I found this stack of booklets recently; the first seven were published by the Trail Blazers’ Publishing Co., and the last two by W. H. Harper. I assume the two companies were the same. All are from 1943. I found very little about them online, except that there was also a “Trail Blazers Almanac” for many years. I post them here in appreciation of their lively two-color covers.

Drawings of different military aircraft, as well as “U. S. Army Aviation Badges.”

A pictorial guide to army insignia.

The same for the navy. Also includes the navy pay scale, from ensign to admiral.

Each page is a grid of 60 dots. I guess that saves you the trouble of drawing them.

Simple origami.

Card, word, guessing, and other indoor amusements. I’d never heard of Jack Horner: “Blindfold two players. Give each player five marshmallows and tell them to feed each other. This is great fun for all.”

The title promises twice that these are wholesome. Games include Swat the Bear, Hop Shove, Hook On, Red Lion, and Nose Jacks. Most are new to me, but they do seem relatively wholesome.

The game later marketed as Battleship. This version is smaller and cheaper.

The rules for football, baseball, tennis, hockey, and other sports. More importantly, instructions on how to lay out the playing field. There’s even a plan for a ping pong table.

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

I will be presenting the latest version of my concert/talk on music attributed to fairies, aliens, and other shadowy entities, “Music from Elsewhere,” on March 5 at 7 pm. It’s part of the series Utopia/Dystopia, curated by Morbid Anatomy and Hauser & Wirth. It’s at Hauser & Wirth, 548 W. 22nd St., NYC, and admission is free. You can find more info here. (This event was originally scheduled for November, but canceled due to a blizzard. It’s back!) It’s free, but an RSVP is requested.

I’m currently working on a book, tentatively also entitled Music from Elsewhere, including essays on not only fairy and alien tunes, but music that is lost or imaginary, musical ciphers and constructed languages, occult and hermetic music, music from seances and angels, music from fraternal orders, didactic music, kitchen symphonies and toy instruments, music from dreams, and other departures from standard practice. It’s slated for Strange Attractor Press; it may take me a while…

I’m also working on a translation of the “Upside-Down Stories” of Charles Cros and Émile Goudeau: nine bursts of hilarious and tasteless provocation from the founders of the Hydropathes in fin-de-siècle Paris. They’ve never been available in English, and it’s high time they were.

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

The Best of Le Scat Noiris now available! It collects memorable gems from the online journal edited by the ebullient Norman Conquest, in a large, full-color trade paperback. I have a number of pieces in it, as do many others, to wit: Paulo Brito, Paul Kavanagh, Erik Satie, Samuele Bastianello, Alice Pulaski, Pink Buddha, Yuriy Tarnawsky, Jason E. Rolfe, Eckhard Gerdes, Harold Jaffe, Tom Whalen, Darlene Altschul, Madalina Tantareanu, Sheila Pell, Samantha Memi, Opal Louis Nations, Alphonse Allais, Francisque Sarcey, Carla M. Wilson, Terri Lloyd, Mercie Pedro e Silva, Georges Hugnet, Norman Conquest, Paul Rosheim, Carol White, Michael Leigh, Nile Southern, Mantis Man, Tom Bussmann, Edward Lear, Mark Axelrod, Adao Iturrusgaral, Jim Johnson, Rick Krieger, Pippa Anais Gaubert, Rebecka Skog, Frank Pulaski, Jim McMenamin, Gail Schneider, Franciszka Themerson,  Raymond Queneau, Georges Perec, Italo Calvino, Tom La Farge, Theodore Carter, Nick Frost, Farewell Debut, Quixote, Robin Wyatt Dunn, Allan Bealy, Angela Pankosky, Brett Stout, Uwe Taubert, Iacyr Anderson Freitas, Desiree Jung, Andy Koopmans, Jim Meirose,  Russell Helms, Peter Payack, Adrienne Auvray, Gelett Burgess, and Eugene Ivanov.

You can find it at Black Scat Books!

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

The Army Navy Hit Kit gave soldiers and sailors a folio of popular songs, in piano arrangements. It began in 1943, and was published monthly. It was never sold, and, for some reason, had no standard size. I’ve seen copies that indicate a month and year; these are identified only by letters (P, S, and X). The covers were contributed by a variety of cartoonists, particularly those in the military. The one above is by Fred Lasswell, who had taken over “Barney Google and Snuffy Smith” in 1942, and was then serving as a flight radio operator in Africa. Those below are by Sgt. Ralph Stein, cartoon editor for Yank and future artist for “Popeye,” and Cpl. Stephen Douglas, who edited and drew covers for Famous Funnies.

As the title indicates, the songs are mostly commercial, although there are also a few traditional tunes. A period note: it was assumed the readers could read music and play the piano, although guitar chords are also given.

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

Yoyo, or, to give it its full title, Tales n’ Tails for the One n’ Every Yoyo, was published in January, 1972, in NYC. It advertised subscriptions, but this seems to have been the only issue, cheerily numbered 00.

It was published and edited by the painter and cartoonist Gerard Millan Perichon, who usually drew under the name of Babi (or Baby) Jery. He contributed to the New York Times, the East Village Other, and the National Lampoon, among others.

Yoyo is a sort of underground comic book in a magazine format, a big book at 96 pages. The contributors are an interesting bunch: veteran underground artist John Thompson (with an uncharacteristic doodle), Michael O’Donoghue (with a photo funny), Tomi Ungerer (with an excerpt from his book Compromises), the Belgian animator Picha. Perichon includes a couple of his trippy stories; the illustrator Paul Spina has pages of his hallucinatory art; and the Hawaiian painter Byron Goto indulges in a raunchy story about cowboys. Thirty pages are devoted to “The Scarecrow,” an inscrutable and inky picture story by Brad Holland, who went to become an influential illustrator. It’s an odd mix: underground comics by artists who usually didn’t draw comics.

Here are some samples. Click on those last three to enlarge them:

John Thompson

Babi Jery

Paul Spina

Brad Holland

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

This miniature deck (about 1 3/4 by 2 1/2 inches) is embellished with simple line drawings of animals, each with its name. There is no indication of date or publisher; the box has a drawing of a cat, and proclaims it “Maotou Renzipuke,” which is, I believe, Chinese for “Kitty Cat Reading Deck,” although I could be wrong.

And here’s the joker; “mimi,” according to the dictionary, means “meow.”

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

Drawn from Black Scat’s eight editions of the master French absurdist, this compendium is a sublime introduction to the wordplay and black humor that shocked and dazzled Bohemian Paris in the raucous “Banquet Years.” The READER includes the celebrated pataphysical text “A Thoroughly Parisian Drama”–a favorite of both André Breton and the Oulipians–as well as stories, plays, an excerpt from his only novel, and the classic exploits of Captain Cap and Francisque Sarcey. The translator, Doug Skinner, has added notes and an illuminating introduction.

Available on Amazon; more info at Black Scat Books.

Here’s another postscript to my recent book, 100 Cartoons from Le Chat Noir. I was surprised to find that some of the cartoons in this quintessentially Bohemian paper were reprinted by the old firm of Pellerin, in Épinal, as “Images d’Épinal” intended for children. Here are a couple of them. The Chat Noir cartoons were wordless, and in black and white; Pellerin added color and text.

The first one, by Uzès [Désiré-Achille Valentin], appeared in Le Chat Noir on November 6, 1886, as “The Skaters.” The second, by Eugène-Louis Mouël, appeared on June 19, 1886, under the same title as its Épinal incarnation.

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

As a postscript to my book 100 Cartoons from Le Chat Noir, here are some illustrations by Théophile Steinlen, one of the paper’s more prolific artists. That is, by the way, his art on the cover.

A brief bio from the book: Steinlen, Théophile Alexandre (1859-1923): Born in Lausanne, Switzerland. Contributed to Le Rire, Gil Blas, Les Temps nouveaux, Croquis; drew the cover for the first issue of L’Assiette au beurre. Illustrated books by Jehan Rictus, Pyotr Kropotkin, Sébastien Faure, Aristide Bruant, Anatole France. Staunch anarchist, painted many scenes of the poor. Specialized in drawings (and sculptures) of cats; best remembered today for his 1896 poster for the Chat Noir tour. 

In 1903, he illustrated Les Soliloques du Pauvre, by Gabriel Randon, better known as Jehan Rictus (or Jehan-Rictus, as he sometimes spelled it). The book is a series of bitter poems in Parisian slang, the reflections of a homeless man as he roams the streets at night. Randon drew from his own experience; he’d had some rough times.

Steinlen drew no fewer than 110 illustrations, both full-page and spot, making the book almost a graphic novel. Most depict the narrator, a gaunt figure in a top hat, modeled on Randon. Steinlen abandoned his usual pen and ink for crayon, giving the whole book an air of smoky gloom.

Here are some examples, scanned from a 1921 edition by Eugène Rey.

(Posted by Doug Skinner)

I will be presenting the latest version of my concert/talk on music attributed to fairies, aliens, and other shadowy entities, “Music from Elsewhere,” on November 15 at 7 pm. It’s part of the series Utopia/ Dystopia, curated by Morbid Anatomy and Hauser & Wirth. It’s at Hauser & Wirth, 548 W. 22nd St., NYC, and admission is free. You can find more info here.

I will be returning to NYC as part of “The Jim Turner Smorgasbord of Koo Koo,” a variety show hosted by the exemplary Jim Turner as a benefit for Dixon Place. I’ll play some of my songs, and perhaps read a snippet from one of my books. Also on the bill: David Felton, Mark Fite, Dale Goodson, Toby Huss, and Two-Headed Dog. It will unfurl on Saturday, December 1, at 7:30, at Dixon Place, 161-A Chrystie Street, NYC. Tickets are $25.

Upcoming from Black Scat Books is The Alphonse Allais Reader, a collection culled from the eight books of Allais that I’ve translated. We hope to get it out later this month.

(Posted by Doug Skinner)