Ted Dawson over at “Three Men in a Tub” blog reports that an original Garfield comic strip is for sale an eBay store for $4,499. The seller writes that it is thought to be the 25th strip published in papers and one of the earliest Garfield originals to be sold publicly.
Disclaimer: With all auctions, online or otherwise, I make no claims as to the authenticity of the item being sold. Do your homework before making purchases.
Anyone here know if Jim Davis wrote/drew Garfield solo in the begining?
Of course he did. Can you think of a cartoonist who would hire gag writers and ghost artists out of the gate? I’ve seen this strip for sale for a number of months now.
I agree with Rick on the answer, but I believe Larry’s question to be a valid one especially considering Jim Davis’ background as an assistant on Tumbleweeds. If I were going to spend five grand for an original Garfield strip, I would want to make sure it was actually drawn by Davis and not Joe Shmoe the ghost artist.
It should be noted here that “being for sale” is not the same as “sold for”.
According to the official Garfield website, it is indeed the 25th strip (7/13/78)
http://www.garfield.com/comics/comics_archives_strip.html?1978-ga780713
It’s wayyy overpriced. Peanuts originals often go for a lot less.
Does anyone know the date of the last Garfield strip Jim Davis drew?
Rick: “Garfield” was conceived as little more than an excuse for marketing from the beginning. I have no doubt that Davis would be the type to start a sweatshop… er… studio from the start.
I don’t know, Pab. I wouldn’t call the first character design of Garfield from the first strips very marketable. He really was fat, ugly and lazy. He looked more like a Kliban cat. However, that did seem to change rather quickly. I don’t know if that was because of the desire to expand the cat’s marketability or if it was just a natural progression of design to allow more expressiveness and range of motion of the character in the comic frame. Perhaps a little of both?