Joseph Leo Baxendale was an English cartoonist and publisher. Baxendale wrote and drew several titles. Among his best-known creations are the Beano strips Little Plum, Minnie the Minx, The Bash Street Kids, and The Three Bears.
Biffo the Bear is a fictional character from the British comic magazine The Beano who stars in the comic strip of the same name, created in 1948 by Dudley D. Watkins. He was the mascot of The Beano for several decades.
A British comic is a periodical published in the United Kingdom that contains comic strips. It is generally referred to as a comic or a comic magazine, and historically as a comic paper. As of 2014, the three longest-running comics of all time were all British.
Buster was a British comic which began publication in 1960, originally published by IPC Magazines Ltd under the company's comics division Fleetway, then by Egmont UK Ltd under the same imprint until its closure in 2000. Despite missing issues due to industrial action during its run, the comic published 1,902 issues in total. The comic carried a mixture of humour and adventure strips, featuring the title character Buster and a host of other characters.
Jackpot was a British comic book magazine that ran from the issues cover dated 5 May 1979 to issue 141, 30 January 1982, when it merged with Buster.
Cor!!, a British comic book, was launched in June 1970 by IPC, their sixth new comic in just over a year. Cor!! was edited by Bob Paynter.
Radio Fun was a British celebrity comics comic paper that ran from 15 October 1938 to 18 February 1961, when it became the first out of twelve titles to merge with Buster.
Knockout was a weekly British comics periodical published by Fleetway Publications from 12 June 1971 to 23 June 1973. A humour comic, the title ran until 1973 before being merged with another Fleetway title, Whizzer and Chips.
The Amalgamated Press (AP) was a British newspaper and magazine publishing company founded by journalist and entrepreneur Alfred Harmsworth (1865–1922) in 1901, gathering his many publishing ventures together under one banner. At one point the largest publishing company in the world, AP employed writers such as Arthur Mee, John Alexander Hammerton, Edwy Searles Brooks, and Charles Hamilton. Its subsidiary, the Educational Book Company, published The Harmsworth Self-Educator, The Children's Encyclopædia, and Harmsworth's Universal Encyclopaedia. The company's newspapers included the Daily Mail, the Daily Mirror, The Evening News, The Observer, and The Times. At its height, AP published over 70 magazines and operated three large printing works and paper mills in South London.
Tom Paterson is a Scottish comic artist who drew characters for Fleetway in 1973–1990, and D.C Thomson from 1986 to 2012. As of 2013, he currently draws strips for Viz.
Ivor Lott and Tony Broke was a British strip which originally appeared in the comic book Cor!! on 6 June 1970, before moving to Buster when the two comics merged in June 1974. The comic strip lasted until the final issue of Buster on 3 January 2000. The comic was originally drawn by Reg Parlett and later continued by artists such as Jim Crocker and Sid Burgon.
Smash! was a weekly British comic book, published initially by Odhams Press and subsequently by IPC Magazines, from 5 February 1966 to 3 April 1971. After 257 issues it merged into Valiant.
Twinkle, "the picture paper specially for little girls," was a popular British comics magazine, published by D. C. Thomson & Co. Ltd from 27 January 1968 to 1999. It was aimed at young girls and came out weekly, supplemented each year with a Summer Special and a hardcover Annual.
Sidney William Burgon, better known as Sid Burgon, is a British comics artist. After working as a mechanic and drawing as a hobby he was encouraged by coworkers into furthering his artistic interests. He gave up his job in 1963 and became a freelance cartoonist with some of his early work being published The Weekly News under the pseudonym Swab. In 1970 Burgon began working for Fleetway drawing a number of strips including Bookworm for Whoopee!, Joker for Knockout and Ivor Lott and Tony Broke for Buster (comics). Burgon began to draw for DC Thomson in 1989 drawing a revival of Biffo the Bear in The Beano and Adrian the Barbarian for The Beezer. Burgon stopped drawing for DC Thomson in the late 1990s/early 2000s and is currently retired.
Richie Wraggs is a fictional comic strip character in the British comic Jackpot, where appears alongside his black cat, Lucky.
Princess Tina was a British weekly girls' comic anthology published by Fleetway Publications and IPC Magazines from 23 September 1967 to 12 January 1974. The comic was created by combining two underperforming Fleetway titles — Princess and Tina — into a third, new comic. Notable strips included the long-running family drama "The Happy Days" and "Patty's World". The latter would outlive Princess Tina, continuing after the comic was merged into Pink.
British girls' comics flourished in the United Kingdom from the 1950s through the 1970s, before beginning to decline in popularity in the 1980s and 1990s. Publishers known for their girls' comics included DC Thomson and Fleetway/IPC. Most titles appeared weekly, with the content primarily in picture-story format. The majority of the stories were serialized, with two or three pages per issue, over eight to twelve issues. They were marketed toward young teen girls.
Princess was a British weekly girls' comic anthology published by Fleetway Publications and, later, IPC Magazines. The first version was published between 30 January 1960 and 16 September 1967, and featured a mix of comic strips, text stories and a large proportion of features; it was merged with Tina to form a new title - Princess Tina - after 399 issues.
June was a British weekly girls' comic anthology published by Fleetway Publications and IPC Magazines from 18 March 1961 to 15 June 1974. Designed as a response to DC Thomson's hit Bunty, June never quite eclipsed its Scottish rival but was nevertheless a success on its own terms, reaching 631 issues before being merged into Tammy in 1974.
"The Astounding Adventures of Charlie Peace" is a British comic strip published in the weekly anthology Buster from 27 June 1964 to 15 June 1971, published by Fleetway Publications and later IPC Magazines. It was previewed by a single instalment in Valiant on 20 June 1964. The strip featured fictionalised adventures of the real-life Victorian era criminal Charles Peace.
