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| Eagle Vol.5:32, 6 August 1954 "Rubio" |
Eagle, the comic created by the Reverend Marcus Morris and Frank Hampson (and others) was first published on 14 April 1950. "Dan Dare" was the most famous creation and the story of him and the comic has been well documented in many places and the Eagle Society still publish a magazine 4 times a year and organise meet-ups. My friend David Slinn supplied many of the images in today's article for which I'm grateful. I first became aware of the series, I'm focussing on through Christine Sheppard's very handy cuttings file.
A half page colour strip, "True Dog Stories", was replaced in Eagle Vol.5:32 (dated 6 August 1954) by "Famous Horses" with a self-explanatory title and the series ran (with 3 gaps) until Vol.5:50 (10 December 1954).
The first horse (image at the top of this article) featured is "Rubio" - an American horse entered into the Grand National - the story having a triumphant ring after Rubio was towing a trolleybus to build up strength with success. He even has a wikipedia entry.
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| Eagle Vol.5:36, 3 September 1954 "Ghostly Steeplechase" |
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| Eagle Vol.5:40, 1 October 1954 "Black Bess" |
There are few more famous horses, in my opinion, than Black Bess, whose master died at the age of 33. Richard Turpin, better known as Dick Turpin, allegedly rode Bess for 15 hours being chased by the authorities from London to York. However,
Turpin became a legend after his death. His story became linked in print with a legendary ride from London to York to establish an alibi, a tale previously attributed to the highwayman William Nevison. This fictional version was further established when it was included in an 1834 bestseller called Rockwood, in which the author Harrison Ainsworth added a new twist: that Turpin’s horse, Black Bess, expired at York after the record-breaking ride. None of this was true. [Source: York Museum]
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| Eagle Vol.5:44, 29 October 1954 "Winston" |
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| Eagle Vol.5:45, 5 November 1954 "The Queen's Horses" |
The above describes various horses associated with Her Majesty, and also in the last panel Cloudy, Prince Charles' pony.
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| Eagle Vol.5:47, 19 November 1954 "Bucephalus" |
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| Eagle Vol.5:49, 3 December 1954 "The Blind Pony" |
Before I move onto other images drawn by Sheppard for Eagle, here's a full listing of the "Famous Horse Stories" with their artists. The three breaks in the series had George Cansdale and Geoffrey William Backhouse information strip "Look around with..." focussing on nature.
- RS = Raymond Sheppard (Highlighted)
- GB = Geoffrey William Backhouse
- FH = Frank Humphris
So now we turn to two other drawings by Raymond Sheppard that appeared in Eagle.
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| Eagle Vol.2:52, 4 April 1952, p.5 "Advice on your pets: Terriers" |
This quarter page from a 1952 Eagle appeared on page 5 and is one of an irregular series called "Advice on your pets". Early on, the column took up half a page. John Dyke's signature appears from the start and G. William Backhouse drew many of the others and initially Professor Cameron is credited as the author. The series ran from 9 March 1951 (Volume 1: 48) to 3 August 1951 (Volume 2:17). It then took a break before the first episode where Sheppard drew some gorgeous studies of Terriers, above, for the issue dated 4 April 1952 (Volume 2:52).
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| Eagle Vol.3:1, 10 [sic] April 1952 "Advice on your pets: Weaver Birds" |
The next episode was published on 10 [sic] April 1952 (Volume 3:1) - I have no idea why the 10th and not the 11th which was a Friday, but someone spotted the error and corrected next week's issue numeration back to the Friday date!). The following week G. William Backhouse took over the art duties, signing his first two episodes but then omitting his signature (thanks for the ID, David Slinn). The series continued until 4 July 1952 (Volume 3:13) and took a break until 13 March 1953 (Volume 3:49) where it now shrunk to a small feature among many and became a column that gave answers to questions submitted by readers. The artwork is so small it's hard to see who drew the animals and the series ended in the 31 July 1953 (Volume 4:17) issue.
Finally, unless I find any more Sheppard in Eagle, this is my last comment.
In Eagle - on the editorial page - of issue 20 August 1954 (Vol.5:34) we see that terrier illustration but looking closely it looks rather crude compared to the one I've shown you above. That fount of knowledge David Slinn let me know he suspected it was Gerald Lipman who drew this copy.
