Queer Visitors from the Marvelous Land of Oz Nov 20 1904

''Queer Visitors from the Marvelous Land of Oz'' was a newspaper comic strip written by

L. Frank Baum Lyman Frank Baum (; May 15, 1856 – May 6, 1919) was an American author best known for his children's books, particularly ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' and its sequels. He wrote 14 novels in the ''Oz'' series, plus 41 other novels (not includ ...

and illustrated by

Walt McDougall Walter Hugh McDougall (February 10, 1858 – March 6, 1938) was an American cartoonist. He produced some of the earliest full color newspaper comic strips, and was one of the first producers of regular political cartoons in American daily papers. ...

, a political cartoonist for the ''Philadelphia North American''. ''Queer Visitors'' appeared in the ''North American'', the ''Chicago Record-Herald'' and other newspapers from 28 August 1904 to 26 February 1905. The series chronicles the misadventures of the

Scarecrow A scarecrow is a decoy or mannequin, often in the shape of a human. Humanoid scarecrows are usually dressed in old clothes and placed in open fields to discourage birds from disturbing and feeding on recently cast seed and growing crops.Lesley ...

, the

Tin Woodman Nick Chopper, the Tin Woodman, also known as the Tin Man or—mistakenly—the "Tin Woodsman," is a character in the fictional Land of Oz created by American author L. Frank Baum. Baum's Tin Woodman first appeared in his classic 1900 book ''The ...

, the

Woggle-Bug The Mr. Highly Magnified Woggle-Bug, Thoroughly Educated is a character in the Oz books by L. Frank Baum. He first appears in the book ''The Marvelous Land of Oz'' in 1904. He goes by the name H. M. Woggle-Bug, T.E. (''Highly Magnified and Tho ...

Jack Pumpkinhead Jack Pumpkinhead is a fictional character from the Land of Oz and appears in several of the classic children's series of Oz books by American author L. Frank Baum. The Classic Oz Books Jack first appeared as a main character in the second Oz ...

, and the

Sawhorse In woodworking, a saw-horse or sawhorse (saw-buck, trestle, buck) is a trestle structure used to support a board or plank for sawing. A pair of sawhorses can support a plank, forming a scaffold. In certain circles, it is also known as a ''m ...

, as

the Gump This is a list of characters in the original Oz books by American author L. Frank Baum. The majority of characters listed here unless noted otherwise have appeared in multiple books under various plotlines. ''Land of Oz, Oz'' is made up of four ...

flies them to various cities in the United States. The comic strip in turn produced its own derivation, '' The Woggle-Bug Book'' (1905). ''Queer Visitors'' was formatted as a series of prose stories, surrounded by large illustrations, therefore not a comic strip in the modern sense.

Development

The project was designed to promote ''

The Marvelous Land of Oz ''The Marvelous Land of Oz: Being an Account of the Further Adventures of the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman'', commonly shortened to ''The Land of Oz'', published in July 1904, is the second of L. Frank Baum's books set in the Land of Oz, and th ...

''. Coincidentally, it ran at the same time as a comic strip featuring Oz characters visiting America, that was written and drawn by

W. W. Denslow William Wallace Denslow (; May 5, 1856 – March 29, 1915), professionally W. W. Denslow, was an American illustrator and caricaturist remembered for his work in collaboration with author L. Frank Baum, especially his illustrations of ''The ...

. Denslow drew the illustrations for ''

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' is a children's novel written by author L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. It is the first novel in the Oz series of books. A Kansas farm girl named Dorothy ends up in the magical Land of Oz after s ...

'' and shared in its copyright. After Baum and Denslow had a falling out, Denslow exercised his copyright through his strip, called ''Denslow's Scarecrow and Tin-Man'', which ran in relatively few newspapers from December 1904 to March 1905—an artistic and commercial failure.

Re-publication

''The Visitors from Oz'', published by

Reilly and Lee The Reilly and Britton Company, known after 1918 as Reilly & Lee, was an American publishing company of the early and middle 20th century, best known for children's and popular culture books from authors like L. Frank Baum and Edgar A. Guest. Foun ...

in 1960, includes about half of Baum's Visitors stories rewritten and illustrated by Dick Martin. The 27 ''Queer Visitors'' stories have been republished in book form as ''The Third Book of Oz'' (1989) from Buckethead Enterprises, which was censored. The Buckethead Edition was a reprint under a new cover of an earlier edition, and Dulabone was not aware at the time that it was censored. ''The Third Book of Oz'' also includes another early promotion project, "The Woggle-Bug Book" (written by Baum and illustrated by Ike Morgan); the volume is illustrated by

Eric Shanower Eric James Shanower (born October 23, 1963) is an American cartoonist, best known for his Oz novels and comics, and for the ongoing retelling of the Trojan War as '' Age of Bronze''. Early life Eric Shanower was born on October 23, 1963. Upon hi ...

Hungry Tiger Press Hungry Tiger Press is an American specialty publisher of books, compact discs, comic books and graphic novels, focused on the works of L. Frank Baum, other authors of Oz books, and related Americana. Hungry Tiger has also published rare, early ...

corrected the censoring from the Buckethead edition but used ''The Visitors from Oz'' as the title, like the 1960 adaptation. In June, 2009, Sunday Press Books released a collected edition of the newspaper strips in their original format and coloring. The book also included

's competing strip ''Denslow's Scarecrow And Tin-Man'' as well as other comic strips by Walt McDougall, W. W. Denslow, and

John R. Neill John Rea Neill (November 12, 1877 – September 19, 1943) was a magazine and children's book illustrator primarily known for illustrating more than forty stories set in the Land of Oz, including L. Frank Baum's, Ruth Plumly Thompson's, and three o ...

References

{{L. Frank Baum Comics based on Oz (franchise) 1904 comics debuts 1905 comics endings American comic strips Fantasy comics Works by L. Frank Baum