y. Bill Blackbeard’s prefatory notes in some of these volumes include biographical as well as historical information (sometimes rather speculative). The only other biographical material on Crane is in The Adventurous Decade by Ron Goulart (Arlington House, New Rochelle, NY; 1975). A sympathetic and insightful appreciation of Wash Tubbs can be found in Coulton Waugh’s classic, The Comics (Macmillan, NY; 1947; rpt. University Press of Mississippi, Jackson and London; 1991). Crane’s papers (1918-1965), including some original drawings, are archived at the George Arents Research Library of Special Collections at Syracuse University, New York. • RCH

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