Penny Turner, (the best person to have with you on a pub quiz team), reading the website mentioned 'had I read "Pawley's Peepholes"?' I hadn't....she had a copy which I borrowed and shortly after, I encountered Wyndham's clever take on time travel.
The story tells of ghostly appearances in a small town which turn out to be time tourists! The townsfolk get tired of the intrusions on their private lives .....and fight back. I won't spoil the ending!
What's this got to do with Bellamy? In November 1969 Bellamy was asked by BBC Educational Publications to produce 9 drawings in black and white for "Music Session One "Pawley's Peepholes Pupil's Pamphlets for the Summer of 1970.
To date, we have not seen a pamphlet. Can you help? Email us at the usual address See here for this
An aside taken from "Time Travel" - PBS Airdate: October 12, 1999: STEPHEN HAWKING: Time travel might be possible, but if that is the case why haven't we been overrun by tourists from the future? CARL SAGAN: This argument I find very dubious.
Shaqui has done it again. He's sent me a scan of the Daily Mirror for the 1st Mar 1978 and as he says, "it's a bit of a non-starter but, hey, you're the completist!"
But Shaqui has sent me other stuff which I have never seen! More to follow shortly
I tripped over some new information about "Suzy and the Red Stripes" and thought I'd look again at this article to improve it somewhat as I started it in 2007 (updated 10 years later)!
Bill Storie writes: "I was told by Terry Jones (when I was researching Bert Fegg's book) that he himself had been told the "Wings" illustration [as I've labelled it] for Paul McCartney was originally commissioned for the cover of a solo album by Paul's wife Linda under the project title of "Linda and the Red Stripes". Terry himself didn't know if that was 100% true though and MPL publishing never replied to me on the subject but maybe someone else out there on the net might know?" Below are the comments on this story Bill wrote back in 1992 for his fan publication dedicated to Frank: Gopherville Argus
Bill Storie and Terry Doyle produced Gopherville Argus in 1992 (Taken from Issue 1)
Paul McCartney takes two years to pluck up the courage to commission Frank Bellamy
It's for a record sleeve
Frank drew the rough
Meeting arranged in London
Frank died in July 1976
Gopherville Argus 1992 (Taken from Issue 2)
A bit more certainty it was for Linda's solo persona "Suzy and the Red Stripes"
This interesting article Seaside Woman by Suzy and the Red Stripes explains: "Paul called the group Suzy (Linda) and the Red Stripes (Wings) and they signed with Epic under that name. The name Red Stripes is from one of Paul and Linda's favorite drinks."
Linda's Pictures 1976
I put out another call to the Internet via Facebook and received this from Tony Smith, the reporter who most wrote about Frank during his lifetime:
I
also wrote to Paul [McCartney] not long after Frank's death, but received no reply.
When I interviewed Frank early in 1976, he told me Macca and Linda
called at his home entirely unannounced a few weeks earlier. He showed
me a photographic book written by Linda and signed by them both, which
they gave him, and I understand they wanted him to do the artwork for a
forthcoming Wings album.
I'm guessing the present was Linda's pictures: a collection of photographs / photographs and words by Linda McCartney London: Cape, 1976.
So now we also know this encounter was likely to be the beginning of 1976
Which set me looking for any other information and I remembered this interview with Nancy Bellamy. On 9 July 1992 Nancy and Howard Corn (who was the Editor of the Eagle Times and lifelong champion of Eagle, who passed away in 2016) were interviewed on the radio programme Turning Back the Years with Arnold Peters
AP: And of course through Frank’s work and his… for so many different people… it was largely the Eagle but also lots of other people you had strange phone calls some times, didn’t you?
NB: Well..
AP: The phone rang and you answered… go on, tell us.
NB: Yes, well one, I think it was a Saturday morning, the phone.. I used to answer the phone for Frank because it sort of helped him, it didn’t disturb him drawing, and this voice said ‘Can I speak to Frank Bellamy?’ and I said ‘Yes, who’s calling?’ and the voice on the other end said ‘Paul McCartney’ and I think my eyes must have widened very much but anyway I went to get Frank and sort of whispered to him ‘Paul McCartney’s on the phone for you’. So anyway the outcome of that was he went up to London to meet Paul and Linda McCartney and he said they were very very nice people and they wanted him to do a rough for a design for a sleeve for a record that they were producing.
AP: Just like that?
NB: Yes, just like that.
So here we learn
Phone call initiated process
Saturday morning?
London meeting happened
Rough required for record sleeve
Lastly Russell Jenkins - Frank's nephew - mentioned:
I seem to remember Franks’ meeting Paul and Linda being several years before Frank died [1976] and before the move to Geddington [1975] . I asked him what he had drawn for them and he said it was a woman coming out of the sea. So, “Seaside Woman” makes sense. Maybe the artwork was never used because of Franks’ death?
The artwork was of a woman coming out of the sea
Wikipedia tells us that:
In 1977 the reggae-inspired single "Seaside Woman" was released by an obscure band called Suzy and the Red Stripes on Epic Records in the United States. Suzy and the Red Stripes were Wings, with Linda (who wrote the song) on lead vocals.The song, recorded by Wings in 1972, was written in response to allegations from Paul's publisher that Linda's co-writing credits were inauthentic and that she was not a real songwriter.
"Seaside Woman" was first recorded 27 November 1972 at Air studios, London. later in 1973 further work was carried out at E.M.I.'s Boulogne-Billancourt Studios near Paris, and on 26 November at the Pathe-Marconi studios, Paris. An album was planned but never appeared at the time, however the single "Seaside Woman" (A-side) and the wittily titled B side "B-Side to Seaside" was released eventually in America on 31 May 1977 and reached number 59 in the Billboard charts.
Oscar Grillo created an animated short for the song in 1980, a year after it's first official release, and it went on to win the Cannes Film Festival’s "Short Film Palme d’Or.”
There's more information on The Paul McCartney Project website on "Seaside Woman" and Linda's explanation for the name "Suzy and the Red Stripes" appears in "Band on the Run" by Barry McGee, (NY: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2003) where she says:
"When we were in Jamaica, there had been a fantastic version of "Susie Q", so they used to call me Suzy. And the beer in Jamaica is called Red Stripe, so that makes it Suzy and the Red Stripes" (p.225)
I've checked through all those items of artwork I have access to and still not found one of a anything that's likely to be this, so I would love to see the draft artwork. If anyone wants to suggest how Paul might communicate with me, or me with him - after a few attempts already - I'd be so grateful
~Norman Boyd
=============
(Thanks to Bill Storie and Terry Doyle for dating the interview in Goperville Argus #2 Aug 1992, p.2) and Tony Smith for a better date, and for the wonderful websites such as The Paul McCartney Project,
Thanks to Richard Sheaf for help in updating the Eagle Times material on the page Articles about Bellamy. Where the part numbers are deduced (through continuous publications) the numbers are given in square brackets. Where they appear in the title they are included in the title itself.
But, can any Eagle Times readers tell me why there was a sporadic publication cycle in the following list? Eagle Times Vol 8:3 Autumn 1995 (Part 10) Eagle Times Vol 9:2 Summer 1996 (Part 11) Eagle Times Vol 10:3 Autumn 1997 (Part 12)
Today I was contacted by Richard Sheaf who is passing on data about the series the Eagle Times ran on Bellamy. That was a long series because it covered a lot of ground with many authors. The Eagle Times is published 4 times a year and covers all thing Eagle (that is, the original run from the 50s and 60s)
And Alan Davis, yes fanboy, THE Alan Davis, wrote "Congratulations on getting the site up and running. I haven't given it a thorough reading yet but it looks very informative." Thanks Alan. I'd still love to see you and Don McGregor on Killraven together. Alan has a nice section on his website showing his inspirations and one happens to be Bellamy. Alan shows some unpublished materials one of which we have yet to identify. For more details look on our Unpublished Bellamy page
This online community is not a new thing to me. However, I've realised what a responsibility it is as the 'moderator' / creator!
Can you tell people that the wonderfully knowledgable Steve Holland - no slouch at writing about Bellamy - has sent compliments? His Blog is a wonder of research. Should you mention friends by name? And so on.
One email has offered some materials that will help in our research.
One comment came from India....now how did they find out so fast!!
The very kind Alberto sent me a copy of a checklist of the Portuguese appearances of Bellamy's work. I shall be correcting my spelling mistakes, and adding some new entries to the Non-English list of Bellamy's work reprinted 'abroad' within the next few days.
Thanks to Alberto who also allowed me to show you scans of his unpublished Bellamy strip 'Wes Slade' - see below
Wes Slade #1
Wes Slade #2
The strip 'Wes Slade' was drawn by George Stokes for the Sunday Express. According to Steve Holland:
Jim Edgar spent 22 years as the author of 'Matt Marriott' for the London Evening News (1955-77), drawn by the incomparable Tony Weare. He also wrote other Westerns including 'Wes Slade' for the Sunday Express
drawn by George Stokes. Apparently Stokes wrote the early episodes of
'Wes Slade' himself before handing over to Edgar - who was credited from
1979 - and the strip was taken over by Harry Bishop in 1980-81. Harry
Bishop was also the writer and artist of 'Gun Law' which ran in the Daily Express from 1960. Presumably Jim Edgar took over the writing at some point... but I've no idea when. (Steve Holland, (16th September 2006) Jim Edgar, Accessed 20th May 2007)
It appears reasonable to assume this comes from the early 1970s before Bellamy took over the daily strip 'Garth' in the Daily Mirror
Spent a long weekend finishing the website and tripped at a technical hurdle. Can anyone tell me how to allow comments on this blog? I have saved and re-saved Settings on Comments, but with no option appearing for you to 'Post a comment' I see from blog news that there was a glitch, but this should be sorted
First reactions are very good and I see from statistics that mainly UK visitors are looking at the site, but God Bless Alberto in Portugal who has proved the statistics can see visitors outside the UK
What connects TV's "The Avengers", Dan Dare, Neil Armstrong, Winston Churchill and the Daily Mirror?
Frank Bellamy, graphic artist and illustrator, was born on this day 90 years ago. This blog is here to allow discussion about the published checklist which has been produced to celebrate his life and work.
The website will make a valuable reference tool for researchers and fans alike.
The checklist contains brief biographical details and anecdotes about the artists
