Thank You For being Patrons

First off, I want to thank the entire staff at the Custer County Art & Heritage Center in Miles City, Montana, for asking me to participate in their recent exhibition. There were five artists in the portion of the show entitled Inside Out: A landscape exhibit, and myself with Old Paper New Art. The opening was held on Sunday, October 9th in the afternoon, with demonstrations and gallery talks. It was fabulous. I really couldn't have wished for a more splendid venue.

I didn't have a chance to do much demonstrating, although I did try to finish a Thank You for a piece of art I'd finished the week before, but I spent most of my time on the gallery talk, and answering questions as they were asked.

Kevin and Marie purchased "Have Duster, Will Travel", which I posted way back in November of 2010. It was a fun piece to do, but now I have to come up with an even better eye-catcher to hang on the wall.

Kathy purchased "Startup With a Coke", which I completed in June of 2009. A back story that was simply too good to be true, and both my wife and I will find it hard to replace it on our wall.

Bess purchased "Ming Trout Flies", which I completed in 2010. I did not post this piece when I completed it, primarily because I needed to get it to the framers before the Western Heritage Show. I've now sold every piece of (trout) fly paper I could put my hands on.

Dustin & Erin purchased "Five Feet In the Air", which I completed earlier this year. Here again, I don't know how long it will be before I see another piece of Brown Shoe Company paper, but I sure wish I could find some. Buster & Tige are still popular after all these years.

As is my rule, I will not put addresses on any of the mail art I put up here without prior approval. These four pieces will go in the mail in the AM.

Buster Brown Reprise

In 1902 successful Sunday Cartoonist Richard Outcault, who developed the comic strip character The Yellow Kid, came up with a new character - his name was Buster, a little rich kid with a pompadour haircut and a (talking) dog named Tige. Bottom line is that Tige is believed to be the first talking animal in the comic strips, and it largely went unnoticed.  Buster had no last name - until 1904. That year at the St. Louis Exposition, Outcault sold the licensing rights to Buster to the Brown Shoe Company. Buster had initially been introduced in Outcault's The Yellow Kid strip, and reaction from fans was one of reasons Buster developed a following of his own.

In June of 2009 I published a post of a piece of letterhead from the Brown Shoe Company upon which I had placed an image of a piece of sheet music for which Richard Outcault had drawn his version of the song title: the Buster One Step That was a letterhead. This is the same image on another piece of Brown Shoe company paper. I have several smaller billheads, but the Buster and Tige images are really popular.

Now if I could only take some decent marble pictures for models, I'd be putting old marbles on old paper!

Buster Brown & Tige

In 1902 successful Sunday Cartoonist Richard Outcault, who developed the comic strip character The Yellow Kid, came up with a new character - his name was Buster, a little rich kid with a pompadour haircut and a (talking) dog named Tige. Bottom line is that Tige is believed to be the first talking animal in the comic strips, and it largely went unnoticed.  Buster had no last name - until 1904. That year at the St. Louis Exposition, Outcault sold the licensing rights to Buster to the Brown Shoe Company.

In June of 2009 I published a post of a piece of letterhead from the Brown Shoe Company upon which I had placed an image of a piece of sheet music for which Richard Outcault had drawn his version of the song title: the Buster One Step That was a letterhead.

This billhead is dated August 22, 1907. The Brown Shoe Company was not yet incorporating Buster into their marketing, but Outcault was making Buster more human, better to appeal to people as just another kid. The Company virtually adopted Buster and gave him a last name. They then sent kids out across the country with bulldogs, dressed just like Buster and Tige appear here. They made guest appearances at Brown Company shoe stores all over the U.S.

Five Feet In The Air

In 1902, Richard Fenton Outcault developed a cartoon character by the name of Buster, who quickly became an advertising phenomena. In 1904, the Brown Shoe Company purchased the licensing rights to Buster for $200, and Buster Brown began to sell shoes like there was no tomorrow. A rich little kid with a dog named Tige made a household name of the Brown Shoe Company and by 1917, with updated and more life-like features, Brown made Buster their permanent logo. Advertising art from a cartoon character? Literally, this was just the beginning.