Black and White Wednesday: "Heartfelt Thanks" by Kathy and Ken Barr

Raise your hand if you only know uber-talented artist Ken Barr by his pulse-pounding painted cover art! You know, covers like these:

Don't feel bad--Barr is best known for his paperback and magazine covers (especially the Groovy Age ones he did for Marvel). He did, occasionally, dabble in sequential storytelling, with one such hidden gem being found in Sal Quartuccio's Hot Stuf' #8 (1978). Enjoy!

Black and White Wednesday: Alex Toth's Vanguard

What's happening, Groove-ophiles? Today's B&W Wednesday post is not only a veritable feast for the ol' eyeballs, but a missing link to the short-but-oh-so-complicated history of the meteoric Atlas/Seaboard line. Seems that when Howard Chaykin first sprung The Scorpion on publisher Martin Goodman and company, they didn't dig where Humble Howie was coming from. They then commissioned the master, Alex Toth, to try his hand at the property. Toth worked like a madman, completing a ten page strip in ten days--only to have it rejected, The Scorpion being given back (if only temporarily) to Chaykin. Toth knew he had something groovy in his hands, though, and reworked the strip as The Vanguard. A couple years later, Sal Quartuccio, publisher of the very cool ground level mag, Hot Stuf', ran the strip in (ta dah!) Hot Stuf' #4 (cover dated Spring 1977). Toth, since Vanguard was going to be published in b&w rather than the color, added gray tones, and before you can say "dy-no-mite!" Mark Forte's masked alter-ego finally saw the light of day.