THE OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF THE BOOK
The WHIZZER and CHIPS annual 1971:
The creators
THERE ARE SEVERAL INDIVIDUALS INVOLVED IN THE CREATION OF THE BOOK and the comics, and until comparatively recently we have known little or nothing at all about most of them.
Indeed, it has taken a lot of research to produce this list, and even then it is still incomplete.
Quite simply, up until around the mid-seventies, these creators were not even allowed to sign their artwork.
Many of the writers are even less known, even though their contributions are equally critical.
Sadly most of the creators on this list are no longer with us, so let's now celebrate the names of these unsung heroes that we do know who are featured in this book.
BOB PAYNTER (Editor)
Paynter was the first editor of Whizzer and Chips. Shortly after he became head of the humour group at IPC, launching several new papers including Shiver and Shake, Whoopee! Cor!! Monster Fun, Krazy and others. After being full of enthusiasm for Leo Baxendale’s Sweeny Toddler strips for Shiver and Shake, Paynter gave him free reign of the middle four pages of Monster Fun, which led to the Badtime Bedtime Books, and after, Willy the Kid for Duckworth. After IPC was taken over by Robert Maxwell's BMPC, Paynter moved to Mirror Books and then became an editor at Nexus Media Ltd, producing, among others, puzzle books and another short-lived comic, Fun and Games.
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TERRY BAVE (Puddin' Tops, Scribbler's Treasure Island, Karate Kid, Me and My Shadow, Little Saver, Nipper, Ginger's Tum, Champ, Hetty's Horoscope, Aqua Lad)
Born in Bristol in 1931, and working at the heart of English cartooning, Terry had a long, successful career as an artist working on children's comics, submitting his first comics work to Odhams Press' Wham!, and was given the strip Sammy Shrink to draw. He would work on strips in comics such as Whizzer and Chips, COR!!, Buster, Whoopee, Dandy and Beano, working in creative partnership with his wife Shiela, who wrote many of the scripts. From the heyday of the sixties and seventies, Terry saw the rise, and eventual decline, of creative cartooning for children's comics. His story is not just a tale of one artist, but the story of comics themselves. On 11 January 2013 he published his autobiography, Cartoons and Comic Strips. Terry passed away peacefully on December 11, 2018, aged 87.
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DENIS GIFFORD (Steadfast McStaunch, KooKoo Klub)
Born in Forest Hill, London, on 26 December 1927, Gifford was educated at Dulwich College in South London, where he met his frequent collaborator, comedian Bob Monkhouse. In 1942 he had his first professional work, Magical Monty, in All Fun Comics, published, at the age of 14. Later the same year he began contributing to DC Thomson's humour comics, including The Dandy. He created several characters in the 1940s, and started drawing humour strips for the Amalgamated Press, including Our Ernie, Stonehenge Kit the Ancient Brit and his own character, Steadfast McStaunch, for Knock-Out (yes, with the hyphen) in the 1950s. He wrote for TV and radio, including scripting for popular British comedians Morecambe and Wise. He was one of the UK's leading historians of comics. In 1969 he relaunched Steadfast McStaunch and introduced Kuthbert KooKoo for Whizzer and Chips. He died on 18 May 2000.
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RON TURNER (It came from Outer Space)
Turner was born on 3 August 1922 in Norwich, and grew up in Southend-on-Sea. After leaving school at 14 he joined the graphics department of Odhams Press, where he contributed occasional illustrations to the Modern Wonder. He created Space Ace for Atlas' Lone Star magazine in 1954, which ran for the next seven years, written, drawn and lettered by Turner. The character got his own title in 1960, the same year as Turner started drawing the adventures of futuristic detective Rick Random for Super Detective Library. In the later 1960s and '70s he drew for TV21, including Stingray (1965), the Doctor Who spin-off The Daleks (1966-67), and Star Trek (1970) in full colour. He drew The Robot Builders for Lion, and various strips for Whizzer and Chips and COR!! He drew a handful of early Judge Dredd stories for 2000 AD in 1977, as well as a brief revival of Rick Random written by Steve Moore. On 19 December 1998, Turner died of a heart attack at his home in Berkshire while working on a Doctor Who strip for the magazine.
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MIKE LACEY (Sid's Snake, Shiner, Slowcoach)
After technical school, Lacey entered the comics industry, working for Link Studios. After two or three years he began getting regular commissions from Fleetway on titles such as Whizzer and Chips, Monster Fun, Buster, Whoopee!, Cor!!, Knockout and Shiver and Shake, and began working directly for IPC/Fleetway, continuing an association that lasted into the 1980s on titles such as Jackpot and Wow! Among the many strips he illustrated were X-Ray Specs, Meanie McGenie, Sid's Snake, Shiner, Scared Stiff Sam, the Super Seven and the Bumpkin Billionaires.
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TOM KERR (The "Stealer")
Kerr began his career in the late 1940s, drawing for Playtime comic and Mickey Mouse Weekly. He also drew for girls comics such as Marilyn, School Friend, Girls Crystal and June. He was present in Buster from the early 1960s with his own strip Kip Arrogant, but also with fill-ins on Kelly's Eye, Captain Hurricane, The Steel Claw and Charlie Peace. He also worked on Oddball Oates for Lion (1969-1970). He also worked for comics such as Thunder, Eagle, Knockout, Valiant, TV 21, Lady Penelope, Solo and Jag. In the 1960s and 1970s he also drew for many annuals, including The Monkees and Look-in. In 1970 he drew the first ever Adam Eterno strip in Thunder, and Billy's Boots in Scorcher. He also drew The "Stealer" and The Perils of Paul White for Whizzer and Chips. His final comics work was for DC Thomson's Nursery Comics, Twinkle and Little Star. He died in 1984.
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FRANK McDIARMID (The Spectacular Adventures of Willie Bunk)
McDiarmid was a British comics artist best known for his work on Roger the Dodger in the Beano and on IPC humour titles such as Whizzer and Chips, Cheeky, Krazy, COR!!, Whoopee!, Wow! and Monster Fun. Strips he drew include Cheeky, Kid Kong, Boy Boss, Frankie Stein, The Gasworks Gang and Willie Bunk. He later moved into the field of fine art. He died in January 2021.
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NORMAN MANSBRIDGE (Parker the Parky)
During the Second World War Mansbridge served in the Auxiliary Fire Service, and was a radio operator in the Merchant Navy with a roving commission as a war artist, before returning to work as a cartoonist in papers and magazines like Lilliput, The News Chronicle, The Sunday Times, The Daily Sketch and The Birmingham Post, while contributing regularly to Punch. In the late 1960s he started drawing humour comics for IPC, including Wear 'em Out Wilf (1969) for Whizzer and Chips, Teacher's Pet (1970-74) for COR!!, Fuss Pot (1971-84) for Knockout and Whizzer and Chips, Tough Nutt and Softy Centre for Shiver and Shake and Whoopee!, Mummy's Boy for Monster Fun and Buster, and Little and Large Lenny for Jackpot. He died in Uttlesford, Essex, on 6 March 1993.
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GRAHAM ALLEN (Give a Dog a Bone)
Allen was born in 1940, and joined Fleetway's staff in 1957. He drew comic strips for Fleetway/IPC titles from the mid-60s on, then moved to Odhams Press, where he drew in a frenetic Leo Baxendale-inspired style for Wham!, Pow! and Smash!, including The Nervs for the latter. When Odhams merged into IPC, Allen became a regular artist on their humour comics, drawing Give a Dog a Bone and Fiends and Neighbours for Whizzer and Chips, later in COR!! (and reprinted in the short-lived Scream!), and Eddie and Spoilsport for COR!!. Other IPC titles he worked on include TV21, Look-In, Score 'n' Roar, and Whoopee!. He also worked for DC Thomson, and has tried his hand at political cartooning for the London Daily News and Daily Express. He has also drawn for Viz, and is a prolific book illustrator.
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MIKE HIGGS (Space School)
Higgs is a comic artist possibly best known for The Cloak, a comedic strip about a crimefighter which ran in the Odhams titles Pow! (1967-68) and Smash! (1968-69). He also drew for other titles including Thundercap for Buster and Space School for Whizzer and Chips. He later moved into other areas of illustration, including book design. He also collected and designed reprint collections of Eagle's Dan Dare, Look and Learn's The Trigan Empire and Comics at War strips.
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TONI GOFFE (Fred's Family Tree)
Goffe studied painting and illustration at Southampton College of Art in Hampshire and during the sixties and seventies drew The Kids from Stalag 41 for Jet, Stoneage Brit Ancient Nit! (clearly a continuation of Denis Gifford’s Stoneage Kit) for COR!! plus Fred’s Family Tree and The Loser for Whizzer and Chips.
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ALF SAPORITO (Hot Rod)
Saporito was a comics artist who worked on titles including Buster, Shiver and Shake, Cor!!, Krazy Comic, Monster Fun and Jinty, on numerous strips including Do-it-Yourself Dot, Gums, Gus Gorilla, Micky Mimic and even seventies Yorkshire comedian Charlie Williams!
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REG PARLETT (King of the Jungle, Guy the Guide, The Goodies and the Baddies)
A comics legend, Reg Parlett was in the business for 66 years. with every image seeming to be infused with laughter, happiness and general delight. Although his work for IPC always had a note of the vintage about it, it was full of movement and feeling just as much as any of his contemporaries' output. His considerable output was mainly for the weekly papers; perhaps for this reason, if his art appeared in the holiday specials and annuals, it was more than likely to be a reprint (including this annual). His comic credits included Funny Wonder, Film Fun, Radio Fun, Swift, Buster, COR!!, Whizzer and Chips, Whoopee!, Knockout, Cheeky, Jackpot and Wow! His creations include Ivor Lott and Tony Broke, Hire A Horror, Kid Gloves and Mustapha Mi££ion. His popularity was celebrated in the 4 August 1984 edition of Buster when, still working, he celebrated his 80th birthday. Still with IPC at the time, Parlett passed away in 1991.
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Here is the full credit list from all those sources that have helped me put together the full article on this comic (in no particular order):
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The Encyclopedia of Comic Characters by Denis Gifford (Longman, 1987)
The Ultimate Book of British Comics by Graham Kibble-White (Allison and Busby, 2003)
Great British Comics by Paul Gravett and Peter Stanbury (Aurum Press, 2006)
Cartoons and Comic Strips by Terry Bave (Lulu Publishing, 2020)
Adam Eterno – A Hero for all time (Rebellion, 2021)
King's Reach: John Sanders' Twenty-Five Years at the Top of Comics by John Sanders (Rebellion, 2020)
A Very Funny Business - 40 years of Comics by Leo Baxendale (Gerald Duckworth and Co. Ltd, 1978)
The History of The Beano by Christopher Ritchies (Editor) (D.C. Thomson & Co. Ltd, 2008)
Judge Dredd The Mega-History - the untold story by Colin M. Jarman and Peter Acton (Lennard publishing, 1995)
whizzerandchipscomic.blogspot.com
Also to https://britishcomics.wordpress.com, which sadly is no longer available online.
My dog-eared copies of Whizzer and Chips dated 4 July, 15 August and 12 September 1970 (IPC Magazines Ltd, 1970, now ©Rebellion).
Additional thanks to Irmantas Povilaika, a big Whoopee! Fan and perhaps has one of the largest collection of UK comics of anyone, certainly in Lithuania.
With thanks to British Comics Fandom, Rebellion, the Comics UK forum and Key Collector comics for the additional biographical info.
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I welcome any suggestions, alterations or any additional information to this feature, so let me know at roger.hartopp@gmail.com if you have anything I need to add/subtract/rewrite!
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