6 May 1959 Afterburner

There was a lot more material in the 6 May 1959 edition than the previous week's paper, some of which was quite interesting.  

Back before there word processors that could handle Japanese one way of getting Japanese into a American paper was to print handwritten text as an image. I haven't seen a lot of this in Afterburner. Translation? "For your future buy US government savings bonds."

This piece by the tireless Jack Lebo accompanied a very dated article about knowing one's drinking ability.

A new banner for the paper's regular legal advice column.

I guess this was the image of "Mom" for Americans back in 1959. This AFPS piece is also by Jack Lebo, and once again we see his range of artistic ability. Check out the broach. 

Nothing exciting -- just a space filler. But things like this were a key part of the structure of the paper.

This is a clever, pre-digital mind you, mix of a real photo with hand-drawn art.

Once again, the sports editor John Boyle gives a fantastic bio-comic (my term).

Another space filler graphic.

29 April 1959 Afterburner

There were only two new graphics in this issue of Yokota's base paper. Hopefully the upcoming newspapers won't all be so empty of material!

Fantastic art by Jack Lebo. The rhyme, well, no comment.

Here is where we can see high school yearbook-caliber work creeping in, which doesn't surprise me since that's really all these kids probably knew before they joined the service. This art accompanied a 2-page spread of various photos taken around base. 

22 April 1959 Afterburner

There were three new graphics in the 22 April 1959 Afterburner: Two from AFPS by Jack Lebo, and one locally drawn but unsigned portrait. Enjoy!

Sketch of the outgoing 6102d Air Base Wing commander from Yokota Air Base, Col James E. Johnston. Too bad it wasn't signed, though I would guess it was by the newspaper's staff artist Mr. Manabe Hideo.

The AFPS SOPs by Jack Lebo just keep coming. This one's good, but really dated since USO dances no longer occur, but were apparently still a part of military life in 1959. Also, do people still ask for dances (that's the joke of course -- instead of saying "May I have the next dance?", he's asking for the intermssion for some unspecified reason that we're supposed to guess). 

Now this is new. Here we have AFPS' Jack Lebo doing a sports-page portrait of an athlete from Alaska that was distributed to US military papers around the world. Very nice, and it shows Lebo's depth of ability. 

15 April 1959 Afterburner

Two pieces to show today: One from AFPS by "Sebo," and one local from John Boyle. I am happy to report that I have discovered who the artist "Sebo" is. If you have read my previous blogs you'll see that not only didn't I know who he was, but I obviously I didn't even know to spell his name. Well, his full name is Jack Lebo (the L in his signature looks like an S to me), and as of 2009 he was still alive and living in Levittown, Pennsylvania. Amazing. 

Another AFPS SOP. Kind of a dumb joke, but done with a sincere enthusiasm.

Another awesome piece by sports editor John Boyle. The ball caps are accurate by the way, and the Y was for Yokota.

8 Apr 59 Afterburner

Just one graphic to report from the 8 April 1959 Afterburner: A really nice little piece from page 8 in the sports section. Self-explanatory.

1 April 1959 Afterburner

The 1 April edition had a lot of graphics, most of which were ads for the Red Cross that probably came as a package from the US. Well, see what you think.

I like this one. It really says "1959."

I like this one too.

An SOP by the mysterious SEBO, sent from AFPS. Good art, pretty good joke.

I like the 3-D feel of this one.

There was a feature story on doing karate at Yokota with nice local lettering and terrific art by the talented Japanese artist Mr. Manabe Hideo. 

 

The last piece was another Red Cross ad.

25 March 1959 Afterburner

There wasn't much in the way of graphics in the 25 March 1959 edition of Afterburner, so I thought I would include the publishing info section on page two since it includes a small banner written in a Chinatown-type font (very typical of the time). It also shows the names of the individuals who put together the paper every week.

The paper included an AFPS-produced Rhymes of the Times. Dumb poem, but the art (by SeBe) is pretty nice.

The next three pieces accompanied a feature article by someone from Yokota who had visited Bangkok, Thailand. The story included some handsome sketches which I presume were done locally at Yokota.

18 March 1959 Afterburner

This issue's graphics were mostly from AFPS. Everything here really has the feel of another time period.

This banner was presumably locally made, and was for an editorial on planning.

This one appeared without text. I honestly don't get the joke. Is that a helmet he's holding out? So he's a homeless veteran? What?

I guess this is an effective way to encourage survival during a fire, though in 2012 we'd probably tell the guy to go straight for the exit rather than to crawl around looking for a fire extinguisher.

Rhymes of the Times from AFPS. Consistently lame and dumb.

Another AFPS poster by SeBO. SeBe? I love the 1950s way of speaking: "Let 'em out buddy!" And how about the use of Uncle Sam? It was probably this kind of stuff that turned good old fashioned American patriotism into a parody of itself.

This was local art accompanying a story about a fellow at Yokota who hand-built his own WWI-era Fokker.

An AFPS SNAFU cartoon. It's hard to believe that even in 1959 this one slipped through. It's funny, but more like "men's magazine" funny.

This is pretty funny too.

11 March 1959 Afterburner

The 11 March 1959 Afterburner had seven new graphics found on pages 2, 3, 7, 8 and 10. The last two were local productions, while the rest were from AFPS.

Another by SeBe from AFPS. We saw another like this recently, in that its message is crystal clear and useful. If the target audience was 18-25 year olds, then using a cartoon to get their attention probably worked. The artwork is ok.

Not a bad joke. AFPS, also by SeBe.

What is this telling us about humor in the late 1950s? What is it telling us about the US Navy at that time? Wow, truly unfunny. Probably from AFPS.

A little propaganda piece in the middle of the newspaper.

AFPS' work. Kind of lame, but I'm sure it kept eyeballs in the paper.

A locally produced banner for a recurring article on Yokota's gun club.

This John Boyle piece was part of a sports feature on the possibility of no Little League season at Yokota. Boyle must have had some cartooning training.

4 March 1959 Afterburner

Only three graphic pieces to show from the 4 March 1959 Afterburner.

As with the other "Rhymes," can you imagine a 20-year old soldier, sailor, marine or airman -- the target audience --reading this and saying, "yeah, that's so true!"?

In order to get the joke you have to know what "WAC" means: Women's Air Corps. This is definitely from a different time.

Very nice local banner, and it's even dated.

25 February 1959 Afterburner

Not too much in this issue: 3 pieces from AFPS by Mr. Johnson (we've seen his work before), and one local by A2/C John Boyle.

Another well-done SNAFU from AFPS by the unknown Mr. Johnson. Do all of you know what SNAFU stands for?

Yet another Rhymes of th' Times space filler. Nice art by Johnson.

This is a good gag. I could run this in an Air Force paper today and it would get a laugh.

John Boyle's at it again with this nice comic. The building in the center was the Yokota bowling alley, a saw-toothed industrial building that was demolished long ago. And it's true -- bowling was huge at Yokota in the old days.