Ernie Colón's Richie Rich!

When Ernie Colòn illustrated a Richie Rich story, readers could expect one thing in spades: Adventure! In a Colòn story, Rich became a genius boy inventor fighting crime; and Richie's butler, Cadbury, became a dashing man of action. What great stuff! This three-chapter story is from Richie Rich Success Stories No. 10, October 1966.

After reading this great tale, hyperlink over to Bill White Cartoons; the blog of pal and cartoonist, Bill White; wherein Mr. White talks about meeting Ernie Colòn recently at the 2011 New York Comic Con!

RICHIE RICH No. 54, February 1967

Richie Rich was one of my favorite Harvey comics when I was a kid. Richie's extravagant possessions, like the snowball-throwing machine in our second story, were always so darn cool. The magic of the character was his unpretentiousness and generous character. For a rich kid, he was alright. In fact, he was such a nice kid it was hard to be jealous of his toys.

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These next three stories are all the work of Harvey-master, Ernie Colón, who always drew the best Richie Rich stories. Whenever I recall my favorite RR stories, it is always Mr. Colón's work that I have cataloged in memory.

Artist identification for today's post was confirmed by Harvey expert & cartoonist, Bill White, and (the man himself via Bill) Ernie Colón! Thanks, gentlemen!

Reginald Van Dough, Jr. was a great character, if for no other reason that he brought the devil out in Richie!

No one drew Cadbury the Butler like Ernie Colón.

This ad is from the same issue. I love that this speedometer goes up to 50 miles per hour.

Thanks again to Bill White for confirming artist ID; AND for contacting Mr. Colón. For anyone wishing to see some wonderful cartooning, please visit Bill at his blog: Bill White Cartoons!

PLAYFUL LITTLE AUDREY No. 69, April 1967

The first comics that I loved were Harvey comics. My allowance got me two comics (at 12¢ apiece). As I became a teen, I went Marvel – then DC. But life is a circle, and I will die a Harvey man.

These two stories are from Playful Little Audrey no. 69, April 1967. This first one is most likely the king of Harvey style, Warren Kremer. Those certainly look like Kremer backgrounds. It's a safe bet the cover is Kremer!

This second story, which is a grand look at computers before they went personal, is most likely Kremer as well; but has some Ernie Colon touches – primarily the adults seem Colon grownups. Colon was very good at working in the Kremer/Harvey style. The vast Harvey output remains largely un-indexed – a harsh reality I find hard to live with.

Stumbo the Giant in "Giant Removal Project"

This Stumbo the Giant story goes out by request to my friend, Chuck Wells, at The Comic Book Catacombs. Mr. Wells is clearly a man of discriminating tastes, as he declares himself a Warren Kremer fan. Kremer was one of the finest artists ever to work in comics, and I believe Stumbo to be some of his best work. The subject really gave him a chance to demonstrate his powerful control of perspective and backgrounds. Dig that awesome splash panel! That's the way the big boys do it.

This is from Hot Stuff - The Little Devil No. 86, October, 1968. All scans are from my own comic. Just click the image for the big picture.

Let's throw in an extra Hot Stuff story from the same issue. The art here, I believe, is by Ernie Colon (No Harvey indexes exist for verification). Colon was a major Harvey artist who specialized in Richie Rich stories and loved the dark, demonic shadowing around the eyes for moments of anger. It is definitely in the Kremer style, but the landscapes seem to lack the Kremer texture. If someone disagrees with my Colon diagnosis, I'm all ears!

It’s a fun story. I love the way the kids treat Hot Stuff just like another kid, despite his horns, pitchfork, and burning red skin which nearly par-boils them in the pool. I love the Harvey universe!

Boys, Girls, Men, Women. I remember staring at this ad as a kid and finding it more confusing than algebra. Paragraph after paragraph of text! How could you make $50.00, $100.00, $200.00 and more in your spare time by knowing 10 people? Was this some sort of con? A Ponzi scheme? The constant reminders that IT COSTS NOTHING TO TRY scared the beans out of me. These were clearly some very, very tricky adults. Wallace Brown, Incoroporated, indeed.