All Gummed Up And Nowhere To Go

Well here we are at the end of the strangest year imaginable.  As mentioned last time out, I've moved up the holiday season posts this year and will be back on a Saturday schedule in 2021. Today's entry is really just a catch-up post and then it's off to the champagne and confetti!

Friend o'the Archive Jason Rhodes sent along a scan of what looks like the 42nd subject from Bowman's Uncle Miltie Bubble Gum--examined here last month-- and it's one that allows a sizing comparison:

Shorter and wider than a typical Topps penny tatoo of the era, it looks like glassine to me.  Also of note is the little production rip just like the ones Topps produced.  And then, quite amazingly, this showed up on a UK eBay auction:

There's treasure inside:

One of those packs is on its way to me but arriving too late to include here.  These are a hard act to follow, just like Berle, but I'll give it a whirl!

A 1955 trade journal gives us rough dating for what looks like a coffee-flavored chiclet-style gum:

I've only seen one other reference to this product, which must have fizzled pretty quickly despite the caption.  Karl Fink (not Kink!) was as Shorin in-law and also became a renowned designer of commercial and industrial products.  I am looking for details on him since despite his fame, very little seems to be available on his activities.

Finally, Friend o'the Archive Lonnie Cummins sent along a neat old picture showing a load-in tie-in from Topps Bush Terminal HQ:

McKeesport Candy Company is still in business! It's also an area (near Pittsburgh) where the 1971 Topps Winners contest entries seem to have been concentrated, perhaps a connection to wholesalers is the key to that weird and now-expensive set!  More fodder for 2021-Happy New Year folks, see ya on January 9th!

Dive Right In

Time traveling back to the early days of TV today kids as we take look at Milton Berle, or more specifically, at an obscure Bowman novelty associated with him.

Berle got his start in vaudeville at a very young age and progressed through nightclubs and some forgettable movies in the early 1930's before parlaying a regular slot on the Rudy Vallee radio show into his own program in 1947.  A year later he got his break in televison on Texaco Star Theatre, where was named the permanent host in the fall of 1948, earning the well-deserved sobriquet Mr. Televison.  By 1952 he was the biggest TV star in the land and Bowman capitalized:

Uncle Miltie had artwork (fairly good in execution but occasionally crude in depiction) and a short joke printed on the inside of the white wrapper. Some jokes are not politically correct, which is no surprise as that's how things were back then and for several decades thereafter.

Jeff Allender's wonderful House of Checklists, lists 34 jokes (click through to his site for details) but I've found seven more, as noted below.  The set is obscure and examples are very hard to impossible to track down. I think the pack shown is one of only two known to exist and it would have sold for a penny at the time of issue.

Berle's show was on NBC and Bowman had a relationship with the broadcaster of course, issuing sets in 1952 and '53 showcasing the stars of the network.  Haelan Laboratories Inc. on the wrapper means Uncle Miltie could not have been issued prior to May of 1952 (the name change occurred on April 28) and I suspect it came out in the fall that year as the 1952-53 season kicked off.

The interior wrapper was where the action was, although the obverse design's pretty eye catching.  I can't actually find any issued examples to show but some original artwork was sold by Hake's about three years ago that certainly gives one the tenor of the set. First some paste-ups:

Told ya it could be politically incorrect!  Here is an original art piece from the same lot:

None of these are detailed over at the House of Checklists, so there's at least 41 different if all the pasteups became issued pieces (there is a pasteup of the diving board joke as well). I would think that's pretty close to a final number; Bazooka would often have 42 comics in a series and despite being a competitor's product it would not surprise me if that is the proper count for Uncle Miltie.

Tasty Blony

I've covered Bowman's Blony Bubble Gum before in these parts, mostly focusing on the multi-year Archie Comics that inner-wrapped their (by-then-Topps) gum in the late 50's, but today I'm pleased to showcase a number of their earlier comics thanks to a wealth of scans recently provided by BFF o'the Archive Jeff Shepherd.

Blony was originally marketed for the better part of the decade preceding World War 2 and was manufactured by Warren Bowman's aboriginal confectionery company Gum Inc.  He mostly or completely suspended production during the war and got things going again with the brand around 1947, at which time he had already turned his concern into Bowman Gum, Inc with a mid-war rebranding four years prior.  Blony was a big seller and had presumably included some rudimentary inner wraps with their penny tabs and/or twists prior to the war, although like many things associated with the brand, they remain hard to document. This was from a retail box end and it gives you an idea of how things were pasted up for Blony around 1952-53:

So Shep sent me scans of several dozen Blony "comics" that look to fall into the period between 1947 and the purchase of Bowman by Topps in 1956.  These are, by and large, inferior to what Bazooka was giving the kiddies as you will see.

These appear to be the earliest example in the group, which is pretty obvious given the graphics and (very helpful) numbering scheme.  I think this was from a twist wrap:

Pretty boring, I'd wager sure the kiddies didn't think much of the quiz format.  Here's a couple from a little later, check out how lame the 3rd question is on the Hidden Metals quiz in the second example:

The Wild West was a big theme but man, the production values are pretty much sub-par. Still, this seems to be where more than one spot color was introduced:

Looks like the color bleed problem went away as the series progressed.  I seem to recall Bowman offering wrapper premiums previously but don't seem to have a scan of anything offering same. 

In the below example, an older, larger example appears on the right but it's the insert on the left I'm looking at.  It's a bit of a reversion color-wise, so maybe these were produced independently to a degree but I really don't know. Note the Cincinnati address, just like Topps different locales provided premium redemptions:

Furthering the "independently produced" theory, the pencils from the above left make a reappearance:

None of these are scaled, so who knows how things actually went down but maybe twists had one style and tabs the other.

Here's that heart story, rotated:

Pretty gruesome, just the thing for the kids who were voraciously lapping up EC Comics and such!

It's plain, to me at least, that Bazooka featured much better comics and premiums but I doubt that had anything much to do with sales.  Besides, Bowman also was able to offer this in Blony's stead:

 Thanks to an opened wrapper over at Tick Tock Toys, we can get a peek at some indicia:

Hard to see but Haelan Laboratories are detailed and that became a business entity as of April 28, 1952 so Uncle Miltie was issued after that date. I suspect 1952 was indeed the year of issue as the Milton Berle Show (really Texaco Star Theatre) was peaking that year, with an average rating around 50%!

Now, all I need is a scan of the inside of that wrapper!