This week MAD magazine publishes its 500th edition after 57 years. MAD magazine cartoonist Tom Richmond tells us what to expect this week:
The editors and staff wanted to have issue 500 contain as many of the artists and writers who helped MAD get to issue 500 as possible, so MAD took a sort of “kitchen sink” approach to the issue. They added 6 pages for a total of 58, with only 6 pages of ads (and that includes two pages for MAD subscriptions and MAD books/stuff). In fact, all four of the interior “paid” ads appear in the front of the issue, in the letters section and only one in the Fundalini Pages. After that it’s nothing but MADness.
Artists Tom mentions that will be in this edition include:
Don “Duck” Edwing, Paul Peter Porges, Bob Clarke, Rick Tulka, Paul Coker, Al Jaffee, Sam Sisco, Sergio Aragones, Mort Drucker, James Warhola, Gerry Gersten, Tom Richmond, Angelo Torres, Harry North Esq., Richard Williams and Hermann Mejia. Work from artists who have passed away will also be included: Dave Berg, Bill Elder, Kelly Freas, Harvey Kurtzman, Don Martin, Norman Mingo, Jack Rickard, Basil Wolverton, Wally Wood and George Woodbridge.
Please forgive the bald-face plug here, but this seems like the perfect time to announce to one-and-all that the upcoming fourth issue of STAY TOONED! MAGAZINE will feature profiles (new interviews and lotsa art!) of Jack Davis, Sergio Aragones, Paul Coker, Duck Edwing, Tom Richmond, Ted Rall, Scott Nickel and John Kovaleski – all cartoonists whose work has appeared in MAD. The issue will sport a Tom Richmond cover, too!
I’ll be in issue #500, too! MAD hits an all-time low.
Wow, I may just have to go find a place to buy this one! 😉
Alan…did Tom mention Jack Davis?
Early MAD wasn’t MAD without Kurtzman,
Elder, Wood and…Davis.
I recently borrowed my dad’s 1958 copy of “Mad For Keeps” which is one of the first hard cover books I remember opening as a kid. Jack Davis’s “Anyone can build this coffee table”, “Million Dollar Horse – Naushea’s Story”, and “Baseball, Science or Skill?” still crack me up.
Yeah, Wally Wood, Kurtzman et al — I remember those guys’ work, had cousins that collected the earlier MAD magazines. Wood is one of all time biggest influences for inking.
Can’t remember my comics history, but was there not some cross-pollination amongst those guys and Wil Eisner?
Wood at one time worked for Eisner drawing some of
“The Spirit” strips for him.
Nope. No Jack Davis. 🙁
That’s a REAL shame! Mr. Davis, I believe is still living
and would have gotten a real kick out of some sort of
tribute to his work for MAD. Such is life.
Well, there is plenty of Jack’s work in MAD 500 but it’s all spot examples from classics in the “decades” tribute spreads. No new work from him, but that was his decision. I understand he was given the opportunity to contribute but declined.
wow 500 issues!!!!!!!!!!! and what became of cracked and crazy?
I’m still upset at my mother for throwing out those old issues of Mad Magazine over 35 years ago! (Their first issue was Oct 1952)
Love the TV show they have a magizine…Wow