19 April 1975: Whoopee! and Shiver & Shake

Here’s a step back in time to April 1975, when the Bumpkin Billionaires, drawn by Jimmy Hansen, were regular front cover stars on Whoopee! and Shiver & Shake.

This week’s issue included a pull-out poster of Pa Bumpkin.

For a while following the merger of the two comics, the spooky survivors of the discontinued Shiver & Shake were gathered in a 12-page Shiver Section (I-it’s h-h-haunted) in the middle of Whoopee! The Shiver strip is drawn by Terry Bave.

Favourites included Evil Eye (Reg Partlett), Fun-Fear (Robert Nixon), Sweeny Toddler (Leo Baxendale) and Scream Inn (Brian Walker).

The jewel in the crown has to be this sublime Frankie Stein strip (Robert Nixon): brilliantly dark, dynamic, violent, hilarious comic strip action, superbly designed across two pages.

The back cover featured another of Ken Reid’s wonderful World-Wide Weirdies. This week: The Gruesome Gondola, suggested by reader Michael Jessop of Billericay.