The Coach House Nose Who’s Who
Well, that’s a strange title, huh? I promise it’s not a typo. I will come back to that shortly. This month’s edition of Forgotten Silver will pick up where I left off last month by filling in the blanks that…
Comic Book Daily
Discussing the minutiae of comic book collecting.
Comic Book Daily
Discussing the minutiae of comic book collecting.
brian Campbell
Dr. brian Campbell is an Anthropologist based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. His PhD research focused on the used-goods trade in Halifax. Dr. Campbell is co-owner of East Coast Toys and Games, one of Atlantic Canada's largest eBay stores specializing in pop culture collectibles. Dr. Campbell left academia in 2019 to focus on his business. During his spare time, he researches Canadian comics that were released between 1960-1990.
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Snore Comix
Before delving into this month’s topic, Snore Comix, I want to wish everyone (in Canada) a happy Thanksgiving! As we approach seven months of living in a world fundamentally altered by Covid-19, I am both fortunate and thankful to find…
Canadian Environmental Underground Comix from the 1970s
Welcome back to Forgotten Silver, everyone! Last month’s focus on environmental giveaways from the 1960s and 1970s demonstrated the breadth of these types of publications that were released in Canada during the era. As the giveaway era was overtaken by…
Environmental Giveaways from the 1960s and 1970s
Since starting Forgotten Silver here at Comic Book Daily, I have had the pleasure of writing a topic-oriented column from time to time. As I sat through Halifax’s second heat wave of 2020 (which lasted over two weeks), it dawned…
A FreeKluck Checklist
Happy belated Canada Day (and Independence Day to our American friends). Welcome back to Forgotten Silver, everyone! Last month I presented the first of a two-part series about Winnipeg’s Underground/New Wave comic collective, FreeKluck. Whereas last month I focused on…
An Introduction to FreeKluck
Last September, I decided to use my monthly column here at Comic Book Daily to engage in a bit of armchair punditry by arguing in favour of several creators who I believe should be considered for induction into the Canadian…
The Gamut of Comic Creators at Sheridan College in the 1970s
As a child growing up in the 1980s and 1990s, I was innocently unaware of the fact that many of the cartoons that I watched were produced in Canada. Companies like Nelvana, Atkinson Film-Arts, Cinar and later Mainframe Entertainment and…
Death and taxes
Benjamin Franklin once said (in a letter to Jean-Baptiste Le-Roy) that, “in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” This famous idiom has been used to the point of becoming cliché, but it still…
The Man They Call Reveen
One of my guilty pleasures has long been magic. One of the oldest performing arts in the world, there is something about magic (be it illusion, stage magic, close-up magic and even mentalism) that find both extremely entertaining and intellectually…
The Pre-Vortex Works of Chester Brown
Chester Brown is one of the modern giants of Canadian comics. He is often cited as one of the major figures who brought autobiographical comics to the forefront of the 1990s comics scene. He first gained critical recognition for his…
The Beginnings of the Canadian Silver Age: Ganes Productions or The Story of Funny Money?
Happy New Year everyone and thanks for helping to make 2019 a great start for my Forgotten Silver column here at Comic Book Daily! There is one question that I am often asked what I think is a good way…
The Springtime of Quebec Comics, Jacques Hurtubise and the Emergence of Croc
The early 1970s was a magical time for Canadian comic books. After decades of scant output from the mid-1940s through the 1950s, the 1960s was dominated by the giveaway comics produced by Ganes Productions and Comic Page Features/Comic Book World.…
The Vinyl Records of Canadian Silver Age Comic Collecting
Good morning and happy Remembrance Day! I will be taking a moment of silence to think about the many veterans and active-duty military members who have touched my life and those around this morning and I hope that you will…
La Grande Noirceur of Quebec Comics
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! With the Federal election only a week away, I spent quite a bit of time thinking about whether or not I should focus on political comics or environmental comics this month (due to environmentalism becoming one of…
Who Should the Canadian Comic Book Hall of Fame Induct Next Year?
Honouring a person who has excelled or who has had a noteworthy contribution to a certain field is a common institutional practice. A hall of fame takes this to another level by enshrining a person as an honoured member in…
Comics from the Great White North: Captain Al Cohol, Super Shamou and Issues of Representation
As a socio-cultural anthropologist, the issue of representation has been part of my academic trajectory since I was an undergraduate. How issues such as gender and race are depicted in popular culture (and by whom) are topics that have been…
The Early Works of Jacques Boivin
After I finished writing last month’s column about the legacy of Dave Sim and the caveats of collecting Cerebus # 1, I started thinking about Canadian comic creators who started self-publishing their own comics contemporaneously. Many Canadian creators were getting…
The Caveats of Collecting Cerebus # 1
When discussing the most “important” characters and comics of the Canadian Silver Age, the works of several creators come to mind. The word “important” has several connotations and I use it here in part because of its ambiguity. What makes…
Brain Sugar and the Great Lord Larry Mystery
One of the most simultaneously infuriating, irritating, exciting and compelling parts of conducting research is when one comes across a mystery that cannot be solved. When it comes to Canadian Silver Age comic book collecting, there is one such mystery…
From Captain Newfoundland to Captain Canada
It’s hard to believe that another month has passed and that it is already April! Last month, I provided a broad overview of the historical context that led to the creation of Geoff Stirling’s Captain Newfoundland character and argued that…