Robert Crumb's Heroes of the Blues

Some selections from Robert Crumbs 1980 Trading Card Set Heroes of the Blues.

Mississippi John Hurt

Blind Lemon Jefferson

Memphis Minnie

Son House

I have a set for sale in my eBay store here.

Jones in Black and White

Some black and white sketches by Jeffrey Catherine Jones.

A Jet's No Pet!

This nice little six-page story by Russ Heath if from G.I. Combat #62, July 1958. There's some great panels of aerial combat, a patented Russ Heath explosion on page two and I love the guy's expression in the top right panel of page five.

House of Secrets #92 and All Its Reprints

The eight page story "Swamp Thing," scripted by Len Wein and with artwork by Bernie Wrightson was first published in the DC comic House of Secrets #92, cover dated July 1971. The story spawned a stand-alone Swamp Thing comic book of which Wrightson drew the first ten issues. The series has long been regarded as one of the best comic books of the era and the peak of Wrightson's tenure at DC.
TwoMorrows published a special issue of Comic Book Creator called Swampmen with an extensive interview with Wrightson about the creaton of Swamp Thing.
Below are scans of the original art for the first Swamp Thing story from House of Secrets. The scans are from the Heritage Auctions web site. Below that is a list I compiled of all the places the story has been reprinted because I like that kind of thing. If I missed anything let me know in the comments and I'll add it. I'm sure there's some foreign editions I missed.

Swamp Thing story from House of Secrets #92 reprinted in:

DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #9 (1981)

The Saga of the Swamp Thing #33 (1985)

Roots of the Swamp Thing #5 (1986)

The Saga of the Swamp Thing Vol. 2: Love and Death (TPB, 1990)

DC Silver Age Classics: House of Secrets #92 (1992)

Swamp Thing: Dark Genesis (TPB, 1992)

Showcase Presents: The House of Secrets Vol. 1 (TPB, 2008)

DC Comics Classics Library Vol. 4: Roots of the Swamp Thing (HC, 2009).

Wrightson's Swamp Thing 1: Alec Hollands Saere Skaebne (Dutch, 1979).

Creepy H.P. Lovecraft Covers

Early 1970's H.P. Lovecraft paperbacks with creepy covers by John Holmes.

Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos Volume 1.

The Lurking Fear.

At the Mountains of Madness.

Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos Volume 2.

The Shuttered Room.

These and a lot more H.P. Lovecraft paperbacks are for sale at my Ebay store.

Flash Gordon Paperbacks

Flash Gordon on the Lost Continent of Mongo and Flash Gordon The Ice Monster are two paperbacks that reprint some Al Williamson's and Reed Crandall's work for the King Features Flash Gordon comic books. The paperbacks were published around 1968 - 1968.

I have a set of them for sale on Ebay.

Harvey Kurtzman Biography

Bill Schelly's Harvey Kurtzman: The Man Who Created MAD and Revolutionized Humor in America is easily the best book I have read all year, and likely the best book I will read all year. Schelly's 642 page traces Kurtzman's career from his childhood, his years at the the High School of Music and Art in New York, his beginnings working for Timely Comics, the glory days of Mad and Two-Fisted Tales at EC Comics, later projects like Humbug, Trump and Little Annie Fannie and his eventual status as an elder statesman of the comic book.

The book is meticulously researched and footnoted. There were huge gaps in my knowledge of Kurtzman prior to reading this, but people much better informed than me have said there is a lot of new information in this book. I cant' recommend this highly enough for anyone interested in the history of comic books or humor in America in the second half of the twentieth century.

You can order the book from the publisher, Fantagraphics.

An interview with the author.

And here's a nice article in The Atlantic about Kurtzman and the book.

And some Kurtzman EC covers:

Early Wrightson Sketch

Here's an early sketch by Bernie Wrightson I just picked up.

At the Earth's Core with Frank Frazetta & Roy Krenkel

Here's some Edgar Rice Burroughs paperbacks with covers by Frank Frazetta and Roy Krenkel. These and a lot more are for sale in my Ebay store, Greystoke Trading Company.

Savage Pellucidar, cover art by Frank Frazetta.

Back to the Stone Age, cover art by Frank Frazetta and Roy Krenkel.

Tanar of Pellucidar, cover art by Roy Krenkel.

Land of Terror, cover art by Frank Frazetta.