Merry Christmas from our man Bolles

 

*\November 1st is International Pet Groomer Appreciation Day

 Wouldn't you know it, our man Enoch came through with an image appropriate for today's celebration. This comes from a 1930 issue of Pep Stories. Bolles began his run of covers in mid-1929 and continued until early 1932. R.A. Burley then took on the cover duties for the next year and then passed the baton off to the other "B" artist, the gifited and prolific Earle Bergey. His run continued without a pause until the magaznie folded at the end of 1938, along with the rest of the spicy titles that he and Enoch were working for. The only survivor for Bolles was Film Fun but Bergey kept busy working on a wide variety of genres including romance, sports, and most notably, Science Fiction, a genre I could never Enoch delving into.

September 27 is Scarf Day!

 Back to posting after a bit of a layoff. Today we celebrate Scarf Day with a sassy cover by our man Bolles. This issue of Gay Parisienne debuted at the turn of 1935, just a few months after Enoch took over the cover art duties. He his cover run ended in June 1938, and the magazine sputtered on for a few more issues until it disappeared from the newsstands, along with virtually the rest of the lineup of smoosh mags. 

All this transpired at the very time when Harry Donenfeld, the publisher of Gay Parisienne and other magazines Bolles worked for, was transitioning into the comic books. His National Allied Comics published the debut issue of of Superman in April 1938. This also coincided with Enoch's hospitalization, which snapped his 16 year streak for Film Fun.  But Bolles would be back a year later with new covers until the magzine was pressured into folding in 1942 by the Postmaster General of the United States, operating at the behest of the Catholic Church. But this is another chapter in the story of Bolles' life and career. 

Happy Valentine's Day from Enoch Bolles

 

Happy Valentine's day courtesy of our man Enoch!  This is his earliest Heart cover theme and by far the most--dare I say--unappetizing. Strange yes, but it follows a theme that several other pretty girl illustrators were pursuing at the time; the helpless little man whose fate hinges on the whims of an indifferent flapper. Here's another even earlier example from a 1923 Film Fun. Clearly, she loves him not.  Either these guys were forced into extinction or Bolles bored of the theme because by 1925 they were no longer spotted again on the covers of any of the magazines that Enoch's art graced.