THEPUBLISHER

In 1942 Jack Hannah and Carl Barks worked together to draw a comic book story called Donald Duck finds Pirate's Gold. At the time they were both worked at the Disney Studios. They used all their spare time that summer to complete the venture. They showed the story to Western Publishing who held the licence to produce the Disney comics. Their work was accepted.
Barks decided to take a job offer from Western in 1943 when the company decided to stop reproducing Sunday strips in their comic books and instead publish new stories. He immediately received the script for a Donald Duck ten-pager which he finished after altering a few details to Western's great delight. 'The Victory Garden' was the result.

The following years Barks worked as a duck artist at his home in San Jacinto and both parties found it a fine solution. It was very rare that an illustrator was allowed to work at home. On top of that it was quite unusual that he worked alone. Most of the other writers were given a synopsis and then different illustrators drew the story. Barks did it all alone. He continued happily at Western until he retired in 1966.

Here is a brief history of the Western Publishing Company, which employed Carl Barks for 25 years.

THE TIMELINE

Walt Disney started publishing his own comic stories in 1930 when he introduced a daily Mickey Mouse strip for the newspapers. Some time later Western received a licence to produce the Mickey Mouse Magazine. Disney wanted to earn additional revenues from merchandise relating to his animated films. The mastermind behind the overall idea was Herman 'Kay' Kamen who was a marketing genius. He licenced Mickey Mouse to a multitude of different sorts of merchandise such as toothpaste, ice cream, clothing, toys and cookies.
In 1932 Kamen successfully established Disney Enterprises, which was the formal licence giver for all the merchandising - including the comic books which from 1935 were published by K.K. Publishing (Kay Kamen Publishing) also known as Western Publishing Company. It is important to know that Western at the time also sold many other products such as colouring books, Little Golden Books, jigsaw puzzles and so on. Comics were just a small part of Western's activities.

In 1939 Kamen and Western editor Eleanor Packer started the one-shot comic book series called Four Color which contained a variety of Donald Duck newspaper strip material. Kamen left Western shortly after. Four Color became an instant success and in 1940 Packer gave the ailing Mickey Mouse Magazine the more appealing name Walt Disney's Comics and Stories.
But it was obvious from the start that the Disney name and the recycled newspaper strips were not enough to sell the books and Western began to develop new stories. In 1941 the first - Pluto saves the Ship - was published and the year after Carl Barks and Jack Hannah created Donald Duck finds Pirate's Gold. After that the magazine was marketed with new material from multiple artists.

In the turbulent and successful years that followed, Western was the sole publisher of Disney comics although they were issued under a great variety of different names; K.K. Comics, Dell Comics, March of Comics, Red Ryder Comics, Gold Key Comics, Golden Publishing, Golden Press, Dynabrite, and Whitman Comics.

After 28 years, Dell ended their agreement to distribute Western's comics in 1962 and Gold Key Comics was created instead. This marked the decline of Walt Disney's Comics and Stories. They stopped publication in 1984.
Whitman Comics then began publishing under the well-known Dell label in order to avoid too much confusion! Later they even issued their comic books under the Gold Key label! To top it all Western Printing and Lithographing Company was Gold Key's parent company...

THE EDITORS

During Barks' employment between 1942 and 1966 at Western's Los Angeles branch he had several editors with whom he consulted when visiting the premises. Among the best known were:

Eleanor Lewis Packer
was a strong-willed woman with a history of writing children's books. She handled her staff effectively and introduced the concept of monthly gatherings where some of the artists told about - and enacted - the new stories for all the staff. The idea was to get a feel of how the readers might react and it went on for several years with great success.

Carl von Buettner
came from a family with German origins. He joined Western in 1942 as an artist but soon became art director. It was especially him who enacted the new stories as described above. And he did it in such a convincing way that the staff meetings soon became very popular. As an artist Buettner worked on both Disney's and Warner Bros' characters.

Craig Chase
had worked as an animator for both Walter Lantz and Warner Bros., but had teamed up as a Disney artist with Buettner by 1938 and they joined Western at the same time. Chase was both a comic book writer and an illustrator but his abilities for managing a large company later earned him the position of editor.

THE EMPLOYEES

Western had a multitude of comic book artists working for them and they used many of the cartoon characters of the time for their comic books. Here are some of the more famous artists for the Disney gallery.

Barks, Carl (1901-2000)
The top artist on Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge. Worked for Western between 1942 and 1966.

Bradbury, Jack (1914-2004)
Extremely productive artist who drew almost all of the Disney characters. Worked for Western between 1949 and 1963.

Buettner, Carl (1903-1965)
The top artist on Li'l Bad Wolf. Worked - partly as an editor - for Western between 1942 and 1950.

de Lara, Phil (1914-1973)
Mostly known for his Daffy Duck but did numerous Goofy stories as well. Worked for Western until 1964.

Eisenberg, Harvey (1912-1965)
Mostly known for his Tom & Jerry but he also drew Chip'n'Dale and Little Hiawatha. Worked for Western until 1969.

Gottfredson, Floyd (1906-1986)
The top artist on Mickey Mouse newspaper strips. Worked for Western between 1949 and 1956.

Hubbard, Al (1914-1984)
Almost monopolized the stories with Scamp. Worked for Western between 1951 and 1973.

Kelly, Walt (1913-1973)
Produced mainly front pages for the Donald Duck comics. Worked for Western between 1941 and 1948.

Murry, Paul (1911-1989)
The most productive Mickey Mouse, Goofy and Pluto artist. Worked for Western between 1949 and 1975.

Strobl, Tony (1915-1991)
The most productive Donald Duck artist. Worked for Western between 1955 and 1963.

Taliaferro, Al (1905-1969)
The top artist on Donald Duck newspaper strips. Worked for Western between 1949 and 1963.

Turner, Gil (1911 -1960)
Especially known for his fine stories with Li'l Bad Wolf. Worked for Western until 1957.