I wrote this 10 years ago way back in 2013.

Now, we're months away from Doctor Who's 60th. And while Disney didn't gobble up the rights to the franchise, they are the primary broadcaster of the series throughout most of the world except the UK, which is wild, to say the least.

That's how crazy the world can be in a decade.

Orrin C. Evans (1902 - 1971) and All-Negro Comics (June 1947)

The story behind the creation of Milestone Media has been told and retold for over 20 years, but the story behind the first comic book written and drawn by Black talent is one worth sharing.

The origins feel just like a typical superhero origin story. Orrin C. Evans was a reporter for many Black-owned newspapers throughout the north, starting with the Philadelphia Tribune  and Philadelphia Independent. In the mid-1930s, Mr. Evans was hired by the Philadelphia Record and became one of the first Black journalists at a mainstream widely-circulated newspaper in the country. While there, he wrote several general assignment pieces and caught the eye of the United States Congress with his series about segregation in the military. Written in 1944, Mr. Evans exposed how moronic and hypocritical segregation was in a military that is overseas fighting in a war where they want to restore democracy and make all men equal and free. The article was read in the halls of Congress, and Mr. Evans got many accolades from his peers for his work. 

By the end of the war, the Record was faltering and eventually ceased publication. Mr. Evans worked at various Black newspapers and outlets, including the Philadelphia Independent, the Chicago Defender, and The Crisis (the NAACP’s magazine founded by W.E.B. Du Bois) writing about issues that affect the Black community. He wanted to bring some of those positive attitudes and values he wrote about, not to mention a sense of pride to younger readers. Seeing a lack of positive, non-stereotypical Black superheroes in the still-new comic book industry, Mr. Evans felt the need to give the Black community their own champions and heroes they could look up to and be proud of.

That’s when Orrin C. Evans became a comic publisher.

Along with writers Bill Driscoll and Harry T. Saylor, Mr. Evans created a publishing team for this endeavor to create an all-Black comic book featuring Black creators and Black characters. His brother George Evans Jr., John Terrill, and a pair of one-named artists (Cooper and Cravat) were the artists and plotters of the stories in their initial book, All-Negro Comics.

Among the characters introduced in the first issue were the hard-boiled detective Ace Harlem, a hero named Lion Man who was an American-born scientist who protects and guards a mystical mountain which is a source of  an element that many kingdoms want their hands on,  a cutesy tale entitled Dew Dillies about a pair of wide-eyed childlike pixies. and a pair of humor strips, Sugarfoot and Lil’ Eggie. All of these made their way into the very first issue of All-Negro Comics in June 1947.

Sadly, this was the only issue ever published. The creative teams had strips ready for the next couple of issues, but newsprint distributors (likely pressured by bigger publishers) wouldn’t sell Mr. Evans any more paper to print his books, and he had no other choice but to shutter operations on All-Negro Comics.

Not much is known about the creators of the titles, but Orrin C. Evans returned to newspapers shortly after the end of All-Negro Comics serving as editor of the Chester Times and the Philadelphia Bulletin, director of the Philadelphia Press Association, and an officer of the Newspaper Guild of Greater Philadelphia, and got many more accolades from his peers up to his death in 1971 at the age of 68. The New York Times, in their eulogy, called Mr. Evans “the dean of Black reporters,” but truth be told, he was perhaps the “father of Black comic books.“ 

Heads up.

A Kickstarter guided by Chris Robinson (Marvel VOICES), Tony Washington, and Deron Bennett has launched for a hardcover and a digital remaster of All-Negro Comics #1 with contributions from several talented scholars and creators who’ll provide insight on the creation of the comic as well as new stories featuring characters introduced in those pages.

Support if you can. Spread the word. Make it a reality.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/allnegrocomics/all-negro-comics-75th-anniversary-edition?ref=thanks-tweet

History lesson, kids. You might get this wrong, but you’ll be a lot smarter when you learn the answer.

I have two iconic American inventions here. the chocolate chip cookie and the Oreo cookie. Which one of these favorites is older? If you think it’s the chocolate chip cookie, you’re absolutely wrong.

I know, it surprised me too, but here’s the skinny.

People love chocolate and they love cookies. So, at the turn of the 20th century, more industrialized products came into households, and one of the first was a popular chocolate cookie filled with a sweet white creamy filling. And this cookie was called … the Hydrox. Made by the Sunshine Biscuit Company, the Hydrox (named after the cooking process combining hydrogen and oxygen) was introduced in 1908 and became a hit with consumers. 

Meanwhile, several smaller bakery companies made their versions of the Hydrox, but the National Biscuit Company created their own knockoff that would take over the world, so to speak. The Oreo Biscuit was created in 1912 and completely eclipsed the Hydrox in popularity and sales (some to this day still call Hydrox an Oreo-ripoff despite predating the cookie by four years). 

While off-the-shelf cookies were a quick convenience for an increasingly lazy society, some still preferred their cookies to be homemade. Baking chocolate was becoming more available  for home use, so making chocolate-flavored things had never been easier. Unfortunately, the prices for baking chocolate has always been higher than readily available chocolate bars. Depending on which version of the story you hear, the invention of the chocolate chip cookie was an accident made by Ruth Wakefield, co-owner of the Toll House Inn. The Inn opened up in 1930 by Ruth and her husband Kenneth in Whitman, MA. Mrs. Wakefield, a trained dietitian, prepared and cooked all of the meals for the inn and became famous around New England for her deserts.

One day in 1936, she ran out of baking chocolate for her new batch of  butter drop do cookies. Mrs. Wakefield used pieces of a Nestle semi-sweet chocolate bar as a substitute hoping the chocolate would blend in as smoothly as the baking chocolate. To her surprise, the pieces remained intact, and the Toll House cookie, also known as the chocolate chip cookie, was born. The recipe was reprinted throughout New England, eventually grabbing the attention of Nestle, who put the recipe on their semisweet chocolate bars with Mrs. Wakefield’s permission. By 1939, chocolate chips were on the marketplace, and Mrs. Wakefield got fame, fortune, and chocolate for life up until her death in 1977. 

So, while some may think it’s been around forever, chocolate chip cookies are a pretty modern invention that came 24 years after the world was introduced to Oreo cookies.

Badass

let’s do this isntead of blocking off escalators and elevators k

That is amazing

Honestly shit like this makes me love humans .. and I normally hate them so thank you engineers y'all are perfect beautiful people and need all the huggles

i would definitely spend like an hour there, going up and down and playing songs

Every time I see this post I just grin.

Neat!

Then again, falling down the stairs could make quite a sound. 

Lupita Nyong'o attends the ‘Black Panther’ premiere at Dolby Theatre on January 29, 2018 in Hollywood, California

What the world needs now is more Lupita Nyong’o love. 

Shame the Academy snubbed Us this season. I’m still hoping she’ll grace the place with her presence. 

I Just Woke Up

Howdy, hello, and salutations.

It’s been … too damned long since I’ve talked to you guys at BFMC, and a lot of it has to do with personal issues on the other side of the screen. There have been some dark times lately, but for the first time in a long time, I’m feeling pretty groovy. I’m losing weight, finally understanding where I want to go in this complicated relationship I’m in, getting back into my art and writing, creating some great things, and working on projects I’m not ready to reveal quite yet. In all, I’m stronger than I look.

Also, I’ve been trying to find my place in the whole Black Comic Fandom. Being shunned, scoffed at, and muted by the creator of #BlackComicsMonth for stating a differing opinion about shows all while questioning my blackness was the moment that broke me. That, and the dogpile that followed, kind of hurt too, but I’m a big boy. There’s also this weird belief that Black creators must only work on Black characters. That seems limiting, counter-productive, and counter-progressive. It’s almost like those who believe that wants to keep creators in a creative ghetto of sorts, and that’s no way to be. 

I mean, can’t I enjoy Black Panther, Storm, Luke Cage, Bumblebee, John Stewart, Vixen, Cyborg, Monica Rambeau, Misty Knight, Miles Morales, Ironheart (fourth picture), and Naomi McDuffie even though they all had White creators? In the same light, can’t I enjoy Kyle Rayner, The Question, Plastic Man, Superman, Batman, or other mainstream titles and characters who aren’t Black but written and drawn by Black creators? I can’t enjoy a show like Craig of the Creek, which doesn’t have a Black creator but has a predominately Black cast, and a show like OK KO! Let’s Be Heroes [second pic courtesy of Cartoon Network], which doesn’t have a Black cast of characters but does have a Black creator? According to some, no.

So, yeah, screw that ashy crowd.

I want to celebrate both Black comic creators and Black comic characters. I’m all for GOOD representations of the African diaspora across all mediums, including comics, including both the characters and the talent behind them. I love to showcase creators like Anthony Piper (whose Trill League just got picked up to become an animated series on Quibi), Nilah MacGurder, Sanford Greene, Jamal Campbell (the artist behind DC’s Naomi and Far Sector [third pic]), Afua Richardson, Ashley Woods, Jon Gray, and Khary Randolph among so many as well as writers like David Walker, N.K. Jemisin, Eve Ewing, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Mildred Louis, Chuck Collins, and others. I’d love to talk about more animated projects that caught my eye, like Wesley T. Louis’ The Mighty Grand Pinton (top pic). Black folks are still creating comics and so much more, and it’s a pretty awesome place. 

That’s the thing about loving a medium like comics. There’s no real way to enjoy them, just as long as we do. Opinions tend to differ. I know there are people that don’t like sites like BFMC. I’ve gotten a few hecklers now and then, but you know what? That’s cool. I’ll just keep on presenting these characters and creators to audiences that don’t know about them. That’s my mission here.

I don’t know what the next several months or two will look like in the future of this site, but I’m making it a mission to become more active here in 2020. 

If you like what I do around this site, do you mind helping a brother out? I don’t ask for much, but considering I’m a freelancer due to the fact that I’m currently a caregiver, funds are low and I can’t do a lot of things I want to do. I’m going to be fine, but if you could help, I’d greatly appreciate it. 

Amazon Wish List:

https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/2AMUWUOGE5QG1?ref_=wl_share

PayPal:

http://paypal.me/nemalki

I promise I won’t bombard you with this kind of message monthly. I just needed to put it out there. 

If you know any indie creators who need love, I’ll showcase them here as well. The more, the merrier. Let’s have fun again!

And I run this place too. 

Today (January 21) is my birthday. I feel blessed. But if you want to help a brother out, go to either of those links to do so.

Thanks.

You know, back in the day when Goku wasn’t revealed to be an alien and radically changing everything about the series, Yamcha used to be a real bad-ass at times on Dragon Ball. 

DBZ just made him the butt monkey, and he hasn’t lived that down since. Shame. 

joyce

I love everything about this. 

I do get the “40-Year Old Virgin” vibe from the pose though. 

Still dig it.

Zendaya Coleman – 25th Annual Critics’ Choice Awards

*from my regular blog*

*heart eyes*

PSA

You know what bothers me the most about how little coverage the Australian fires are getting?

I could mention that 18 people are now dead, several are missing and over 1000 homes are lost. All at the start of a new year. +3 million hectares of land is gone. People feel a little bit of empathy, maybe they'll reblog this or give it a like, but they'll give it no second thought.

But if I were to make a post just solely about the fact that 500 million animals have been killed in these fires, including 30% of all koalas meaning they're close to being functionally extinct, people would share the fuck out of it. They would start GoFundMe pages, they would guilt people into reblogging shit with the classic, "if you don't reblog this you don't have a heart." You know that trope yeah?

You all fucking shoved posts about the Amazon fires down our throats. "Oh but they were deliberately lit on Native land." You don't think we understand that? Do you know that is exactly what's happened here? As a woman of Aboriginal descent, do you get how upsetting it is for me to watch my country burn? To watch my friends houses burn to the grown whilst they're left to flee to the beach in hope's of not being burnt? Do you know how upsetting it is to think that the house that I grew up in probably won't be standing in a couple days? All because the RFS are not allowed to backburn because of politics. Politics who don't understand a single fuck about anything that is happening.

Every night I have to try my hardest not to break down in front of my family because I am so upset and so angry about this whole situation. Men and women are out there fighting this fire, missing out on time with their family, time at work meaning they can't afford to feed their family either, they miss out on holidays too.

My brother was sent on a strike team up to Sydney for Christmas. He almost didn't make it back for New Years, even when he got home, he was so tired to go out so him and I stayed at home and played the PS4. And what makes me angry is that some families out there don't see their brothers come home, their sons, their fathers, their sisters, mothers, daughters.

Because people are dying.

And no one other than Australians give a single fuck!

Canberra currently ranks at number 8 for worst air quality in the world right now. The elderly in nursing homes are being evacuated and have nowhere to go. People were jumping in lakes, were swimming out into the ocean to get away from the fire as it started to burn the beach.

And what does our Prime Minister do?

He arrives at fire impacted towns, in a nice and expensive 100k BMW, to give his thoughts and prayers. Not aid, not water and food, not money. But thoughts and prayers.

"I'm sure he's just tired."

"No, no. He lost a house."

"Oh."

How more insensitive can the fucker get? This isn't a Prime Minister. This is a disgrace. May I also mention we are in our worst drought yet but "we" just sold 409 million dollars worth of drinking water overseas.

I am begging all of you by this point. Please, help out our victims of fire and drought. Donate to whatever causes you can, search the internet, I'm sure there are plenty out there. Donate packs of water, toiletries, food that doesn't spoil, socks, sleeping bags, anything.

Every small gesture you do makes a big impact on somebody who lost everything.