A Strange Way to Shoe a Horse…

BY GARY SCOTT BEATTY, PUBLISHER AND EDITOR, MUSKEGONONLINE.NET

Flip the Frog works as a blacksmith and barber in this month's classic cartoons.

This is a good opportunity to show kids how these professions were done in the 1930s -- sort of! I don't think many barbers were as crazy with their straight razors as Flip.

The Village Smitty (1931) -- Horses needed horseshoes to protect their hooves, and blacksmiths shaped horseshoes by heating them in a forge and hammering them into shape. Horseshoes were nailed into the hoof without hurting the horse -- a horse's hoof is much like a large, thick toenail. Kids outside are playing the tossing game horseshoes.

The Village Barber (1930) -- Striped pole signs used to let people know a business was a barber shop. Barbers used straight edged razors, and sharpened them by running them along strips of leather. Also seen: a player piano and a coal burning heat stove. The singing at the end refers to barbershop quartets, harmony singing that actually began in real barber shops.

Cartoons can be found at Muskegon County's online magazine, http://muskegononline.net/

Ub Iwerks was a two-time Academy Award winning animator who co-created Mickey Mouse with Walt Disney and was Walt Disney's collaborator in the formative years of Disney's studio (Steamboat Willie, Plane Crazy). Iwerks opened his own studio in 1930, producing Flip the Frog shorts and more.

These Works are in Public Domain and not Derivative as specified by U.S. copyright law (title 17 of the U.S. Code). 

 

Earth Day Lessons in Cartoon Classics

BY GARY SCOTT BEATTY, PUBLISHER AND EDITOR, MUSKEGONONLINE.NET 

Brothers Max and Dave Fleischer, of Fleischer Studios, were city boys. Maybe that explains these characters' longing for nature.

Don't expect the urban, jazz crazy tales of the Fleischer brothers' early years in these Color Classics from 1935 (The Song of the Birds) and 1940 (Little Lambkins). Although their Koko the Clown dominated '20s cartoon popularity and Fleischer Studios' Betty Boop was a household name, the enforcement of the Hays Code in 1934 kept Fleischer cartoons from the racey, dark, city-oriented subject matter that made their early cartoons unique.

Parents be cautioned, though. The kids in these shorts are destructive and their "play" involves activities dangerous to children!

http://muskegononline.net/0413/cartoon-0413.html

In The Song of the Birds, a little boy uses his air rifle to shoot up his house, then turns on the neighborhood birds! At least this one has a moral, perfect for Earth Day month!

What toddler would prefer city life to a country home surrounded by nature? The kid in Little Lambkins, tampers with the electronic gadgets in his new home and creates chaos. Caution: children should not rip live wires from their homes' walls!

These Works are in Public Domain and not Derivative as specified by U.S. copyright law (title 17 of the U.S. Code).

Interested in classic animation? Visit Animation Resources, a 501(c)(3) California non-profit corporation dedicated to serving the worldwide online animation community. 

Subscribe for free to Muskegon County, Michigan's monthly, online magazine and receive updates about content there, at http://muskegononline.net/

How Cartoons are Made, with Elephants (1931)

BY GARY SCOTT BEATTY, PUBLISHER AND EDITOR, MUSKEGONONLINE.NET 

Finally, it can be told! How do studios make cartoons? 

How do they draw all those thousands of pictures and transfer them to film? Who knew it was accomplished by dogs, cats and elephants? 1931's Makin' Em Move (retitled In a Cartoon Studio here) is one of the last of Van Beuren Studio "Aesop's Fables" series, originally begun by Fables Studios (Howard Estabrook, and Paul Terry, who in 1929 had left to form TerryToons Studios).

The cartoon-in-a-cartoon is a parody of popular damsel in distress film serials, begun with Perils of Pauline (1914). http://muskegononline.net/0313/cartoon-0313.html

Opening Night (1933) follows Cubby Bear as he sneaks into the amazing Roxy Opera House. http://muskegononline.net/0313/cartoon-0313.html

 

 

Celebrate Valentine's Day with Van Beuren Cartoons

BY GARY SCOTT BEATTY, PUBLISHER AND EDITOR, MUSKEGONONLINE.NET 

This month we celebrate Valentine's Day with two Van Beuren Studio cartoons from the 1930s featuring love -- sort of. 

With offices across the street from Fleischer Studios in New York, the Van Beuren Studio produced a steady stream of oddly unfocused, stream-of-consciousness cartoons for the blossoming black and white film market in the late '20s and early '30s.

As the Walt Disney Studio became the cartoon market leader in style and popularity it became necessary to up the quality of Van Beuren cartoons. Producer Amedee Van Beuren decided to hire two Disney veterans to up the cartoons' quality. In 1934 he brought in Burt Gillett, who had recently directed Disney's highly popular The Three Little Pigs, and Tom Palmer, who had worked for virtually every studio in town.

The result was the handsome Rainbow Parade series. Parents, caution, in Cupid Gets His Man: some racial insensitivity, and arrows shot at people (cupids).

http://muskegononline.net/0213/cartoon-0213.html

These Works are in Public Domain and not Derivative as specified by U.S. copyright law (title 17 of the U.S. Code). 

Editor and Publisher Gary Scott Beatty has been working in printing and publishing for over 35 years, including editing Muskegon's On the Shore magazine and typesetting Muskegon Magazine. In 2008 he won a Xeric Foundation Grant to publish Jazz: Cool Birth, a murder mystery in a 1957 jazz club with illustrations inspired by '50s album cover design. This and his other Aazurn Publishing books can be purchased through Amazon.com. Worldwide, he edits and publishes Indie Comics Magazine, 64 pages of the best story and art from today's independent comic book creators.

 

 

Laughing in 1932

BY GARY SCOTT BEATTY, PUBLISHER AND EDITOR, MUSKEGONONLINE.NET

After co-creating Mickey Mouse, Ub Iwerks left Walt Disney to open his own studio in 1930, producing Flip the Frog shorts.

Adult supervision required for Nurse Maid (1932). Note to children, do NOT: let baby eat coins; shake baby; shove your arm down baby's throat; or let baby eat bottles of strange medicine. If I, with my Scottish descent, can laugh at the cheap Scottsman here, I hope we can all also laugh at the Chinaman and the Native American, because Flip is one of the funniest humor series stars from 1930s cartoons!

The Milkman (1932). Milk deliveries were common in 1930s America, due to the lack of refrigeration in homes. Flip may seem a little audacious, but so was Mickey Mouse in the early cartoons Iwerks produced with Disney. He is relatively well behaved here, compared to some of his other exploits.

These Works are in Public Domain and not Derivative as specified by U.S. copyright law (title 17 of the U.S. Code).

Happy Holidays with Classic Cartoons

by Gary Scott Beatty, Publisher and Editor, MuskegonOnline.NET

We say happy holidays this month with 1930s cartoons from Ub Iwerks and Fleischer Studios.

Jack Frost (below) helps a bear cub combat Old Man Winter in this 1934 Ub Iwerks ComicColor cartoon.The song "I Don't Have to Worry, I Don't Have to Care" was written by Carol Stalling, who would become best known for his Warner Bros. cartoon orchestra soundtrack work. Note to children: the wringer washer is how people used to wash clothes. http://muskegononline.net/1212/cartoon-1212.html

1936's Christmas Comes But Once a Year (below) comes from Fleischer Studios, with a strangely adult-absent orphanage and Jack Mercer (Fleischer Studios voice of Popeye) as Grampy. Max and Dave Fleischer had decided years prior to tone down Betty Boop to make her more family-friendly, and her invention-creating grandfather was one of the additions. http://muskegononline.net/1212/cartoon-1212.html 

These Works are in Public Domain and not Derivative as specified by U.S. copyright law (title 17 of the U.S. Code). 

Classic Cartoons: Toys

by Gary Scott Beatty, Publisher and Editor, MuskegonOnline.NET

With the toy buying season upon us, we look at classic cartoons starring toys this month.

http://muskegononline.net/1112/cartoon-1112.html

Van Beuren Studio's A Toy Town Tale, produced in 1931, makes more sense than a lot of Van Beuren Studio cartoons from this period. (No, I don't know what the man in the moon has to do with awakening toys, or what happened to the elephant.) This includes the songs Silent Night, Parade of the Tin Soldiers (by Leon Jessel), and the 1911 ragtime hit Oh, You Beautiful Doll (by Seymour Brown and Nat D. Ayer).

Van Beuren Studio's Toy Time (1932) is a cartoon musical featuring mice playing with toys, and the most emaciated cat I think I've ever seen in cartoons.