Plop Day!

Basil Wolverton was born on this day in 1909. I first encountered Wolverton's artwork in DC's wacky humor comic Plop! The images Wolverton created stick in the mind. He was a Golden Age artist with memorable features such as Powerhouse Pepper and Spacehawk among countless others. I've sought out and collected quite a bit of his work over the years, but those early covers still stick.

I was lucky to get hold of PLOP #1 when it dropped all those decades ago and I picked up an issue here and there before it closed up shop with its twenty-fourth issue. The series was famously inspired by a story entitled "The Poster Plague" which Steve Skeates and Sergio Aragones were finally able get into an issue of  House of Mystery.  A story dubbed "The Gourmet" by Berni Wrightson from the debut issue even won an award. This is a series screaming out to be collected in proper fashion for a new generation of fans. I think much of the humor is timeless.

Here are the covers for the entire run, most by the deliriously entertaining Basil Wolverton, assisted a few times by Wally Wood. Later the comic adopted a more traditional cover scheme with artwork by Joe Orlando, Dave Manak and others. The comics themselves are filled up with great Sergio Aragones artwork as well stories by the likes of Bill Draut, Alfredo Alacala, and Berni Wrightson.

Tbe PLOP covers changed consideradly with the twentieth issue when the bizarre characters were replaced by panel gags. After one cover by a classic cartoonist the balance of the run were produced by Joe Orlando or Dave Manak or so combination. Doubtless this was done to help sales but it was sad to see the menagerie of oddballs stop.

Below is one unpublished cover by Basil Wolverton -- I assume for issue twenty.

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