EXTRACTS: Frank Bellamy's Robin Hood The Complete Adventures © 2008 The Book Palace (134 PAGES in Full edition)

5 FROM BALLADS TO BELLAMY early 20th century and Robin first appeared in comic strip form as early as 1922 in the pages of Bubbles . To establish a point of reference for the younger audience, Robin often found himself playing nursemaid to lost and runaway children in the years between the wars. Perhaps the biggest boost given to Robin Hood was the appearance in 1938 of Errol Flynn in the movie The Adventures of Robin Hood . It’s huge popularity led to a short boom in the appearance of books about Robin and his exploits – curtailed by the wartime paper shortage which effectively brought British publishing to a standstill for over a decade. The film’s re-release in the late 1940s inspired the appearance of a comic strip adaptation in Knockout in 1947, drawn with considerable aplomb by Mike Hubbard. From thereon, Robin Hood was to become one of the most popular characters appearing in British comics, his position cemented by a series of adventures appearing in Thriller Comics Library which filled 56 issues between 1951 and 1960. It is against this background of popularity that Swift brought Robin Hood to its pages in 1956. * * * * * Frank Bellamy was the perfect choice for these tales of loyalty, honour and duty. Born in Kettering, Nottinghamshire, in 1917, Bellamy grew up reading the adventurous stories of Wizard , Rover and imported pulp magazines starring G-Men and cowboys. His first choice of career would have been as a big game hunter in Africa but hunting’s loss was comics’ gain. A naturally talented artist, his drawing skills were encouraged at school and he entered a local art studio at the age of 16. The work here including drawing up posters and billboards for display at cinemas promoting the films of Edward G. Robinson, Humphrey Bogart and others much loved by Bellamy. Called up in 1939, he served in the Royal Artillery at West Aukland, spending much of his time painting an aircraft recognition room with every conceivable type of Allied and enemy plane. In his spare time, he submitted cartoons to the local Kettering Evening Telegraph which featured his work regularly. He returned to studio work on demobilisation but left for London in 1948, armed only with a list of studios where he could submit his portfolio. He was offered work by the first studio he tried and remained with them until 1953 when he and his wife and young son moved to Morden in South London. He had freelanced illustrations and advertising before taking the plunge to work as an illustrator full-time and one assignment, for Gibbs toothpaste, had led to him being offered a one-page comic strip by the editors of Mickey Mouse Weekly . The strip was “Monty Carstairs” and Bellamy drew four complete adventures in 1953-54 before he was tempted away by an offer of work from Swift . Swift was the junior companion to Eagle , famously the home of Dan Dare and one of the best-selling of all British comics. Its success led to the launch of Girl in 1951, Robin in 1953 and Swift in 1954; the publisher, Hulton Press, and managing editor Marcus Morris designed these four comics as a way of holding onto their readers who, at nursery age would start with Robin , progress at around the age of six or seven to Swift , then to either Eagle or Girl . As such, Swift had to appeal to both sexes and stories of the Wild West would appear alongside schoolgirl adventures and tales of plucky dogs and horses. To make reading easier (and as a natural progression from Robin ’s simplified language), the Swift strips were a mixture of dialogue balloons and blocks of text located below the frames. The lettering was clear and concise and used both upper and lower cases which mimicked handwriting – where traditionally balloons in comic strips were lettered in upper case throughout. It gives the strips in Swift a unique look. Bellamy fitted in with the high standard of artwork that was appearing in Swift where Harry Bishop and Giorgio Bellavitis were amongst the regular weekly contributors. Bellamy was drafted on to a one-page weekly strip entitled “The Fleet Family in Island of Secrets” when the original artist, Eric Dadswell, began drawing “The Grove Family” for a daily newspaper. Bellamy drew only 8 pages before the strip came to an end and he moved on to an adaptation of “The Swiss Family Robinson”, which ran for 41 episodes between October 1954 and July 1955. From April 1955 he added a second single page strip to his workload, taking over “The Exciting Adventures of Paul English” for thirteen weeks. From single page strips, Bellamy graduated to a series of two- page serials adapting Britain’s most famous legends: “King Arthur and His Knights” ran for 41 issues between July 1955 and May 1956, followed by two series featuring Robin Hood, “Robin Hood and His Merry Men” and “Robin Hood and Maid Marian”, the latter spanning 67 episodes between volume 3, number 19, dated 12 May 1956, and volume 4, number 33, dated 17 August 1957.