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Showing posts from April, 2012

captain britain presents the fantastic four adventure game

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Source: Captain Britain #28, April 20, 1977. Sort this one out: a game page written and drawn by a Canadian for an American publisher who placed it in a comic book designed for the British market. You follow? The game itself is pretty simple. If you're feeling bored, print out the full-sized version , grab the nearest die, and play a round or three. Owen McCarron was an advertising director and cartoonist with the Halifax Chronicle-Herald whose feature Fun and Games was syndicated across Canada. A comic book fan, McCarron produced various giveaways that, according to John Bell's guide to Canadian comic book history Invaders From The North (Toronto: Dundurn, 2006), were "mostly full-colour comics that were distinguished by bold, engaging artwork and reasonably solid storylines." For  Marvel, McCarron produced Fun and Games pages like the one above and a series that ran 13 issues in 1979-80 with covers advising readers that "all you need is a pencil....

the mail and empire on journalism schools, 1912

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  The journalism school that Toronto's morning conservative paper barely conceals its disdain for evolved into the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism (though I agree that one doesn't have to sit in a classroom to learn the essentials of reporting). Seventy-nine budding scribes made up the opening class on September 30, 1912. Within five years, the school handed out its first Pulitzer Prize, which makes me wonder if the Mail and Empire later pooh-poohed the concept of journalism awards. Source: the Mail and Empire , April 19, 1912.

a british opinion on canadian wine, 1965

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One series of paperbacks I've picked up at fundraising book sales over the years is Penguin's food handbooks.  Small, rarely more than 50 cents a copy, and ranging in subjects from haute cuisine to proper freezing techniques, they're food guides designed for reading instead of gawking. Aimed at a British audience, there are occasional nods to North America, such as a brief look at our fermented grape industry in Allan Sichel's 1965 guide The Penguin Book of Wines .