[housebreath]

Hello, I was reading through a comic about a year ago, and I had a lot of tabs open, and I misplaced which comic it was.  It has a story in which an organ grinder and his monkey are outside of a building, the monkey climbs the side of a near building, peeks into a window where the protagonist is sitting at his desk, and then the monkey sprays the protagonist with a knockout gas, stealing something from him after.  Does any know which comic this is?

Thanks!

House Breath

[Captain Audio]

This sounds very familiar. There's an episode of the old Superman TV series that has a similar scene.

[Robb_K]

Hello, I was reading through a comic about a year ago, and I had a lot of tabs open, and I misplaced which comic it was.  It has a story in which an organ grinder and his monkey are outside of a building, the monkey climbs the side of a near building, peeks into a window where the protagonist is sitting at his desk, and then the monkey sprays the protagonist with a knockout gas, stealing something from him after.  Does any know which comic this is?

Thanks!

House Breath

That sounds a little like a 1943 mid WWII Donald Duck story, in which Donald's Nephews agree to keep the local, South Duckburg Italian organ grinder's monkey for the duration of his military service, for him, as he has just been drafted into The US Army.  The Nephews take the monkey home.  But, he plays rough, and trashes the house.  So, Uncle Donald tell his nephews they won't be allowed in the house until after they get rid of him.  Not wanting to give up their new pet, they decide to hold out till Donald goes to sleep, late that night, and then sneak into the house with the monkey.  As it will be cold in the evening, they'd need their coats.

By coincidence, a saboteur, trying to sell and deliver valuable weapons plans from a munitions plant in Duckburg, to a foreign enemy agent, is walking by.  He sees the boys sending the monkey to the open window of their bedroom on the top floor of the house to get their coats.  He watches the monkey climbing up the wall, jumping through the window, and returning, bring the coats to the boys.  He realises he could use such a trained monkey to climb up to a room on the top floor of the munitions factory, where his contact inside the plant will leave it for him, so neither of these US citizens can be in danger of being seen handling the plans.  He offers to buy the monkey.  The boys hesitate, but Donald, watching them from his kitchen window completes the sale.

The crook brings the monkey to the munitions plant office building.  He points to the open window, telling the monkey to pick the rolled-up papers off the table, and bring them to him.  The monkey climbs up the walls of the 4-story building, and jumps inside.  However, there is no man in the room to spray, -and he just takes the papers.  So, I know this is not your story.  But it is interesting that during The War, there were many stories from different comic book publishers that had similar themes (and sometimes had exact same scenes) (even in different genres - i.e. superhero. realistic action/combat, and even funny animal). 

I'll be curious to find out if someone identifies the comic book issue of the story you seek, to find out if it was issued BEFORE or AFTER the Carl Barks story I described above (which was released in spring 1943), to see who borrowed the basic premise (or, at least, the idea for that one sequence) from whom.

[Robb_K]

There is at least one other Golden Age non-canditate with a similar plot for your desired story, from 1941, in "Big Shot Comics" issue No. 19 (November Issue - usually on the newsstands one month BEFORE The printed date).  The Marvelo (The Magician) story, has a villain who uses a trained ape (chimpanzee) who apparently stole top secret US military papers (future battle plans and strategies for The Pacific Fleet operations).  We see the ape throwing a dagger from the top of a nearby building, down at the street below, aimed at Marvelo.  And we are told that it was the same dagger that murdered the man whose body Marvelo was inspecting.  The villain in this story (an evil magician named Ramun) planned to sell the plans to a Japanese agent, who will deliver them to a Japanese military representative.

Unfortunately, we know that this is NOT the story for which House Breath is looking, as it is a trained ape, not monkey, and there is no organ grinder in the story.  In addition, we don't see a monkey climb up the tall building, look through the window and spray the protagonist (hero?) with a knockout gas. 

Yet, I suspect that the story he seeks has a very similar plot to both this story and the 1943 Donald Duck story, and like the latter, was also printed during WWII.  I find it interesting that the Big Shot Comics story was printed a few months BEFORE The Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, and The US entry into The War.  it was President Franklin Roosevelt's policy at that time to appear neutral, despite sending much aid to Britain starting in early 1940.  But, apparently, The US public was aware they would be at war in The Pacific within a year, as demonstrated by this story.  Of course it was obvious, based on The US embargo of oil from going to Japan, and its building up of its armed forces starting in early 1940. 

I, myself, was born 2 months after the end of The War, and my father served in The Canadian Army from 1942-44, and participated in The D-Day landings in Normandy.

I hope someone on this forum can find the story House Breath seeks, as it will be interesting to see IF it has a very similar plot to the other two I've brought up, and if it was the first of the three to be printed.

For any members who are very familiar with The Marvelo character - I am curious as to whether or not this story was condensed down from several daily or Sunday episodes from a newspaper strip, to be made into this, short stand-alone "story", because a lot of the interesting action, such as the ape's stealing the papers, or helping Ramun obtain them was not shown in the panels.  Clearly, the stabbed US  Naval Intelligence agent had to hand them to Ramun.  I can't help but think that there were many panels cut out of the newspaper version to form this condensed story.  Otherwise, in my opinion, the scope of this story is too broad to fit decently into the mere 6 pages in this comic book, and too much of the interesting action is only described in dialogue, when it should be shown in artwork.

[Andrew999]

Firstly, Robb,  can I say how much I enjoy your posts on the Forum - always
> something new and interesting.
>
> I have been following the thread you mention. I'm not really any kind of
> expert but the story is frustratingly familiar - I'm sure I have read a
> story just like that at some point, quite recently too - perhaps it's
> because the idea of an organ grinder training his monkey to pickpocket is
>  an urban folk tale - and stealing plans is an extension of that?
>
> I'm not going to be much help here but I can mention:
>
>
> Captain Freedom had an organ grinder enemy called Blitzer, whose monkey
> used a drugged dagger (Harvey comics) Misty 85 has an absolutely terrific
> and unique organ grinder story that can be viewed through Google - though
> this would be a breach of copyright:

[paw broon]

Took me a while to get round to this - health problems in the family - but right away I was sure I had the answer, but when I checked I was way wrong.  I thought this was where the story came from:-
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=36905

[crashryan]

I thought about that very same story. Great minds think alike.

[narfstar]

Sorry I do not come here much since become EIC of InDELLible Comics. The only thing I could think of was the BOJO and Tony series that ran in Charlton's Zoo Funnies