Monday, April 8, 2013

Bible Stories, 1974

(Continued from 1972)

For 17 months, darkness was upon the face of the magazine... for there was no STORIES FROM THE BIBLE feature. Yea, it had been replaced with a new feature, the title of which was THE RELIGIOUS EMBLEMS PROGRAM.  As if the people reading BOYS' LIFE did not have enough features focusing on Scouts, even unto the comics section.

But then it came to pass that the new feature went the way of all things... and lo and behold, the old feature didst return, but under a new name...   
BIBLE STORIES.  And there was much rejoicing.  Or something.

(Try imagining John Huston's voice when you read the above.)

A strange thing happened.  It was probably no surprise when, after such an extended hiatus, that the BIBLE comic should start over at the beginning... AGAIN.  In fact, this was the 6th time "The Creation" had been featured.  It had previous appeared in the issues dated September 1952, January 1954, January 1957, March 1963, and June 1966.  No, the strange thing can be seen if you look at the June 1966 installment, and compare that to the new version.  For the first time in the history of the series, they had a REPRINT!!  A few details were changed, but the art and most of the text was identical.  For now, at least, it seems to have been a one-off thing.

"And the evening and the morning of the first day..."  (Sorry, couldn't resist.)

Story by Al Stenzel  /  Art by  (??)
BOYS' LIFE  /  July 1974
BOYS' LIFE  /  August 1974
BOYS' LIFE  /  September 1974
BOYS' LIFE  /  October 1974
BOYS' LIFE  /  November 1974
BOYS' LIFE  /  December 1974
It should be pretty obvious there were no less than 3 DIFFERENT artists' work on display here. The 1st from the June 1966 reprint, the 2nd for August-November, and the 3rd for December.  The 3rd one looks awful familar to me... but I can't for the life of me place who it is.  ANY ideas???

(Continued in 1975)

Copyright (C) BOY'S LIFE Magazine
Restorations by Henry Kujawa

Read the Bob LeRose page at Wikipedia 
Read about the history of Johnstone & Cushing at the Hogan's Alley site     

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