Frank Bellamy and Red Devil Dean

Red Devil Dean (cropped image)

***STOP PRESS*** See the blog article expanding this one

The Unseen Frank Bellamy Exhibition has been mentioned on the blog a few times before and today we can close another mystery.

Chris Harris got in contact with me and innocently said:

I helped curate an exhibition called the Unseen Frank Bellamy, at a small gallery in Brixton in the late 80s/early 90s . We got artwork from his wife Nancy and presented it in our basement space. I still have a copy of the Escape magazine we put out at ACME comics with a brochure inside and some original artwork. The most significant is an exquisite watercolour treatment for a character called Red Devil Dean - never taken up I think. It still has his hand designed dust sheet, tracing paper insert and the treatment. Would you like me to send you a photo?

What would you say? OF COURSE, YES PLEASE etc etc. Fortunately I didn't scare him off and he was good to his word!

The next email came with attachments and I was bowled over by them. Remember the catalogue for the exhibition called this "Red Devil Dean Suggestions" - well it's obvious from the piece that Bellamy was trying out for something. The title on the artwork is "Suggestions for Red Devil Dean and Tug Wilson" and as Chris states he bought the artwork itself, plus an 'insert' which shows an amended Tug Wilson portrait plus a cover sheet to protect the artwork with the title on it. All the artwork can be seen on my website by following the 'More...' link on the Unseen Bellamy page

The artwork for Red Devil Dean

Bellamy often drew these overviews of characters before starting the assignment, such as the Garth one and others such as the Thunderbirds characters, Heros the Spartan, David the Shepherd King and Fraser of Africa. However, he swore to never having used 'white-out' or Tippex, to correct art (but that didn't mean someone else used it on his artwork!) But this is the first time I've seen an overlay like this which shows an alternative piece of artwork.

Express Weekly 3 March 1956, No76
Drawn by Ruggero Giovannini

So what about the title? Is the character a real person? Unlikely. The only references I've found to Red Devil Dean is when a person is called Dean and they gain this nickname. And the comic strip in the Express Weekly of the eponymous title illustrated above. I asked Steve Holland about this and he replied:

As far as I know there were just three artists on this strip -- but I've not seen all the episodes (nor, I should add, do I know anyone who has all the issues). Desmond Walduck was the original artist when the strip started in issue 41 of Junior Express Weekly (2 July 1955); Ruggero Giovannini took over with issue 59 and was the artist when it became Express Weekly (issue 74); and Bosch Penalva took over in issue 103 (8 September 1956). I don't know when the strip ended. Probably not long after in 1956 or maybe 1957. [Norman: I've seen Express Weekly #84 (28 April 1956) and it does appear there but not in #156 (14 September 1957)] The only episodes I have are in the issue 109-120 region in which Red is some kind of adventurer; in this story he's tracking down some crooks trying to rig the football pools and the crooks frame him for an attempt to blow up Parliament. Doesn't sound like the sort of thing that would involve a couple of British soldiers.

**ADDITION*** (Aug 2013) David Slinn states: "I can add to the information Steve Holland provided, in that the series was dropped from Express Weekly at the end of December 1956, coinciding with ‘Wulf the Briton’ being moved onto the cover and a number of new strips and features being lined up for the New Year."

So we still don't know and it seems unlikely Bellamy was commissioned to draw this strip as the dates are wrong. At the time of the strip beginning he was working on winding down Swiss Family Robinson, drawing Paul English and starting King Arthur as well as doing illustrations for Boy's Own Paper and Lilliput!

I wondered about the insignia on the art and  a kind 'Internetter' pointed me to the Wikipedia article on Combined Operations Headquarters As all three services were involved the only clue I gained was that landing craft and commandos are relevant but more of that later.

The Bellamy illustration above shows a redhead who is called Ted Dean. Could this be the origin of the name - redheads getting called "Red Devil"? No idea. Also I wondered if there was a player for Manchester United who was called Dean (as they are known by the nickname the Red Devils) but I can only find one name and he hardly played at all!  Any guesses gratefully received!

Lastly to add a little something else to the mystery, our generous friend Jeff Haythorpe sent me a picture that he always wondered whether it was Red Devil Dean

A boat (landing craft?) afloat with four soldiers, one of whom is redheaded!

He has promised a better scan so when that arrives I'll replace this one. But again it may be part of the above story. The signature is of the same pre-1950 period from what I can see.

So there you go a mystery solved (we now know what the Unseen Bellamy Exhibition refers to, but have a greater mystery as, like Anthony Falloway, we don't know if and where and when this was published!. If you have any ideas about the name's origins it would be interesting to hear from you.
My email is

Frank Bellamy and an unknown romance illustration - original art

Romance illustration by Frank Bellamy

UPDATE: Winning bid with 2 bids: £200 (April 2012) 

 
Thanks to Richard Farrell for pointing out the latest sale on eBay of a Frank Bellamy I've never met before. The seller (susita66) has listed it at the starting price of £200 and the auction ends on 25 April 2013. The piece measures 11.5" x 9" (approximately 27.94cm X 22.86cm) and is in colour. The medium used is unclear but decide for yourself. I've copied all the pictures provided on ebay and hope that the buyer will share a better scan of the piece.

The seller's description: 

"Graphics are of a dark haired man and blonde woman, with a circular feature of a house and trees in the background. The background is painted a luscious deep burgundy. Also has another small circle to the left of the picture of the same house. Board cuts are visible. Actual Artwork is on heavy paper."

Detail of a house with a light on

Bellamy's signature from pre-1950

Lines suggesting where cropping could be done

Now where did it come from? If I hear back I'll let you know what the seller says. I've checked the listing for the exhibition "Unseen Bellamy" but the size doesn't match anything there nor the descriptions. It looks to match another piece (provided by Tim Barnes - see below)  which I have yet to track down in any publication. The style matches his Home Notes work and the romance books "Dark Inheritance" and My True Love" 

To see a larger version visit website

NEW GARTH STORY - The Beast of Ultor AND A MYSTERY

NEW GARTH STORY - The Beast of Ultor...and a mystery!

Thursday 11 April 2013 © Daily Mirror

"Garth is exploring a deep pothole in Derbyshire with a girl friend four hundred feet below ground. 'Garth the water's rising!' 'Must be a heavy rainstorm above ground Liz! Let's get out of here before we're trapped!'"

Jim Edgar knew how to start a story with tension, and Frank Bellamy certainly knew how to attract the male readership straight away! They discover a colony of strange eggs and that thrusts Garth into another exciting adventure!

The original story ran in the Daily Mirror from 19 February 1974 - 5 June 1974 (H42-H131), 90 episodes.The story was reprinted in The Daily Mirror Book of Garth London: IPC Limited, 1976 and also Menomonee Falls Gazette #202 (27 October 1975) - #218 (16 February 1976)- but that's not quite true....

Can you see what's missing from the page illustrated below from the 1976 reprint book?

Interestingly Martin spotted it and told me. The reprint book from 1976 does not contain all the story. And by my calculations, the Menomonee Falls Gazette will have contained all of them, so that means the story has never been reprinted in full...in the UK! 

Using the page numbers from the 1976 reprint, the missing episodes are H61, H62 (page 53), H65 (page 54), H77, H78, H79 (page70), H116 (page 77/78). Unfortunately I don't have access to the MFG volumes in question to see what I missed. But I do have a couple of these in the ones I cut out crudely in 1974!

Missing strips H78-H79

And Paul Holder has come to my rescue with the others which I present in no particular order. And yes, the ladies are comfortable in their skins, so to speak (and avoid web-blockers!). I'd love to hear explanations as to why you think these strips were left out - beyond the fact this would have added 8 pages to the book's length!

UPDATE (20/04/2013)

I have gone through the whole book now and found the answer is indeed in multiples of four! The following are 

Mask of Atacama has the following missing:
G170, G173, G230, G231, G237, G246

and

People of the abyss:
F243, F259, F264, F272, F273, F299

H77-79

H115-116

H65

H61-62

Now children, you can print out this page and insert them in your copy of the 1976 reprint! But get an adult to supervise the cutting out and remember Bill Gates' tip in Microsoft Word from many years ago...DON'T run with scissors!

Thanks go again to Martin for sending me this first episode and also unearthing a bit of Bellamy background we hadn't found before! And to Paul for his kindness. I love the Internet for building community!

Frank Bellamy - various bits and pieces again

I get quite a few emails regarding Bellamy's work and there are a few enthusiasts who know that no detail is too small, and Bill Storie gave me several things to do this week when I was wondering what to share with you!

Firstly he alerted me to this sale on eBay of a single that has some familiar artwork on it!

Frank Bellamy's artwork

The artwork is taken from TV21 Thunderbirds story "The Bereznik Zoo Rescue" from TV21 issue 110. I've asked the seller for more information and will update this on receipt

TV21 110

Bill made me realise that as a "Southerner" I hadn't realised that the Daily Record was the Daily Mirror's name in Scotland when Bellamy was around. Why did he mention this?

I have noted one of the times Bellamy was interviewed on TV. I have a transcript and recording and to be honest it's not much use as an interview. In my view Barry Askew held the opinion that comics were ephemeral and hardly worth mentioning and the usual BAM, POW, CRASH were mentioned - a good indicator that someone's view of comics is stuck in the 60s Batman show. The programme, Edition, went out as the last programme of the evening (yes, TV used to be less than 24 hours a day!) and states "Frank Bellamy, the artist who draws 'Garth' in the Daily Mirror and the Daily Record [...]"

Radio Times (24/11/1973 - 30/11/1973) Page 51

As Bill says:

The Radio Times "Modest Strip Artist" reference mentions that (erroneously) FB drew for the Daily Record - this is technically accurate inasmuch as he was never (as far as I know) commissioned to do art for that paper but his work did appear there quite often in the form of Garth and various other spot illustrations such as the moon landing piece. Back in those days the Daily Record was basically the Scottish version of the Daily Mirror (the Mirror did not have a large Scottish readership and much of the Mirror's daily output was simply re-jigged into the Daily Record).

It's amazing to me how I can seen this piece for 40 years and not have noticed the Daily Record reference. I've added the version from the copy of the Radio Times that I cut out and stuck in a lined notebook all those years ago. Needless to say I didn't stay up that late to watch it as I didn't even notice it was on till too late - and videos were as likely to be in my possession as a full size replica of Thunderbird 1!

Radio Times (24/11/1973 - 30/11/1973) Page 4 as it appeared

Lastly Bill also pointed out to me a piece that I knew about was glad to be reminded so I could show it to you. I've placed it under the Unpublished section of Bellamy's work.

Lion and lioness in profile with dead zebra

And for good measure here we see Bellamy's rather abstract image of a Lion and zebra

Lioness and zebra - abstract

Two lions and a zebra

 Many thanks to Bill, a fellow Mike Noble fan, for his prompting me to look at these points.

Heros the Spartan edges ever closer!

Heros the Spartan is nearing completion. This book not only has an introduction by yours truly, but also by John Byrne, a long-time fan of Bellamy, and a reprint of the most famous Bellamy interview by Dez Skinn and Dave Gibbons - lucky fellows met Frank! You'll notice that many pictures accompany the interview, several of which you don't often see. For a look at low-res scans of some example pages, follow this path

£95 / $142.50 / €109,25 HARDBACK

The hardback will be 272 full colour top quality pages and has a limited print run of 600 copies  The size is 11" x 14" (that's 270mm x 360mm for non-imperialists!)
ISBN: 9781907081194

Geoff West and colleagues have also decided to produce a leather embossed slipcase edition too. If it's anything like the previous "Complete Swift Stories", which is still available. These scans don't so the book justice - trust me, it'll be great.

£265.00 / $397.50 / €304,75 LEATHER

 This will have an additional 24 pages of original art and this edition is limited to 120 copies

Unexciting but necessary

This post is my way of catching up with myself and letting you know what I've been up to.

1. Steve Rubin let me know  a while ago about two gaps in my information regarding Garth reprints in Menomonee Falls Gazette - "MFG reprinted H132-H225, which was the final issue. Unfortunately, in addition to not printing the last two strips in the story, they inexplicably skipped H160-H165" He also mentioned "On the same subject, Sundance started in MFG 38, not 40". Checking my archive I see that the Garth story Sundance, the first in MFG, actually started as a story in #38 - see cover below - but Bellamy's strips started in #40 with a Bellamy panel on issue #38!

The first appearance of Bellamy's Garth in MFG

MFG #40 the first Bellamy Garth strip appearance in the USA

 2. I've realised that in keeping this complex machine going I had not updated Steve Holland's comments on the controversial Amundsen Swift cover. Follow this link to read all about it!

3. My old friend David Jackson mentioned that this reminded him of a Bellamy character...Fraser of Africa. The film is Never So Few and starred Frank Sinatra, Gina Lollobrigida, Steve McQueen amongst many others and was released in 1959. I've read the plot summary and still don't think I've ever seen it. It's actually set in Burma in WWII but knowing Frank & Nancy Bellamy's film-going habit they are likely to have seen it - especially as it featured these three popular actors.

EAGLE 1960 Dec 10 p6

That's all for this time, but I have other 'little bits' to add soon...

Frank Bellamy tribute art in comics

Not wishing to turn this blog into an advert for Richard Farrell (who does Andersonic) but he inspired me to dig out some pictures from my collection to see what his article on Bellamy was about. I warned you all to buy it when his new fanzine came out, but it's obviously a collector's item due to #1 and #2 being sold out already!. It's called  Plaything of Sutekh and had an article called "Frank's Who: Bellamy's influence on the art of the Doctor" by Richard Farrell (Issue #1 April 2012, pp 24-27)

Issue 1 Art by Richard Farrell

Richard's idea is that he has seen Bellamy's influence in several places and being the detective I am, (well, librarian actually!) I decided to hunt them down- quite easy when Richard gives the references!

"If you're a real geek you'll notice that [Bellamy's] drawing of Pletrac for 'Carnival of Monsters' is based on a rehearsal shot of Peter Halliday in his braces"

Radio Times 3 Feb1973 - 9 Feb1973, p.13

I'm not enough of a geek/detective to ask how he knows that! His references to Gerry Haylock are interesting and I can access the art so here you go...

Countdown #5

Farrell sees Bellamy's art from his Sunday Times piece "Last great invention" (see my blog entry on this) particularly the last panel second from the bottom row

Here's the Bellamy to compare:

Yes, I agree, with the orange colour it's obviously a 'tribute'. Richard also mentions the launching of the Polaris missiles in Countdown issue# 52

Countdown #51

and again the Bellamy:

I can see the inspiration too. It's a shame Gerry's artwork hasn't been collected or at least a website created dedicated to his work. Anyone up for the challenge? His work appears in Hulton Press' Eagle, Girl, Look and Learn, World of Wonder and Schoolgirls Picture Library amongst many others.

Richard then goes on to mention Brian Lewis and his Thunderbird strip in TV Century 21 Thunderbirds Extra (1966).

TV21 #52

TV21 #55

TV21 #53

TV Century 21 Thunderbirds Extra (1966) Page 6

TV Century 21 Thunderbirds Extra (1966) Page7

I had never noticed this before and as Steve Holland recently said to me regarding this 're-use' or tribute to another's artwork, if you're asked for an item, you'd immediately look at what had been done and use that. In this case I think Lewis would have easy access to Bellamy's accurate drawings and use them instead of photos or models etc.

I have posted a few similar comparisons on my Frank Bellamy FaceBook page. I use this infrequently to put smaller stories, thoughts, links, but many thanks to Richard for writing an article that inspired me to do a longer piece - oh! and he mentions several other inspired artists such as Chris Achilleos. Hope you enjoy the art of these brilliant UK artists! Any other examples gratefully received. Email me: