Walt Disney Comics Digests: #31 - #35

 

                  Walt Disney Comics Digest #31 (October 1971)

As you see it here. We didn’t have it and I still don’t have it.

Walt Disney Comics Digest #32 (December 1971)

A special commercial for the newly opened Walt Disney World. Goofy, Minnie, Pluto, and Jiminy Cricket get transported to Fantasyland after being offered “Hee Hee-ee …A Poisoned Apple!” Gyro Gearloose sends Scrooge and April, May, and June back in time to Main Street USA where Scrooge tries to make a mint collecting rare bottles. Gyro is again instrumental in sending Mickey, Morty, and Ferdy on a real ride to the moon where they foil the plan of two crooks to paint it black in Tomorrowland. Donald reminisces about Scrooge going on safari with a hypnotic eye at Adventureland. We had it! And I have it again.

Walt Disney Comics Digest #33 (February 1972)

Bedknobs and Broomsticks came out in 1972 and this adaptation (a story with some illustrations) had to hold us until we saw it at the theater. The ‘punkshul’ Brer Rabbit whittles a bone out of soap to fool Brer Bear (“Yeeoow! I’se been pizzened!”) to prove “Greed is good bait for traps.” Chip and Dale help Tinkerbell evade Old Man Winter, Lady’s dog pound friends each get a story, Gyro makes a snow-melting machine that has adverse effects on the weather, and Donald and the Nephews compete in the ice-taxi business. The Ants and the Grasshopper (“Oh, the World owes me a livin’!”). Had and have.

Walt Disney Comics Digest #34 (April 1972)

The Disney Ducks! Donald learns how to charm snakes … and a sea serpent! Grandma Duck uses an elephant on the farm, the Junior Woodchucks go on a treasure hunt, Scrooge builds a perfectly round money bin, and Magica De Spell makes a potion that changes your face to the last face you look at (Body horror! Lost identity!). Had and have.

Walt Disney Comics Digest #35 (June 1972)

Donald and Gladstone compete for a kiss from pageant queen Daisy. Gyro and a neighbor compete as to who can grow the best trees (“A hot dog with mustard tree!”). Mim and the Beagle Boys compete to get into a villains’ club with the Evil Queen, Captain Hook, Pete, and the Big Bad Wolf. And, of course, The Biscuit Eater with Johnny Whitaker, which I never read nor ever saw. Had and have this issue, though.

A word about Johnny Whitaker. He was a persistent and inexplicable presence throughout all our early childhood. From his first appearance at the age of three in a commercial for the toy line of Animal Yakkers (we had Chester O’Chimp), through his role as Jody Davis on Family Affair, from his title part in the strangely disturbing The Littlest Angel in 1969, to his occasional appearances on Gunsmoke, Bewitched, and Green Acres, to his lead role as Tom Sawyer in the 1973 musical adaptation (songs by the Sherman Brothers!) and as Johnny in Sigmund and the Sea Monsters, we saw his sandy curls, squinty eyes, and snub-nose everywhere. Oh, yes, and The Mystery in Dracula’s Castle (TV movie 1972) for which see elsewhere in this blog. He was in four live-action Disney movies, the last in 1977. As kids, did we like him? Did we hate him? All I know it that he was in a sense being presented as ‘the kid’ of the early Seventies. And here he is now: