theinspirationfc

0009 1942 Donald Duck finds Pirate Gold
While working in Disney's story department, Barks and his colleague Jack Hannah were presented with an abandoned cartoon manuscript which they decided to transform into a comic book story. They worked in their spare time through the summer of 1942 to finish the project. This became the first official story from Barks' hand and the only adventure story that he did not write himself.

0029 1943 The Mummy's Ring
For his first singlehanded story Barks chose an exotic place - The Valley of Kings in Egypt - and proceeded to build a story around the scenery. This was to be the first story in which he would rely heavily on the National Geographic Magazines.

0062 1945 Frozen Gold
When Barks set the scene in Alaska he remembered his story Northwest Mounted for which he wrote and drew 400 storyboard sketches at his time at Disney's. Some of the gags and the character Black Pete were reused for the story. (See FC0199).

0062 1945 Mystery of the Swamp
The story was a result of some brainstorming Barks did in order to make a story in which Donald was travelling in the Florida Everglades. The small inhabitants of the swamp, the Gneezles, were modelled after one of the sketches Barks had sent to Disney's when applying for a job in 1935. (See also U$13 and U$18).

0079 1945 The Riddle of the Red Hat
The only story in which the duckman drew the mouse universe. Barks was probably inspired by Floyd Gottfredson's newspaper strip from April to July, 1941, called Love Trouble in which Mickey Mouse is visited by his cousin Madeline Mouse.

0159 1947 Ghost of the Grotto
Barks started out by deciding that the ducks should have an adventure at sea as he always liked to draw his ducks in connection with water. At first, the story was meant to be a tenpager with Donald as a kelp harvestor but from then on the ideas came pouring in and Barks ended up with a full adventure story.

0178 1947 Christmas on Bear Mountain
For this holiday farce Barks needed a rich uncle who could lend his mountain cabin to his nephews. Uncle Scrooge was born, but in this, his first story, he was not a fully developed character, mainly because Barks did not intend to use him again. However, after his instant success, both his personality, wealth and general appearance would be developed during the following stories.

0189 1948 The Old Castle's Secret
Barks used a modified edition of Harlech Castle in Wales when drawing the impressive castle.

0199 1948 The Sheriff of Bullet Valley
Barks was always partial to Western movies and the life in the Wild West thus a story with that theme was an obvious choice. Barks reused a scene from his early epic Northwest Mounted (see FC0062). He also made a caricature drawing of himself in a wanted poster on the story's last page.

0203 1948 The Golden Christmas Tree
Since 1945, Barks had been doing a Christmas story every year (started as Firestone Giveaways) and this year was no exception. But this time he received a brief synopsis from Western in which he was asked to draw a story about the Christmas spirit. As could be expected, Barks rewrote and polished the initial idea into a story which one could call his own invention.

0223 1949 Lost in the Andes
This was Barks' first adventure taking place in the South American mountain range (see U$26).

0238 1949 Voodoo Hoodoo
Barks was triggered by a Bela Lugosi movie called White Zombie and a thrilling painting by Joe Little showing a humanlike zombie with torn clothes. This inspired him to build a story around such a creature. It turned out to be somewhat of a cuddly monster in the comic book because Barks had no intention of imitating the horrid monsters from the EC comics.

0275 1950 Ancient Persia
As in FC0238 Barks was inspired by horror movies, this time the films starring Boris Karloff who often played the role of the mad professor. Moreover, Barks was always modestly interested in archaeology and ancient myths and he later acknowledged that ancient Persia fascinated him.

0300 1950 Big-Top Bedlam
In those years Barks began experimenting with his panel layouts in the stories. The standard square panels were broken up into odd-shaped and fanciful ones but always with the purpose of showing the action as best as possible. This is especially striking in the circus sequences of this story. (See also VP1).

0308 1951 Dangerous Disguise
It was only natural for Barks to think of writing a story about spies and counter spies as the Cold War was in full swing at the time. In order to make the spies as credible and menacing as possible, Barks drew all of them with 100% human features.

0328 1951 In Old California!
The inspiration was Helen Hunt Jackson's historical romance novel, Ramona, published in 1884. It is the story of Ramona, the child of a white father and an Indian mother, who falls in love with an Indian sheepherder named Alessandro.
Barks' story incorporated many things: love, heroes, villains, history, nature, gold rush, atmosphere and nostalgia. Barks did not have to consult his beloved National Geographic Magazines for backgrounds to draw this epic story - he was living smack in the middle of the area himself!

0367 1952 A Christmas for Shacktown
This story is normally considered as Barks' best Christmas story. Maybe it is because of its use of children or the fact that poor people experience a happy holiday in spite of bad odds or that Scrooge finally is brought into the right mood...

0408 1952 The Golden Helmet
Several things inspired Barks for this adventure:
He combined his fondness for Prince Valiant creator Hal Foster's masterly drawings of the rugged natural settings along the northeast coast of the USA with the knowledge of the famous Kensington Stone which - according to history - was found in 1898 in Minnesota and depicts the story of 8 Swedes and 22 Norwegians who came to Vinland as early as 1362.
Furthermore, Barks' second marriage had just ended in a painful divorce, and his bad experiences with greedy and talkative lawyers during the divorce procedures inspired the character of Sharky!