[crashryan]

I was intrigued by Peter Gillis' statement that two issues of Ajax' Super Cat don't have Super Cat in them. Sure enough, the title character doesn't appear until the third issue! The rest of the books are filled with random stories, some featuring characters (like Tic, Tac, and Toe) who appeared in many A-F titles.

Then Narf pointed out that Spunky Spook doesn't have any spooks. In fact Spunky is a kangaroo, one of those characters that appeared in several A-F funny animal comics. This set me on a quick browse through Ajax-Farrell funny animal titles. Along the way I discovered that Mighty Bear is actually a re-lettered Neddy Bear. No other adjustments, not even an added cape.

Can someone who knows more about Ajax than I do--which means, like, anyone else in our membership--tell me how often the company did this sort of thing? I know some of their [name] Rider comics were retreads. I thought A-F cranked out original low-budget comics. Did they also reprint other publishers' material?

This company definitely rushes to ride trends at the lowest possible cost. It reminds me of Victor Fox.

[narfstar]

Just my opinion, but I think it primarily had to do with using up stock. I assume they had plans that did not come to fruition. They would have paid for stories and covers and were darn sure gonna use them. When the planned titles never appeared they had covers t use so they stuck in stocked stories.

[mopee167]

ROBERT W. FARRELL (1908-1986) was a writer and editor at Fox Publications and (according to Joe Simon) Farrell was Victor Fox's right hand man. Rumor has it Bob Farrell was also an attorney. 

https://www.pulpartists.com/Farrell.html

[Yoc]

He was a lawyer for sure.

-Yoc

[crashryan]

Thanks for that link, mopee. Sounds like Farrell/Katz had quite a career...very Fox-y.

[mopee167]

Several lawyers had a hand in the early comic-book industry.

George T. Delacorte Jr. had a law degree but founded Dell Publishing instead.

William K. Friedman, Nat Rothstein, and George Unger had Youthful/Story/Trojan Comics.

Gerhard Kramer partnered with L.B. Cole on Star Publications, Inc., 1949

[Robb_K]

I was intrigued by Peter Gillis' statement that two issues of Ajax' Super Cat don't have Super Cat in them. Sure enough, the title character doesn't appear until the third issue! The rest of the books are filled with random stories, some featuring characters (like Tic, Tac, and Toe) who appeared in many A-F titles.

Then Narf pointed out that Spunky Spook doesn't have any spooks. In fact Spunky is a kangaroo, one of those characters that appeared in several A-F funny animal comics. This set me on a quick browse through Ajax-Farrell funny animal titles. Along the way I discovered that Mighty Bear is actually a re-lettered Neddy Bear. No other adjustments, not even an added cape.

Can someone who knows more about Ajax than I do--which means, like, anyone else in our membership--tell me how often the company did this sort of thing? I know some of their [name] Rider comics were retreads. I thought A-F cranked out original low-budget comics. Did they also reprint other publishers' material?

This company definitely rushes to ride trends at the lowest possible cost. It reminds me of Victor Fox.

Bob Farrell (Nee Isadore Katz) was, indeed a lawyer, but had decided to get into the publishing business in 1940.  He ran the nuts and bolts work of Victor Fox's comic book section of his multi-product publishing company.  Yes, he wrote stories, edited those of other writers, as their company produced stories for both Fox Features and Star Publications, with whom Farrell also had connections.  And, I believe (but am not positive), that they also produced stories as a subcontractor for Novelty Press' "Frisky Fables" (which later, moved over to Star (partly owned by Farrell)in 1949, where it eventually changed to "Frisky Animals"(end of 1950), which later changed to "Frisky Animals On Parade", as reprints issued by Farrell's Ajax in 1957-58. 

Farrell founded Ajax in 1950, whose Funny Animal titles printed mainly reprints of stories they had produced for Four Star Publications in the early 1940s ("Hi-Ho Comics"), and for Novelty's "Frisky Fables", now reprinted in Ajax's "Frisky Animals On Parade", "Mighty Bear", "Funny Fables", and "Super Cat" the latter made up of a mix of "Cosmo Cat" stories from Fox's catalogue, mixed with stories from "Frisky Fables".  "Holiday Comics"(1949-53), published by Star, reprinted a mix of "Frisky Fables" and Fox funny animal stories.  Ajax later reprinted the Holiday issues.  Star' earlier late 1940s "Mighty Bear" issues also reprinted Frisky Fables stories.  "Kiddie Kapers" and "Daffy Tunes" were mid 1940s one-offs of new material by Four Star and Star.  "Full of Fun" by Ajax subsidiary, "Red Top Comics", printed material in 1957-58 that Farrell may have originally produced for Ace's "Monkeyshines Comics", and St' Johns' "Bingo Comics", or their rights were purchased cheaply by Farrell.  Fun Comics Giants, and Fun Comics 10 cent size were all reprints of "Hi-Ho" and Four Star stories, with some from Fox mixed in.  The Billy Bunny X-Mas annual was all reprints from the 4 "Billy Bunny" issues, which, in-turn, had been mainly reprints of early '40s "Hi-Ho" stories, except for 2 newly-drawn Billy Bunny lead stories, with the other 2 being early '40s Hi-Ho's Daffy Dragon stories with Billy Bunny as a supporting character, with the logo changed to read "Billy Bunny".

Ajax DID produce all new covers (except their "Holiday Comics" reprints), as well as a relative handful of new stories during the mid and late 1950s (mainly a few new Super Cat stories), after reprinting many of Fox's 1940s Cosmo Cat stories; as well as a Casper The Friendly Ghost clone, "Spunky Spook"/"Super Spook"/"Mighty Ghost", all of which had new stories with that character, except for the first issue, which had Spunky The Kangaroo reprinted from "Hi-Ho Comics"; and also in addition to "Full of Fun", Billy Bunny reprinted a couple of stories from outside publishers (among them a Zingo Zebra story from Universal-Phoenix's "Bobby Comics".  But these outside publisher stories look like L.B. Cole's and Holly Chambers' Four Star and Fox-style artwork, so, they might have been produced by Farrell's staff, anyway.

As far as non-funny animal production of Ajax, I know a LOT less, as that is outside my field of interest.  But, I DO know that they DID reprint a fair amount of stories.  And, I suppose they also printed new stories and series, as well.  But, I have no idea what the relative proportions were.  As I delineated above, Ajax's funny animal production was almost completely reprints of Fox, Four Star and Star 1940-1954 production.