Celebrating the Genius of Ken Reid at Christmas

By John Freeman on December 22, 2015

A panel from “Football Forum” drawn by Ken Reid, published in Scorcher, Christmas 1970

Over on this always-entertaining blog about British comics, cartoonist Lew Stringer has posted a number of terrific Christmas strips drawn by the wonderful Ken Reid.

You’ll have seen some of the pages before on Lew’s blog over the years but others will be new to you.

“I thought I’d collate some of the Christmas strips that Ken Reid did over a ten year period from 1964 to 1973,” Lew says, “Some of the funniest pages in British comics…starting off with Frankie Stein‘s first Christmas from Wham! in 1964…”

It’s a wonderful trip down memory lane.

If only the powers that be had given Pat Mills the go ahead to commission Ken to draw a humour strip for 2000AD, centring on a character living in a nuclear bunker post apocalypse, perhaps more comic fans would be aware of this much-missed talent’s great work.

There’s so much of this man’s work do deserving of collection, I simply don’t know where to start, but I do wish an enterprising publisher of children’s books would take a look at his amazing “Fudge the Elf” strip, first published in the Manchester Evening News in 1937, a series easily on a par with “Rupert the Bear”, which I know artist John Ridgway has spent much time on, restoring the work to its original glory. It’s surely well worth consideration.

Check out some of Ken Reid’s Christmas Crackers on Lew’s blog here

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.