The Toon Treasury Of Classic Children's Comics!

While The Toon Treasury of Classic Children's Comics is divided into five categories ranging from "Funny Animals" to "Fantasyland", the real categories in this book according to editors Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly really fall between four artists -- Sheldon Mayer, Walt Kelly, John Stanley and Carl Barks. The editors admit as much and work from these giants of comic art dominate this collection regardless of the category a story might fall into. 

Chapter One is titled "Hey, Kids!" and celebrates such titles as Sheldon Mayer's Sugar and Spike (three stories) and Scribbly (one lengthy sequence of one-pagers), as well as two stories featuring Little Lulu by John Stanley. Dennis the Menace makes two appearances in this section and talents such as Jules Feiffer and Harvey Kurtzman are represented by Clifford and Egghead Doodle respectively. We are also treated to a story of Intellectual Amos by Andre LeBlanc from the pages of The Spirit sections. 

Chapter Two is dubbed "Funny Animals" and leading the way is Walt Kelly with a few "Uncle Wiggly" pages, a skewed fairy tale titled "Hickory and Dickory  Help the Easter Bunny", as well as an early Pogo story from Animal Comics. Mayer returns with a funny Three Mousketeers story and we get three Fox and Crow stories by Jim Davis. Donald Duck by Carl Barks is on hand alongside John Stanley's "Jigger". Throw in a Nutsy Squirrel and you have quite a bevy of beasts. 

Chapter Three titled "Fantasyland" delivers the goods as might be suspected. Lots more Walt Kelly with stories (four to be exact) from Fairy Tale Parade and a new name George Carlson shows up with some offbeat fairytale variations. John Stanley returns as does Little Lulu with two offerings. We get a story by Popeye animator Dan Gordon featuring a prototype of Droopy and MAD man Dave Berg is represented with two stories adapted out of Alice in Wonderland. Add in a little Supermouse by Milt Stein and it's a festive section indeed. 

Chapter Four is called "Storytime" and seems to be a section in which some oddball stuff finds inclusion such as more Pogo, more Intellectual Amos, and even a C.C. Beck story starring "The Big Red Cheese" himself  titled "In the Land of Surrealism". The latter is a delight. But the highlights of this section are by Carl Barks who has two Duck stories, one featuring Donald battling bees and the other with Uncle Scrooge and the boys venturing to the distant paradise of Tralla La -- one of comic's great classics tales. 

Chapter Five wraps it all up with under the heading "Weird and Wacky" giving the editors free reign. Such things as three Burp the Twerp one-pagers by Jack Cole, four Hey Look! one-pagers by Harvey Kurtzman, alongside  a J. Rufus Lion story by Mayer and a Patsy Pancake yarn by Milt Gross. Dr. Seuss offers up the peculiar classic "Gerald McBoing Boing" and Dick Briefer's Frankenstein plays music. John Stanley's Melvin the Monster tries to catch a mouse and it doesn't go well. The highlight though of this section are several pages of "Foolish Faces" as well a complete Powerhouse Pepper story by Basil Wolverton. 

The main significant  difference between this 2009 collection and the exceedingly similar Yoe Book collection from 2011 I examined last weekend, is that the latter was more interested in a diverse range of examples from the public domain to showcase what had existed in kids comics. This collection was more about the pure quality of the stories and sacrificing some variety. There's not much to criticize about either collection though if you have any fancy at all for light-hearted comic book tales. 

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