Al Capp : Li'l Abner, Abbie an' Slats, autobiography
Al Capp: books reprinting his comic strips
Al Capp's Complete Shmoo: The Comic Books

First appearing in Al Capp's Li'l Abner comic strip in 1948, the oddly shaped (and happily edible) Shmoo became an overnight phenomenon, spawning an unprecedented merchandising frenzy in the late forties and fifties. As part of the Dark Horse Archives series, ALL Shmoo comic book appearances are being collected for the first time ever in a deluxe hardcover edition! In addition to every issue of Shmoo Comics from 1949 and 1950, rare bonus stories, and Shmoo-centric advertisements from yesteryear, Al Capp's Complete Shmoo: The Comic Books features an introduction and annotations by certified Shmoo-ologist Denis Kitchen. A persistent presence in pop culture, the selfless Shmoo has served humanity for decades-mostly by offering itself as food-but also by entertaining and tickling our funny bones like no other creature can. Treat yourself to these hilarious adventures, featuring Washable Jones, Super Shmoo, Frankenshmoo, Fu Manshmoo and truly a cast of thousands! This archival collection sports a new cover by Peter Poplaski. Hardcover, 7x11, 176 pages... $49.95.

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Al Capp's Li'l Abner: The Frazetta Sundays

At last! A great new series reprinting the Li'l Abner Sunday pages and featuring the works of Frank Frazetta! Before legendary artist Frank Frazetta became an American institution for his lush paintings, he was drawing muscular hillbillies and scantily clad women for an earlier American institution: the comic strip Li'l Abner, which boasted 60 million readers daily. From 1954 till 1961 Frazetta toiled as a ghost for Al Capp, the most famous and successful cartoonist of his era. Except for a brief 1954 dailies sequence (when Frazetta drew himself as Frankie the Biker in a send-up of Marlon Brando's contemporary motorcycle film The Wild Ones) Frazetta's energy was focused on the Li'l Abner Sunday strips. For the first time ever these gorgeous full-color Sundays are being collected! Dark Horse plans to publish four comprehensive 9x 12 volumes within the next year. Each quarterly volume will contain an introduction and extensive annotations by Li'l Abner expert Denis Kitchen (publisher of 27 volumes of Abner dailies). The color strips are being scanned from the best available archival sources. Includes extensive annotations by Li'l Abner expert Denis Kitchen.

Volume 1 reprints Sundays from 1954-1955 and features The Bald Iggle (from Capp's Shmoo and Kigmy school of creatures with social messages), Loverboynik (a thinly disguised Liberace) and Milton the Masked Martian (an early superhero parody) as well as Indian princess Minnie Mustache, Moonbeam McSwine, The Tigress, Daisy Mae Yokum and Gloria Van Wellbilt as only Frank Frazetta can draw them!!
9x12, 128 pages, full color, ...
Volume 2 reprints Sundays from 1956-1957 and features the reverse Milton the Masked Martian, a parody of Mary Worth, and lampoons on Jayne Mansfield, Liberace, Grace Kelly, and more!
9x12, 128 pages, full color, ... $18.95
Volume 3 reprints Sundays from 1958-1959 and features the reverse Sadie Hawkins Day race, the pronounciation of Joe Bftsplik's name, the search for Christopher Columbus's underwear, the return of Adam Lazonga, and more! All from the pen of Frank Frazetta!
9x12, 120 pages, full color, ... $18.95
Volume 4 reprints Sundays from 1960-61 is the final Frazetta volume and features the Abner movie, Joe Btfsplk, Captain Eddie Ricketyback, the Japanese Nomotocar, two Fosdick episodes, and more!
9x12, 120 pages, full color, ... $18.95

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Daisy Mae Li'l Abner Dailies by Al Capp. Before Kitchen Sink Press went out of business in January, 1999, it was in the process of publishing the complete Li'l Abner strip in a quality oblong format. The reproduction is especially fine because the series was being reproduced from syndicate proofs and original art provided by the estate of creator Al Capp. The volumes run just under 200 pages. Available in both paperbound and hardbound, oversize 11˝x9 oblong format, black and white pages with color covers. Many of the volumes are still available, but supplies are getting low and some covers may be slightly scuffed.

• Volume 14   • Paperbound WAS $22.95. ON SALE! $19.95
• Volume 14   •Hardbound WAS $39.95. ON SALE! $33.95

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in his own words...
  Alfred Gerald Caplin, who was born in 1909, and who died seventy years later, was in his prime perhaps the most successful writer of his time. His words were read every single day by literally millions of Americans. And although he wrote less than 50,000 words a year, he was certainly one of the best-paid writers in the business. Better known as Al Capp, he was the creator of Li’l Abner , the most popular comic strip of the 1930s, 40s and 50s.
  Al Capp is a well-known name, and his creation, Li’l Abner , is even more well known. What is not so well know is what John Updike, in his introduction, calls “the central fact of Al Capp’s story,” namely that Al Capp had only one leg. And it is the theme of one-leggedness that dominates Capp’s newly-published collection of autobiographical essays, My Well-Balanced Life on a Wooden Leg.
  Capp made no secret of his one-leggedness. In fact he wrote about it often, and in 1946 he created a pamphlet to be distributed by the Red Cross to thousands of amputee veterans of World War II.
  A subtheme of My Well-Balanced Life on a Wooden Leg is Capp’s memories of teen-age lust, made all the more poignant because of his handicap. The fact that Li’l Abner used his two strong legs to run away from women every year on Sadie Hawkin’s Day is ironic. Capp recounts in his memoirs how during his teen-age years he perceived his one-leggedness as the only impediment to his chasing after girls. The accounts of his scheming and pining in pursuit of the opposite sex are hilarious.
  Capp’s memoirs also shed light on other aspects of his life: his background, his cartooning career, his family life, and his international celebrity. Introduction by John Updike.

My Well-Balanced Life on a Wooden Leg—by Al Capp
128 pages, 5˝x8˝, hardbound with dustjacket, illustrated ..... WAS $15.95. ON SALE! $13.95

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