1946 in comics

Notable events of 1946 in comics. See also List of years in comics.

Events and publications

January

• January 6: Hildie and the Kid Gang, by Will Eisner.
• January 23: In Italy, the first number of Albi dell’intrepido by Editrice Universo, is published.
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #52 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #68 - Timely Comics

February

• February 2: Jean Dulieu's Paulus de Boskabouter (Paulus the woodgnome) debuts in Het Vrije Volk. [1]
• February 7: Buth's Thomas Pips makes its debut in Het Volk. [2]
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #53 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #69 - Timely Comics

March

• March 1: The National Cartoonists Society is established, along with the annual award, the Billy DeBeck Memorial Award, which will be renamed the Reuben Award in 1954. [3]
• March 3: Milton Caniff's Male Call comes to its conclusion after three years of newspaper publication. [4]
• March 4: Alex Raymond's Rip Kirby makes its debut. [5] with The Chip Faraday Murder.
• March 12: The first issue of the comics magazine Treasure Chest is published. [6]
• March 24: The Last Trolley aka The Man who Killed the Spirit, by Will Eisner.
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #54 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #70 - Timely Comics
• Young Allies Comics (1941 series) #19 - Timely Comics
• Master Ice-Fisher by Carl Barks, on Walt Disney's Comics and Stories.

April

• April 15: Ed Dodd's newspaper comic Mark Trail is first published in the New York Post.[7]
• April 22: First publication of Machiko Hasegawa's manga series Sazae-san in Fukunichi Shimbun.[8]
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #55 - Timely Comics
• Human Torch Comics (1940 series) #22 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #71 - Timely Comics
• Sub-Mariner Comics (1941 series) #19 - Timely Comics
• The Hicks formula, by Alex Raymond, second adventure of Rip Kirby.

May

• May 12: Andrea Lavezzolo and Edgardo dell'Acqua's comic strip Gim Toro makes its debut.
• May 15: Willy Vandersteen's Suske en Wiske story De Sprietatoom is first published. Halfway the story Lambik makes his debut.
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #56 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #72 - Timely Comics
• The first number of Albi d’Oro (Golden albums), anthological magazine edited by Mondadori, centered moreover on the Disney comics.

June

• In Al Capp's Li'l Abner the character Lena the Hyena is introduced. "The world's ugliest woman" is an unseen character who is always obscured from view, but characters react in horror to her ugliness. Her face will finally be revealed five months later. [9]
• All-Winners Comics (1941 series) #18 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #73 - Timely Comics
• Sub-Mariner Comics (1941 series) #20 - Timely Comics
• In the Rip Kirby story Liquid murder, by Alex Raymond Rip Kirby meets his nemesis, the Mangler.

July

• July 5: Hans G. Kresse's Eric de Noorman debuts in Het Laatste Nieuws. [10]
• July 15: The first issue of Fantax magazine is published. The character, by Marcel Navarro and Pierre Mouchot, had debuted two months earlier on Paris-Monde Illustré.
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #57 - Timely Comics
• Human Torch Comics (1940 series) #23 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #74 - Timely Comics

August

• August 1: Willy Vandersteen's De Vrolijke Bengels (1946-1954) makes its debut in Ons Volkske. [11]
• August 26: In Chester Gould's Dick Tracy Breathless Mahoney is killed. [12]
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #75 - Timely Comics

September

• September 7: The first number of Albi dell’ardimento (Bravery albums), an anthological magazine is published, edited by Edizioni Alpe, centering on Western comics.
• September 9: Honey and Hank, aka Elsworth by Bernard Segal, aka Seeg, makes its debut. It will run until 1958. [13]
• September 20: The British comics magazine The Comet is first published. It will run until 17 October 1959, after which it merges into the magazine Tiger. [14]
• September 23: The Mickey Mouse story Mickey’s menagerie, by Floyd Gottfredson and Bill Walsh is first published.
• September 26:
  • The first issue of the Belgian comics magazine Le journal de Tintin (Tintin) is published by Raymond Leblanc. The magazine will run until 1993. This also marks the continuation of The Adventures of Tintin by Hergé, which had been interrupted after World War II.[15]
  • Edgar P. Jacobs' Blake and Mortimer by Edgar P. Jacobs debuts in Tintin. [16]
  • Paul Cuvelier's Corentin debuts in Tintin. [17]
• September 30: National Periodical Publications is established, from a merger of All-American Publications and Detective Comics, Inc.
• All-Winners Comics (1941 series) #19 - Timely Comics
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #58 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #76 - Timely Comics
• Sub-Mariner Comics (1941 series) #21 - Timely Comics

October

• October 21: After five months of playing with readers' expectations the previously unseen character Lena the Hyena in Al Capp's comic strip Li'l Abner is finally revealed to the audience. Her design was part of a readers' contest won by a still unknown cartoonist Basil Wolverton. The exposure finally launches his career. [9]
• October 26: In Topolino, the SF series Saturno contro la terra (Saturn vs. Earth), by Cesare Zavattini, Federico Pedrocchi and Giovanni Scolari, gets its final chapter. It had continued since 1936, with a two year break-up because the war.[18]
• Cesare Solini and Antonio Canale's Amok makes its debut. [19]
• Human Torch Comics (1940 series) #24 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #77 - Timely Comics
• Young Allies Comics (1941 series) #20 - Timely Comics - (Final Issue)
• Ipnos il re della magia (Ipnos king of magic), by Gian Luigi Bonelli and Carlo Cossio, edited by Edizioni Audace; Italian imitation of Mandrake.[20]

November

• November 15: First publication of the Filipino comics magazine Halakhak Komiks.
• All-Winners Comics (1941 series) #21 - Timely Comics - (Issue #20 was never released, and issue #21 was the final issue.)
• Captain America Comics (1941 series) #59 - Timely Comics
• Human Torch Comics (1940 series) #25 - Timely Comics
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #78 - Timely Comics

December

• December 7: First appearance of Lucky Luke and his trusty horse Jolly Jumper by Morris, in Spirou with the story Arizona 1880.[21]
• December 12: In the French magazine OK, the first chapter of Arys Buck et son épée magique (Arys Buck and his magical sword), by Albert Uderzo. In 1946 he publishes also his first album, Les Aventures de Clopinard.
• December 23: Marten Toonder's Panda makes its newspaper debut. [22]
• Marvel Mystery Comics (1939 series) #79 - Timely Comics

Deaths

January

• January 2: O'Galop, French painter, illustrator, graphic designer, animator and comics artist (Le Supplice de la Roue, Fifi Céleri), passes away at age 78. [23]
• March 2: Don Newhouse, British comics artist (Bertie Blobbs, comics based on Charlie Chaplin, continued Pitch and Toss, Our Saucy Shipwrecked Mariners), dies at age 62. [24]

June

• June 15: Charles Forbell, American comics artist (Naughty Pete), dies at age 71. [25]

August

• August 3: Viktor Deni, Russian cartoonist and poster designer (made sequential propaganda cartoons and comics), dies at age 53. [26]

September

• September 16: Francisque Poulbot, French illustrator and cartoonist, dies at age 67. [27]

Specific date unknown

• Albert Lanmour, French illustrator and comics artist (Les Années de Service de Théodore Tiroflan, Le Hoquet d'Hector Boyaux), dies at age 58 or 59. [28]
• Red W. Shellcope, American comics artist (Jimmie the Messenger Boy), dies at age 66 or 67.[29]

Initial appearances by character name

• Fantax, created by Marcel Navarro and Pierre Mouchot.
• Lambik by Willy Vandersteen.
• Morgaine le Fey in Batman #36 - DC Comics

References

1. "Jean Dulieu". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
2. "Buth". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
3. Stone, Tucker. "The Comics Journal". Retrieved May 18, 2020.
4. "Milton Caniff". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
5. "Rip Kirby". Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on 2017-01-19. Retrieved January 19, 2017.
6. Treasure Chest of Fun & Facts Vol. 1, No. 1. March 12, 1946 at WRLC Libraries. Archived from the original on May 3, 2012.
7. "Mark Trail". Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on February 13, 2016.
8. "Machiko Hasegawa". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
9. "Basil Wolverton". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
10. "Hans G. Kresse". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
11. "Willy Vandersteen". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
12. The Complete Dick Tracy, Volume 10 by Chester Gould, IDW Publishing (2010)
13. https://www.lambiek.net/artists/s/seeg.htm
14. "Complete AP / Fleetway Comic Index". www.dandare.info. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
15. BDoubliées. "Tintin année 1946" (in French). Archived from the original on 9 July 2007. Retrieved 17 June 2007.
16. "Edgar Pierre Jacobs". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
17. "Paul Cuvelier". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
18. "FFF - Saturno contro la Terra". www.lfb.it. Retrieved 2020-02-14.
19. "Young April 12, 1948 Findings of Facts". Scribd. Retrieved 11 December 2016. DETECTIVE COMICS, INC. was a corporation duly organized and existing under the laws of the State of New York, and was one of the constituent corporations consolidated on September 30, 1946 into defendant NATIONAL COMICS PUBLICATIONS, INC.
20. "Ipnos N-07 (Italian Language Books)". Comic Book Plus. Retrieved 2020-02-14.
21. BDOubliées. "Spirou année 1946" (in French). Archived from the original on 11 July 2007. Retrieved 17 June 2007.
22. "Marten Toonder". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
23. "O'Galop". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
24. "Don Newhouse". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
25. "Charles Forbell". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
26. "Viktor Deni". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
27. "Francisque Poulbot". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
28. https://www.lambiek.net/artists/l/lanmour_albert.htm
29. "Red W. Shellcope". lambiek.net. Retrieved May 18, 2020.