Having spent the first Christmas issue of EAGLE on Venus and the second on Mars, Dan and Digby were on Mercury for the third, dated 24th December 1952. As in 1951, there was just a single reference to Christmas in the strip. Dan and Digby are prisoners of the Treens and Digby comments on the fact that it is Christmas back on Earth in a single frame on page two. Dan Dare's creator Frank Hampson was suffering from a breakdown caused by overwork, so this story was illustrated by his team, led by Harold Johns and written by Chad Varah. The issue itself acknowledges Christmas in the title box, which has a decorative Christmas trim across the top and down the left hand side. There is a circular picture of stars behind the eagle image and the title letters are in yellow, instead of the usual white and have snow on them. This layout is exactly the same as the previous year's Christmas issue.
The start of a new 'PC 49' adventure on page three provided the opportunity to reference Christmas strongly, with the episode devoted to the Boys' Club Christmas party and including a seven verse poem about the party extending down the middle of the page. Written by Alan Stranks and illustrated by John Worsley, the strip would run in EAGLE until 1957, although the radio series would end in May of 1953. Page four and a quarter of page five are occupied by the latest episode of the text serial 'The Adventure Club' by the prolific veteran writer J. Jefferson Farjeon, which does not relate to Christmas. However, there is a small 'EAGLE Window' advertising box in the bottom right hand corner of page seven which highlights the 'EAGLE Window' stand at the Schoolboy's Exhibition, being held in the Horticultural Hall in Westminster. Each week for several years, EAGLE included an 'EAGLE Window', which highlighted a different EAGLE related product. This one is number 77 and there were many more to go, indicating the vast amount of merchandising that the weekly spawned. The 'EAGLE Window' stand at the exhibition featured many of the toys, clothes and other merchandise that were available. The rest of page five is occupied by a Christmas puzzle corner, an advertisement for a book about stamps, a request for donations to the N.S.P.C.C. and a short information piece sponsored by the tyre manufacturer, Dunlop. This is actually the seventeenth issue of the 'Dunlop Dispatch' and includes very short articles about Barrage Balloons and Paddle Wheels (from Paddle Steamers). It is not Christmas related.
The next page is the 'Sports Page' and under the headline 'This was my Thrill of the Year', several of EAGLE's sports contributors have written about their most memorable sporting moments during 1952. These include E. Macdonald Bailey's recollection of Jamaica's success in the 4 x 400 metres relay at the Helsinki Olympics and Geoff Paish's celebration of Colin Gregory's fine performance in Tennis' Davis Cup in the final set against Yugoslavia to give Great Britain victory. Gregory was actually replacing Paish, who was injured. Kenneth Wheeler, who was EAGLE's Sports editor recalled a fine performance by Arsenal's reserve defence to beat 'star studded' Blackpool and Jack Crayston witnessed the 1952 F.A. Cup Final from among a 'cross section' of Newcastle and Arsenal fans, a situation that would sadly be unthinkable today. Newcastle won, but Crayston's praises were heaped on Arsenal, who played much of the game with ten men. Although it was created by northerners, EAGLE was necessarily based in London, which is presumably why so many Arsenal supporters were employed on the Sports Page! The page also managed to include a small advertisement for the first EAGLE Sports Annual.
Page eight is the first of the four colour centre pages and is occupied by 'Riders of the Range'. Now illustrated by its most celebrated artist, Frank Humphris, the heroes, Jeff , Luke and Jim Forsythe are in the early stages of 'Jeff Arnold and the Lost Bonanza', about an ornate Mexican saddle that Jeff buys which leads him and his friends into a series of perilous adventures. There was no Christmas reference in this episode. Written by Charles Chilton, at this time, 'Riders of the Range' was still on the radio, but it would finish there before next Christmas. However, Jeff's adventures in EAGLE would run for another nine years, produced by Chilton and Humphris.
The top half of the centrespread is a 'cutaway' drawing by L. Ashwell Wood of the stage and backstage area of a theatre during a Christmas Pantomime. Like all Ashwell Wood's cutaways, it is highly detailed and obviously provides another Christmas element to the issue. Below the cutaway is 'Luck of the Legion', featuring in only his second serial adventure 'Death by the Dawn'. Written by Geoffrey Bond and illustrated by Martin Aitchison, the story is set in Syria and in this episode, Luck and his men narrowly escape death, when a bridge ahead of them is blown up by rebels or freedom fighters, depending on your point of view. As an ongoing serial, there is no mention of Christmas in this episode.
Page eleven is split into two informative strips. The first is 'Their Names Made Words' and this is about William Banting, a nineteenth century undertaker who ate so much that he became unhealthily overweight, so he gave up beer, milk and all fatty foods, eating only meat, fish and dry toast. Christmas is quite cleverly contrived into this strip which begins by showing how many people ate huge Christmas meals in Victorian times and then leading in to Banting's dieting. Banting gave his name to dieting and the strip says "Women still say they are banting when they diet to get slim". But this strip was produced in 1952 and while the word survived till then, it is no longer used today. The lower half of the page features a strip called 'Strange Animal Adventures' and references G.K. Chesterton's poem 'The Donkey' about the donkey that carried Mary to Bethlehem and then after the birth of Jesus, to safety in Egypt. As in Chesterton's poem, the strip ends with the same donkey being the one that carried Jesus into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, thirty three years later. When I first read Chesterton's poem, I looked up the life span of donkeys to find out if this was credible and it is. Donkeys can live for over forty years. Apart from the star of Bethlehem behind the eagle on the cover and a brief reference in the 'Banting' strip to Christmas meals celebrating the birthday of Christ, this is the first significant reference to Christmas being about Jesus' birth in this issue, but it is not the last. The Editor's Letter from the Rev. Marcus Morris, on the next page promotes a strong Christian message: We should give and receive presents, but we do it in remembrance of Christ. After referencing the other Christmas elements in the issue, the Editor goes on to introduce the new back page biography, which begins in this issue. This is the life of St. Vincent De Paul, the sixteenth century French priest and champion of the poor and Morris uses his example to promote his 'muscular Christianity' ideal. He says "there is nothing namby-pamby about being a Christian.... it's a man's job." He goes on to quote St. Paul, so this editorial is unequivocal in its message.
The rest of the page is split into several sections as usual. There is a Christmas crossword competition with prizes of Ingersoll 'Dan Dare' pocket watches, a 'Readers' Letters' section, with one from Roy Dinning of Glasgow, suggesting that EAGLE Club badges should be polished daily. There is more news of the Schoolboy's Exhibition in Westminster, where there was an EAGLE stand in addition to the 'EAGLE Window' one mentioned earlier. This was the largest stand in the exhibition and was built in the form of Dan Dare's spaceship! EAGLE was not just a boy's weekly. It was a major part of juvenile culture in the 1950s. Also on the page is a short report on an EAGLE Club visit to Chessington Zoo, some photographs of prize winners from a previous competition, an advertisement for Marcus Morris' record about the forthcoming Coronation and the three picture humorous strip, 'Chicko' by Norman Thelwell. This had a Christmas theme. Chicko notices a sign in a shop window, saying 'We wish You a Merry Christmas' and he writes underneath 'Thank You! The Same To You!'
Page twelve and a quarter of page thirteen contains a complete text story 'Ron's Christmas' which is about a boy who finds a bag of stolen jewellery. Knowing that his widowed mother cannot afford to buy him and his siblings the presents they would like for Christmas, he toys with the idea of trying to sell them before his conscience leads him to take them to the Police. Worried that he will be punished for his delay, he is finally rewarded by the Jeweller who gives him enough money to buy presents for the whole family. The writer was Guy Daniel, an Anglican clergyman, who later scripted 'The Road of Courage' (the story of Jesus) and the life of Sir Walter Raleigh, for the back page. While these strips would be attributed to Marcus Morris, the scripting was by Daniel. No less than three Anglican vicars contributed to this Christmas issue, with Morris as editor and Chad Varah as scriptwriter of 'Dan Dare'. A corner of page twelve contains an advertisement for a small 'Ever Ready' hand held vacuum cleaner, while the rest of page thirteen includes a self examination Christmas quiz about unselfish behaviour, with three possible answers to each question, only one of which is correct. The rest of the page contains adverts for a club run by Cadbury's chocolate manufacturers, Newmark watches and 'Golden Arrow' stamp albums.
The last three pages are all strips, with 'Harris Tweed Extra Special Agent' occupying page fourteen. This humorous strip has a Christmas theme, with Tweed accidentally thwarting a robber's plan to use an anaesthetic gas to put everyone to sleep so that he can steal their jewels at a Christmas party. Tweed's whole page stories must have been a challenge for cartoonist John Ryan, for they each contained five rows of detailed strip artwork and they were consistently funny. Page fifteen featured 'Tommy Walls', the strip sponsored by Wall's Ice Cream. Since May, the strip had become a serial story instead of weekly self contained stories and it had also become extremely popular with readers. Illustrated by Richard Jennings and often written by him as well, this episode makes a brief reference to Christmas in the final frame of the strip, when Tommy, swimming in the Thames in an attempt to stop an evil megalomaniac from destroying the Houses of Parliament, thinks "What a way to spend Christmas Eve," and imagines himself succeeding and celebrating Christmas with a Wall's ice cream. With the introduction of serial stories, the 'Tommy Walls' strip moved into Dick Barton Special Agent territory, with fast paced action, which made it more difficult to honour its contract to include Wall's ice cream in every episode. Nevertheless, it did and the unlikely plots involving evil geniuses and secret service commandos proved a major success. Wall's must have been delighted.
The final page marks the start of 'Man of Courage' about St. Vincent De Paul. Written by 'R.B. Saxe' whose real name was Francis John Dickson, it was illustrated by Norman Williams. Like most back page biographies, the strip begins with incidents from the subject's boyhood. These were usually fictional and in the case of Vincent, it gave Dickson the opportunity to include Christmas. The story begins on Christmas Eve and Vincent and his family go to the "Christmas Eve Service at Church" (presumably Midnight Mass) and they look at the crib before returning home. Vincent was an ideal subject for EAGLE, because he led an eventful life, which involved being captured and enslaved in North Africa, before escaping and later volunteering to take another man's place as a rower on a prison galley. He created an order of nuns to serve the poor that still functions to this day and he inspired a lay person's group which also provides for the needy and again is still active all over the world. Dickson wrote three back page biographies for EAGLE and although all three led genuinely action packed lives, he embellished them all with fictional villains and events in the finest traditions of Hollywood.
This issue focuses quite successfully on the religious and charitable aspects of Christmas and avoids a strong emphasis on merchandise, despite the fact that EAGLE initiated so much. However, the issues leading up to Christmas were full of advertisements for EAGLE related products and other potential presents for boys, with special four page advertising supplements from late November to mid December.
With the arrival of Frank Humphris and 'Luck of the Legion' and the change of 'Tommy Walls' to a serial story, EAGLE was continuing to improve. Despite the temporary absence of Frank Hampson from the 'Dan Dare' strip, the publication as a whole was far better than it had been at its launch two and a half years earlier and it would continue to improve for several years.
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