Tuesday, May 24, 2022

Walt Disney’s Comics Digest - Reborn

 

Walt Disney’s Comics: #1 (December 1986) - #7 (September 1987)

Walt Disney’s Uncle Scrooge: #1 (December 1986) – #5 (August 1987)

Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse: #1 (January 1987) - #5 (September 1987)

Walt Disney’s Donald Duck: #2 (January 1987), #4 (May 1987), #5 (July 1987)

 

So much happened to me between 1976 and 1986, a whole decade of living. I had finished middle school, got a job, graduated from high school, failed to graduate college, and was back home with Mom and Pop, trying to figure out how to have a life and find a way to go on. The sudden appearance of Walt Disney’s Comics Digest was like an echo of childhood, a reminder of innocence and of how far I had travelled.

And, of course, they were just fun to read. Reprints of old stories from the Forties on up, adaptations of Disney films, stories I remembered from the old Digests (this was before I started collecting them again), and a tale or two that I recalled from old regular comic books of long, long ago. I was particularly overjoyed to see the story with the Peter Pan characters and a piratical parrot called Yellowbeak that I had read in Second Grade and never forgotten but had never seen again until then. (I remember Smee cooking ‘slumgullion’ – and that became a nickname for our family incarnation of chilimac.)`

“Shortly after Gladstone's launching of its original 4 [comic book] titles in 1986, it was decided to publish an additional four titles - only in digest form: Walt Disney's Comics Digest, Walt Disney's Uncle Scrooge Digest, Walt Disney's Donald Duck Digest, and Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse Digest. For slightly more than the cost of a comic book, these pocket-sized editions contained 3 times the comic pages, were kid-sized, and lasted longer because of the stiff covers. The kids had no problem with the small printing...but enough older readers did ... such that it was not economically feasible to continue their publication. After 5-7 issues of each title, the digest series came to an end.” – brucehamilton.com

After finding the statement above, it seems likely that I am only missing two volumes for sure, #1 and #3 of the Donald Duck Digest. Perhaps more of the Mickey Mouse and Scrooge, but perhaps not. Further research, I suppose, is indicated.


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