Thursday, July 15, 2010

A Gift from the Trap of Solid Gold

Last March I received a note from Steve Scott. It began, "I write a blog on author John D MacDonald, a guy who wrote hundreds of short stories for magazines of the forties and fifties, and I own a pile of old magazines containing his work."

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"Mostly I simply use scans of old covers -- ones I own or ones I found on the web -- but I occasionally do the inside magazine artwork if I can. I have to confess that I already nicked a couple of your scans for my blog: Thornton Utz's "Hangover" and Arpie Ermoyan's "The Trouble with Erica."

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Steve continued, "I'd be happy to send you copies of anything I scan for use on your blog, assuming I don't already see it in your collection." And not long thereafter, Steve sent some really terrific images by one of my favourite mid-century illustrators, Thornton Utz. Its those images which decorate today's post.

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Steve explained, "I started wondering how I learned [about] the friendship between Utz and MacDonald. A little digging and I uncovered the April 1957 issue of Cosmopolitan. It's their Florida issue and it contains the attached photo of Utz, MacDonald and yet another artist neighbor, Al Buell."

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"This issue features a MacDonald work illustrated by Buell..."

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"... plus another Utz work illustrating a story by Thornton Delehanty."

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Steve concludes, "I'm sure to come across more illustrations by this great artist and I'll be sure to forward them on to you when I do."

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Many thanks, Steve! Besides seeing once again what a versatile illustrator Utz was, its interesting to discover that he, Al Buell and John D. MacDonald were close friends and neighbours.

* Steve's blog is called The Trap of Solid Gold, named after a John D. MacDonald short story. Be sure to drop by there and check it out!

* My Thornton Utz Flickr set.

3 comments:

  1. Cardew the Cad2:53 PM

    Didya ever see a set of gams painted better than that! Fun in the Sun..wowsa.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love the photo too. Classic mid-century architecture / interior design to go with the classic mid-century illustrations!

    ReplyDelete
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