A look at JINGLES from 1949

I did a post on this title a few years ago, but that was a slightly earlier issue. Here are a few pages from Jingles No.571, dated July 25th 1949. Another tabloid-sized comic published by The Amalgamated Press from Fleetway House in Farrington Street, London. 

A.P. still dominated the UK comic scene at this time but their rivals in Dundee were proving to be fierce competitors and readers were preferring the more modern-looking Beano and Dandy to comics such as Jingles which were looking quite old fashioned by this time.

Nevertheless, Jingles is a nice lively comic and features some top class cartoonists of the period. The cover strip, Dreamy Dennis, is by Albert Pease I believe.

The adventure strip Strongheart, The Wonder Dog of the Woods, was one of several "heroic dog" strips in comics. (The best remembered being The Dandy's Black Bob.) However, Strongheart preceded Black Bob, and the strip was based on the dog of the same name that starred in films in the 1920s. Sadly, Strongheart was long gone by the time this strip appeared. The comic strip was drawn by Hilda Boswell, one of the few women working in comics back then.

Jolly Jingles, the strip sharing the page with Strongheart, was drawn by George Parlett, brother to Reg Parlett...

Jimmy Jolly and his Magic Brolly was drawn by the master of golden age slapstick comics, Roy Wilson. Other A.P. cartoonists of the time were instructed to mimic Wilson's style, which is why it's sometimes difficult to identify who drew what. Roy Wilson's style influenced the look of comics from A.P., and later Fleetway and IPC, for years, and elements are still noticeable today. (I've certainly absorbed some of his techniques into my style but I'd never consider myself in his league of course.)

On the back page, another adventure serial. Nicely illustrated, but I'm afraid I don't know who drew it. I feel I should, as the style looks familiar. Can anyone identify the artist?

Jingles ran from 1934 to 1954, then merged into TV Fun. The copyright to this material would now be part of Rebellion Publishing's recent acquisition I believe. It would be nice to see some strips from this period back in print, just for the sake of the heritage of British comics if nothing else. Roy Wilson certainly deserves a collection of some of his work. However, one has to be realistic and it's unlikely that many readers would actually buy such a book. People tend to mainly be interested in the sphere of their own nostalgia unfortunately. Personally, I've always found the whole history and development of comics to be fascinating, but there aren't enough of us to support reprints of material of this vintage. Or are there? What do you think?

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