British Comic Stamps: The Beano

By John Freeman on March 20, 2012

Royal Mail Comic Collection 2012 - Beano

Here’s the second of our ten posts to mark the release of the Royal Mail’s Comic Collection, celebrating 75 years of British comics. The Royal Mail have kindly sent us large versions of each stamp, so we thought we’d show them off in all their glory, in the order of first comic publication.

The Beano first appeared on 30th July 1938. The Dennis the Menace strip (now known as Dennis and Gnasher) first appeared in 1951 and is the longest running strip in the comic. Other iconic strips include the Bash Street Kids, Roger the Dodger and Minnie the Minx.

Still Britain’s best-selling weekly comic, the title is also available for iPad and the app had over 72,000 downloads within days of launch earlier this year. There’s more about The Beano online at www.beano.com

• Stamps and stamp products are available at all Post Office branches, online at www.royalmail.com/personal/comic-stamps-and-collectibles, the Royal Mail eBay shop: http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Royal-Mail-Stamp-Collections and from Royal Mail Tallents House (tel. 08457 641 641), 21 South Gyle Crescent, Edinburgh, EH12 9PB.

John Freeman

The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.

Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.

He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.