Coming Soon: Four Issues of College Humor

For some decades—yes, decades!—I have wanted to know everything I could about cartoonist Peter Arno's work in the magazine College Humor. Though significantly downscale from the rarefied pages of The New Yorker where Arno gained his fame, the humor magazine offered the popular cartoonist a young and educated audience eager to see more of his lively and sophisticated work. I have posted quite a bit of this material already in the archives. Now I am taking the next small step, purchasing four more issues of College Humor, each with Arno's "Side-Show," the two-page spread on which three of his cartoons regularly appeared.

These four issues were procured last month from four different eBay sellers, this being too important a mission to worry about combining postage. As it happened, not one of these sellers chose to photograph any of the Arno pages; clearly that will have to be for me to do. To begin with, though, let me post the four magazines the way the eBay sellers chose to present them but with my added commentary. Think of it as a coming attraction.

The September 1936 cover is modeled by caricaturist Sam Berman and photographed by Dudley Lee. Berman, along with cartoonist E. Simms Campbell, created the Esquire magazine mascot Esky and sculpted a number of covers for the men's magazine. Arno was a big newsstand draw and is therefore the first of the eight names listed at the bottom of the cover. 

For those who think disinformation in the mass media is a new thing, a leading cigarette brand advertises "For Digestion's sake—smoke Camels."

Here's the view of the magazine's spine:

On the right, a dog cartoon from the reliable Dorothy McKay:

College Humor, September 1936
eBay listing ended June 30, 2024

https://www.ebay.com/itm/135117395561?itmmeta=01J25FR5ZTHG4638HYMZKFV8PF&hash=item1f759fd669:g:eEsAAOSwUlZmeHeL&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwF7Xe%2F99XvkMXQRhr5z9wggWbc55FYI6v0XaoP0BT9pVsEQIkDmRXmACFub%2BwIfpBi%2BHAHqGDh98h5CHX

0MfqGlJr9rhTeMSihhrDVWH9qPCzSiu8xn2BM8My2VNaXx%2FCKtWffivRGB6jJ1k14x%2FKMg2POLbR2kvAA%2FBK57ac4AezhQkTw8xkZmuTrqFTnVzzR%2FNtsNg0mpEgm%2FJOCVtw6OSL8buGCoiAst94k7sljr3sWXvri9Wl5Qwn10GDUotyQ%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR_7f4K-RZA

College Humor, September 1936
eBay item description

Thank you for not bidding against me:

The December 1936 cover is also by Berman and is again photographed by Lee. Arno's name still has pride of place on the lower banner.

I wonder whether the College Humor crowd is the right audience for the promotion of original etchings.

The boxing illustration is by Carl Mueller:

Four cartoons to a page seems about right for the illustrated humor section. Here we have work by Syd Hoff, Jay Irving, Reamer Keller, and Gregory d'Alessio. At the top left we see just a fragment of a drawing by Chon Day.

Jefferson Machamer educates readers on politics and . . . other things.

The Camel ads continue. If you don't believe that these cigarettes aid digestion, perhaps three testimonials will set you straight.

College Humor, December 1936
eBay listing ended June 24, 2024

https://www.ebay.com/itm/335375255703

College Humor, December 1936
eBay item description

By April of 1937, the cover sculptures were made by puppeteer Bil Baird. The dog here steals the show. To this day, Baird is remembered for his work on "The Lonely Goatherd" sequence in the 1965 film version of "The Sound of Music." The photography of the model is still done by Lee. Arno does not get top billing this go-round. A mistake?

It's uncanny how few eBay sellers think to include the table of contents:

Prepare to be teased. Eloise Martin of Drake University is the Co-ed of the Month. She alone might have been worth the 15 cent cover price. My guess is that this sold out quickly on newsstands in Des Moines.

Otto Soglow pokes some fun at an old moralizer, a surefire target when cartooning for the hip on-campus crowd:

Ty Mahon is given a full page to ponder the dilemmas of the wealthy:

The nation's top campus humor magazines also get some space in the issue:

Call my taste sophomoric, but I love this club's name, left. McKay's cartoon, right, taps into some of the discomfort with traditional sex roles present even back in 1937.

College Humor, April 1937
Best offer of $5.59 accepted
eBay listing ended June 24, 2024

https://www.ebay.com/itm/226081677435

College Humor, April 1937
eBay item description

Finally, the November 1937 cover is by Baird again. Readers must have understood that even football players could get distracted. Arno is once again restored to top billing and all's right with the world.

Including the table of contents, again, is really helpful. The "Don't be a cave man" ad for Packard Lectro-Shaver is just an added bonus.

If College Humor's young readers aren't hopelessly addicted to Camels by this point, you can't blame the ads.

College Humor, November 1937
eBay listing ended June 25, 2024

https://www.ebay.com/itm/166833385903?itmmeta=01J25FR5ZVG9QX75WF3M9QJFN8&hash=item26d80b71af:g:dRYAAOSwjOpmdEWj&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwEJrjqt0iK8fSmTAEb7j5YBr6DcL1uYebM6--hZUqYtmnnbei4qaY4ABxmQk%2BfMV7BPWqQOYaV9C9BSsTE8LtEKgZl5C%2F5s3NLdzSUrvA

cmlHx2sLSnocvuZMJNWq73ciWnAkBP8t2%2B8UltSbTMf05no7RhgiwXamXR2vIumciwp8y14YXtQ1aLmMakCsW%2BpRcfWGGp0XOJ1jLWcUaMJkHoUL3HxamlNP7h3CSYIHP%2Bqeu%2F041New%2BNRK2DaeAQ5CQ%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR4Lg4K-RZA

College Humor, November 1937
eBay item description

The April 1937 best offer of $5.59 was accepted.

Note:  There's a lot more to see of caricaturist Sam Berman's work and a good place to see it is in Drew Friedman's 2011 post here.

What is the significance of the ticket clerk grabbing the male ticket holder's tie? I'm not sure I understand Berman's cover for the December 1936 issue. Anybody?

What sort of co-ed  do you suppose sits for a provocative College Humor photoshoot? Perhaps the backstory provided in this 1972 clipping will help to explain Eloise Martin's contribution to our collegiate culture:

https://nyshistoricnewspapers.org/?a=d&d=jou19720111-01.1.13&e=-------en-20--1--txt-txIN----------

After all these years, a press photo of Martin, the first image in the Co-ed of the Month spread, can still be purchased here.

The $5 etching, Sardine Fleet at Anchor (1936) by George Elmer Browne (1871-1946), is available today on eBay for $239.20. If you somehow missed out back in the day, you can get it here.

Peter Arno's work published in The New Yorker is generally well enough known, but his cartoons and illustrations from other publications such as College Humor or The American Magazine remain hard to locate. I am always eager to hear from paper collectors with examples of obscure Arno published work or cartoon collectors with original Arno art. You know where to find me.

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The Illustrators' Show

The place to be on May 13, 1932 was the Illustrators' Show at the New Yorker Theatre, now Studio 54. This was an annual benefit with racy content not unlike the Dutch Treat Shows. The program describes a revue in two acts written by and starring famous illustrators. James Montgomery Flagg contributed "The Illustrators' Song" to the first act. Tony Sarg put on a marionette play in the second.

Rube Goldberg supervised the whole event. He contributed a sketch entitled "Diddle Me This" which features such thoughtfully-named characters as Dr. Belcher McBurp and Mr. and Mrs. Hiram Broccoli. Like many of the illustrators, he performed in his own sketch. Otto Soglow contributed and performed in two sketches, "On Guard" and "Home!!!" In J. P. McEvoy's sketch "Art for God's Sake," Rube Goldberg and Otto Soglow play their own pictures in an art gallery. There is an Arno picture on the wall as well, but Peter Arno does not seem to have been a participant. His picture is played by Peggy Young and Dow Walling. Arthur William Brown and James Montgomery Flagg also did not play their own pictures, but they were involved with the production. Patti Patterson—perhaps Russell Patterson's wife—played a nude.

Illustrators' Show program, May 13, 1932

Note:  Thanks to Tom Bloom for providing this extraordinary program.

Anyone with photos, sheet music, scripts, programs, or recordings of this show or any contemporary "Illustrators' Show "or "Dutch Treat Show, " your material is needed here on this blog.

Some of these illustrators have already been blogged about here:

Peter Arno

James Montgomery Flagg

Rube Goldberg

Carl Mueller

Lloyd Myers

Tony Sarg

John Sheridan

Otto Soglow

Encore, encore!

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The Dutch Treat Club 1946 Yearbook

Rube Goldberg was a member. So was James Montgomery Flagg. Leading illustrators of the day belonged to the Dutch Treat Club and contributed to its annual yearbook. This was limited to 500 privately-printed copies and featured more than a few risqué drawings and photographs. The postwar theme of the 1946 yearbook was "Reconversion or the Dutch Treat Club Gets Back to Normal," normal being a relative term....

A rather unusual copy of this book was just sold on eBay. The spine is sadly unroofed but it still has the book cover featuring the 1946 design by John E. Sheridan against a historical backdrop of older yearbook covers. A true gentleman always makes certain that a lady gets home safely.

John E. Sheridan, Dutch Treat Yearbook 1946

Our good friend Whitney Darrow illustrates the title page with a bookish nude. We already knew this was the unexpurgated edition, right?

Whitney Darrow, Jr. Bookish nude.
Title page to Reconversion or the Dutch Treat Club Gets Back to Normal
The Forty-First Anniversary of the Dutch Treat Club

Readers of this blog have been asked to ponder a great many perplexing questions, but never one of such grave importance to the dignity and station of the British monarchy as this: Is it possible that Edward, Duke of Windsor, would sign his autograph in a copy of the Dutch Treat Club Yearbook above a cartoon of an enema bag? The eBay seller hedges a bit here, but the Duke very well might do such a thing and almost certainly did. This in turn raises the rather interesting speculation of whether the endpaper sketch opposite by illustrator Carl Mueller is actually the Duke's portrait. The gentleman in the sketch would seem to have a mustache and to be a bit older than the Duke so, alas,  probably not.

Carl Mueller, portrait sketch, left. Signature of Edward, Duke of Windsor above Rube Goldberg, Alpha enema bag cartoon, right.

Edward, Duke of Windsor, 1949

http://www.vogue.it/en/encyclo/people/w/the-duke-of-windsor-

Signature of Edward, Duke of Windsor

Here are the known signatures of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor for comparison:

Signatures of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor

http://www.autographcollection.co.uk/duke--duchess-of-windsor-autograph-signed-display-4658-p.asp 

Boxer Mickey Walker retired in 1935 and later surprised everyone by taking up painting. Ham Fisher's Joe Palooka is pretty quick on the uptake and sees how this might be a good idea for himself. The onlookers's comments seem to be tailored to an audience of illustrators.

Ham Fisher, Joe Palooka takes up painting

James Montgomery Flagg contemplates Surrealism, Life magazine, and Salvador Dali.

James Montgomery Flagg, Art Marches On

Paul Webb is known for his cartoons of hillbillies. Say, is that a see-through dress? Lynn Bogue Hunt (1878-1960) is known for his wildlife illustrations.

Paul Webb," "Welcome home, cousin Tizzie. How long afore you kin reconvert to we-uns?"
Lynn Bogue Hunt, A Few Added Bird Notes

EBay Listing Ended June 9, 2015

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1946-THE-DUTCH-TREAT-CLUB-BK-EDWARD-DUKE-OF-WINDSOR-SIGNED-CARL-MULLER-DRAWING-/400931212148?_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D31478%26meid%3Df45f1abd85434ae8a2af692c26a38bfc%26pid%3D100033%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D4%26sd%3D400931212148&_trksid=p2047675.l2557&nma=true&si=Zv4PhLp6HocGRC23iqci2JeQ2LI%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

EBay Item Description

Any questions? No questions.

Not too long ago a different copy in better condition--but without an original sketch or royal autograph--sold for a bit more.

John E. Sheridan, Dutch Treat Yearbook 1946

Rube Goldberg's cartoon referes to his Reuben Award design.

Rube Goldberg, Pre-War and Post-War Sculpture. James Montgomery Flagg, Art Marches On

"Reconverting the Sports Writers"

EBay Listing Ended June 1, 2015

http://www.ebay.com/itm/DUTCH-TREAT-CLUB-BOOK-1946-Willard-Mullin-Rube-Goldberg-Ernie-Bushmiller-/351409691308?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item51d1a65aac&nma=true&si=Zv4PhLp6HocGRC23iqci2JeQ2LI%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Endpapers

http://drawger.com/show.php?what=shows&show_id=27&image_id=675

Note:  Well, now you know a little bit more than you wanted about the Duke of Windsor's social activities in New York. To learn what other pressing topics are covered on this blog, check out the handy link index. This was first published here in December and has been in a continual state of update. At this point it's almost kind of impressive....

I did not put the acute accent on the word risqué. Google did that all by itself.

The New Yorker covered the Dutch Treat Club annual show back in 1925 and I got around to covering the New Yorker ninety years after the fact. It's here in the archives.

I suppose booksellers will oblige me occasionally by posting highlights from the Dutch Treat Club's annual yearbooks, but readers can help too by sending along the real rarities: those pages from yearbooks past containing original drawings by the members.

Recently, I've been showing a bit of the art of Whitney Darrow, Jr. Clothed or unclothed, it's all good.

You simply can't have this kind of blog without Rube Goldberg. Do you suppose anyone else could have drawn that enema bag?

James Montgomery Flagg ain't too bad either.

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