Woolfolk Records 1946/11

These William Woolfolk scripts sold to Fawcett and Quality. The Mary Marvel story was cut by a page.

Woolfolk reused the flame planes concept from the Captain Midnight story he wrote in March 1945.

And this is the first month where I could add every single story's publication data to the original notations (boldface shows what wasn't in the records notebook).

November 1946 Comic Book Scripts by William Woolfolk

9 pg	Hopalong Cassidy	phantom stage coach
		"The Phantom Stagecoach" HC 8, June/47
15	Blackhawk	flame planes
		"The Flame Planes" Modern 62, Apr/47
7	Captain Marvel Jr.	man who hated midnight
		"The Man Who Feared Midnight" CMJ 51, July/47
8	Mary Marvel	town couldn't lie
7		"The Town That Couldn't Lie" Marvel Family 13, July/47
7	Captain Marvel Jr.	magic cap
		"The Magic Cap" CMJ 51, July/47
11	Doll Man	20 year old mail
		"The Return of the Undertaker" Feature 111, June/47
11	Blackhawk	Condor Man
		"The Condor Man" BH 16, Autumn/47
11	Doll Man	Mr. Curio & his miniatures
		"Mr. Curio and His Miniatures" Feature 112, July/47
6	Ibis	housing shortage ghosts
		"Ghost of a Chance" Whiz 87, July/47
8	Captain Marvel Jr.	voyage round the Horn
		"Voyage 'Round the Horn" Master 81, July/47

Change the Reprint to Fit

In a Comic Book Legends Revealed post, Brian Cronin quotes Roy Thomas about the time Chip Goodman (son of Marvel publisher Martin Goodman) gave some editorial input: demanding a cover for a Kid Colt reprint issue feature outlaws in animal masks. That meant the reprint story art, which featured nothing of the kind, had to be altered in a couple of panels to match the cover.

Here's another reprint where, as already pointed out in the Grand Comics Database, a story was altered (and again with masks). I submit that it was changed for the same reason as the Kid Colt story: to match the cover. Who knows whose decision it was? Weird Wonder Tales 2 (Feb/74), cover by Gil Kane and Frank Giacoia,  reprints "The Little People" from Marvel Tales 138 (Sept/55). The title is changed to "I Was Kidnapped by a Flying Saucer"—to match the cover. (Possibly the scripter is Joe Gill.)

The hurried redrawing certainly sticks out in the midst of Paul Reinman's earlier art:

From the next page:

The "improvements" don't end with the art. You can't miss where some dialogue has been relettered to fit the new plot point. In panels not shown here, names have been relettered, just as poorly, to those of Marvel Bullpenners: "Mabel" to "Carla," "Colonel Mite and his wife" to "Don the Dwarf and Tiny Tony," and "Cluny the Giant" to "Marvin the Giant"—but not consistently; "Cluny" is left unchanged once.

I can't cite a single instance where altering a story in reprint improved it for this reader. Reprints have been changed for any number of purposes beyond fitting the story to a new cover or a production person's whim. For instance:

cutting the story length
acquiescing to the Comics Code or new publisher policies
updating fashions or culture references
retconning or annotating
replacing a character because the license has expired, or for other reasons
redesigning the page
rewriting the story entirely

Every great once in a while, I suppose, an actual mistake in the original has been fixed.

I think the readers and original creators are respected more just by reprinting the stories unaltered.

Woolfolk Records 1946/10

William Woolfolk's scripts in October went to Quality, Fawcett, and Timely.

Not only does the Blonde Phantom story in issue 13 of her title fit the number of pages given for this month's undescribed script, but it's in Woolfolk's style—the exclamation "Good glory!" (the BP story, top) is one clue to his work, as seen in another tier from the Captain America story (bottom) in Marvel Mystery 83 that Woolfolk submitted in September.

The Hopalong Cassidy story's final disposition is a mystery to me.

October 1946 Comic Book Scripts by William Woolfolk

11 pg	Blackhawk	island in the sky
		"The Island in the Sky" BH 15, Sum/47
9	Hopalong Cassidy	plays a bluff
		HC
9	Blonde Phantom	"Peril from the Past" BP 13, Spr/47
12	Blackhawk	sky matador
		"The Sky Matador" BH 15, Sum/47
13	Doll Man	Fat Catt
		"The Man with Nine Lives" Feature 110, May/47
7	Captain America	gets amnesia
		"24 Hours of Terror" Marvel Mystery 82, May/47
7	Captain America	murder at the Mardi Gras
6		"The Murder at the Mardi Gras" BP 16, Win/47-48
12	Doll Man	Lazarus returns from the dead
		"The Man Who Returned from the Dead" DM 13, Sum/47

Bill Draut's Overwhelming Inks

Here's a story where the inker's style overwhelmed the penciller's. "The Young Man Who Cried...Werewolf...Once Too Often" in DC's Secrets of Sinister House 8 (Dec/72) was published without credits. It's been indexed as drawn by Bill Draut. But just as his pencils were almost buried by Joe Orlando's inks at Warren...

The faces in close-up or medium shots certainly show Draut's clean lines. It's in the long shots that you can see the penciller's angular, somewhat awkward figures. See especially the man with the kerchief in the first panel and the policeman in the center of the second panel. The pencils are by Bernard Baily. He was most famous for the Spectre in the Forties, and continued with various publishers, doing mostly anthology work like this in the Fifties. Before returning for this story, he had worked on Prince Ra-Man in House of Secrets in the mid-Sixties. I believe "...Werewolf..." was his first Seventies comic book work (all of it at DC), and he returned to inking himself after this one story. He replaced Mike Kaluta on the Spawn of Frankenstein series in Phantom Stranger; his last comic book work appeared around 1975.

This panel from another page showcases Draut's inks again, more than Baily's pencils, but I chose it for its clue to the writer. On a number of his other mystery stories in the Seventies he uses the expression "Pshee!" from his signature series, but not on this story. However, the "Ahhhhrrr" leads me to ID this script as by Sugar & Spike's Sheldon Mayer.

Woolfolk Records 1946/09

These scripts noted in William Woolfolk's notebook sold to Timely and Fawcett; and one sold to the Lutheran Church.

The "Death Mask Dance" story not only sat on the shelf for some time, but the editors expanded it by two pages to fit the slot as the Timely superheroes' first run drew to a close in 1949.

September 1946 Comic Book Scripts by William Woolfolk

12 pg	Captain America	house that moves
		[unpublished]
8	Lutheran Church	[giveaway]
7	Captain Marvel Jr.	Jumbo the whale
		"Jumbo the Whale" CMJ 48, Apr/47
7	Captain America	masks of murder
9		"Death Mask Dance" Marvel Mystery 90, Feb/49
7	Captain Marvel Jr.	bluecoat's honor
		"A Bluecoat's Honor" CMJ 49, May/47
7	Captain America	house of cards
		"The Devil to Pay" Mar Mys 83, June/47

Bill Finger on Captain America Again

"Beware the Medicine Man" in Captain America 57 (July/46) is another Timely script by Bill Finger that I just found.

Something he uses here that so far I've seen from no other writer is "Arumph" for "Harrumph."

Other stylistic indicators in this Cap story that Finger has used elsewhere are:

"Atchoo"
"____, but fast!"
colorful figure
lash out
Later...in ____...
Meantime, in ____...
Nightfall...____...
"Ooh"
sturdy figure

And captions beginning with gerunds: Scanning the paper, ____...

The Cap artist here is Maurice del Bourgo, who did Green Arrow and Mike Gibbs: Guerrilla at DC; at Timely he also drew Mr. Wu in All Select 11 and Blonde Phantom 12.(The Batman art on "The Case of the Honest Crook" in Batman 5, Spr/41, is by Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson.)

Woolfolk Records 1946/08

This month Woolfolk sold stories to Fawcett, Parents, and Timely; and there are two more meant for OW but published by EC.

I couldn't find the issue number of the Dig Bailey story.

August 1946 Comic Book Scripts by William Woolfolk

9 pg	Lance O'Casey	leopard men of atoll
		"The Leopard Men of Bonge Atoll" LO'C 4, Sum/47
5	Hector the Inspector	[untitled] Animal Fables 5, Aug/47
11	Lance O'Casey	curse of age
		"The Curse of Age" LO'C 4, Sum/47
8	Danny Demon	[untitled] AF 6, Sep-Oct/47
6	Dig Bailey	Tugboat Susie
		Calling All Boys
8	Blonde Phantom	dust of doom
		[unpublished]
10	Captain America	Laughing Boy
		"Death Enters—Laughing" CA 61, Mar/47
7	Captain America	crime from prison
		"Prison Plunder" Marvel Mystery 81, Mar/47