“Foto Funnies” (Sixteenth in a Series) – Library of American Comics

In the days before phones could take pictures, before social media sites where even the most innocuous photographs were shared worldwide, the old saying went, “People love seeing their pictures in print.” Having one’s phizz snapped by a photographer, to appear days or weeks later in the pages of magazines or daily newspapers was a Big Deal that drove many to buy extra copies for posterity.

Cartoonists were no different from anyone else in that regard and perhaps more so than most, since they recognized the value of publicity when it came to promoting their work. So we conclude our look back at Cartoonist PROfiles, the long-running “unique quarterly magazine for the professional, the cartoon buff, the student, and all who enjoy cartoons,” by showcasing photographs featuring creators whose art has graced various Library of American Comics books. We begin with a brace of images featuring Alex Raymond (Flash Gordon, Jungle Jim) that date from the end of the 1940s and include a visual report on his trip to the University of Connecticut, as the artist researched a future Rip Kirby story. (Click images throughout for isolated views.)

Next, a handful of one-shot photos. John Prentice’s picture was snapped at an event where cartoonists showed off their “fine art” efforts. This group also includes a taste of the salty and the sweet. The salty: Alex Toth’s photo accompanied his article “correcting” (as only Alex could!) several inaccuracies of memory by Neal Adams that had surfaced in a previous PROfiles issue; the sweet: Bil (Family Circus) Keane turned a TV appearance into a self-deprecating laugh.

Our LOAC Essentials: Charlie Chan – 1938 collection features pre-Kerry Drake comics by Alfred Andriola, who did an overview piece on the continuity newspaper strip for PROfiles, which also featured these two photos of the cartoonist:

A few years prior to the passing of Jimmy Swinnerton, the magazine was also able to feature pictures of Milton Caniff, on National Cartoonist Society business, visiting Swinnerton, the venerable creator of pioneering comics features such as Little Jimmy:

And here are shots of Al Williamson and his wife, Arlene, at work:

This sampling brushes the surface of the many photos and accompanying articles on comic strip creators, political cartoonists, animators, advertising men, and comic book artists that filled each issue of Cartoonist PROfiles. Though LOAC never did a MAD Magazine collection, this final PROfiles picture and its accompany caption explaining the backstory behind the visuals was just too delightfully fun not to share with you:

We once again tip our Red Sox baseball caps to Bill Chadbourne, a true friend of LOAC who provided many of the PROfiles issues from which these photographs were taken. You can follow these three links to see the earlier entries in this Cartoonist PROfiles overview, and from there you can trace back to the other installments of The Chadbourne Dossier that use examples from “Chad’s” personal collection to examine many threads in the colorful tapestry of American comics.