The Wolf by Sgt. Leonard Sansone

A few months ago, I bought this book online for 1 euro I guess. I haven’t many ‘vintage’ cartoon books , I usually collect non-text cartoons, but ‘1945’ made me think of WWII and maybe the book could surprise me. It did! It really breathes the atmosphere of American GI life: in action, in the mess and most of all, in relation to girls…



This is what I found in the book (Copyright 1945 by Leonard Sansone)
“Along with the jeep, the robot bomb and Spam, the wolf in GI clothing will become one of the historical mementos of World War II. The most amusing testimonial to this wartime phenomenon is a dead-pan cartoon character who has been entertaining serviceman. His name is The Wolf. His face is familiar. The brain child of sgt. Leonard Sansone, The Wolf has become a veteran soldier in the 18 Army months. He has had the complete training program, has been shipped overseas and has seen action. But his attitude toward a two-day pass remains essentially the same.



Sgt. Leonard Sansone (1917- 1963, USA) has lightened the load for millions of G.I. guys and gals. He was working for the Yankee dollar in a New York ad agency’s art department when the roof fell in a Pearl Harbor. A few weeks later the government offered him a new smock if he would come to Fort Belvoir. After basic training he drew The Wolf as a one-shot cartoon for a local camp publication – the first appearance of that all-too-human character. The idea caught on and Sansone was syndicating his lupine glom for world-wide Camp Newspaper Service. Sansone insists that The Wolf is strictly a product of hearsay and observation. But to all working wolves and corner coyotes he wishes “Happy howling”.



Learn more:
You can still find this book at Amazon.com
Cartoonbooks file 'The Wolf'

Please Mister Postman... is there a letter in your bag for me?

(sounds like The Carpenters)
As I am collecting cartoon books and catalogues, I try to preserve the envelope from the books I've received. You can call it a kind of spin-off of cartoonbook collecting...
We can't live without e-mail any more nowadays, but there ain't nothing but real mail!

Here's a selection of some cartoonbooks-containing envelopes mr. Postman had in his bag for me:

From France:

From China:

From Azerbaijan (the biggest) :

From Iran:

From France:

From Korea:

Pinochet + Mother Theresa = Op De Beeck ?

What do Mother Theresa and Augusto Pinochet have in common? Of course nothing, but they are neighbourgs at the Jan Op De Beeck exhibition in the ECC Kruishoutem.

Jan is a top-class caricaturist, even known more abroad than in his own country Belgium.
Many of Jan Op De Beeck's caricatures were published in the Belgian press. He won many prizes both at home and abroad and is regularly invited to give master classes in caricature.
In 1989 he published his first book 'Bekketrekkers from Belgenland', in 1993 he harvested a lot of success with 'The Last Testament of the Belgians'. ' The Art of the caricature', which in 1996 went to press was even in published in a Korean and Chinese translation. In 2006 'Famous Corpes' was published. For details on this books, you can visit Jan's website.

I have a copy of his book, published by Glénat in 1993 'Het laatste testament der Belgen' (the last testament of the Belgians).

Jacques Schepmans describes how the unfortunate 'Belgian ship' is tossed to and fro on the waves of political storms.


Jan provides in this book over 50 depicting portraits of Belgian politicians.
Yes, he's a great caricaturist!


Some other pics of the exhibition (March 21 - June 15, 2008 ECC Kruisthoutem):

Pierre Ballouhay, Ro Burms and Jan Op De Beeck

Great caricatures!

Learn more:
www.opdebeeck.com
Cartoonbook file Het Laatste Testament der Belgen

About cartoon book databases and other Librarythings - part 1

When your book collection grows and grows, there has to be a way to organise all these books. For that reason I use Microsoft Access to arrange my books. Once you know this program you can do anything with the data: make reports, lists and even “cartoonbook files”.
My cartoon book friend Jean-Marie uses files he makes in Microsoft Word. Although Word is not a database program, he manages to make nice and well-ordened files.
Recently Saskia introduced me to “Librarything(Beta)”: a free web 2.0 application to share your books with others. It’s amazing! I experimented and created an ‘account' and a ‘group’for the ECC Cartoonbooksclub and myself. Learning by doing, is the best method to get involved…
Click here to see my first books on the web. You can easily change the language.
You can read here what other finds about Librarything. Here are 2 of the reactions I read:

"If you love books, and love people who love books, LibraryThing is for you. Start by using the service to catalog your book collection: Tag your books by topic, share your catalog with others, and then endlessly browse the titles that they have on their shelves. The utterly book obsessed can add the LibraryThing widget to a blog to show visitors what they have been reading lately."
"Have you heard of LibraryThing yet? For book lovers, it will surely be the Coolest Thing Ever. For obsessive catalogers, it will be even cooler. As a making-book-connections tool, LibraryThing will certainly surpass Amazon..."


Maybe Librarything can be a way for us cartoon book collectors to share (parts of) our collection. To be honest, I must say that my books are quite ‘rare’. There are thousands of people having ‘Lord of the Rings’, but there are not so much of them having good cartoon books…
I’d like your opinion , so feel free to comment and make suggestions!