Sun (comic)

Sun was a British comic magazine focusing on adventure strips, published from 1947 to 1959. Sun featured such strips as Battler Britton, Billy the Kid, and Max Bravo; contributors included Mike Butterworth, D. C. Eyles,[1] Geoff Campion, Don Lawrence, Eric Parker, Reg Bunn, and Gianluigi Coppola. Sun published 558 issues before merging with the Fleetway Publications title Lion.

Sun
Publication information
PublisherJ. B. Allen (1947 – May 1949)
Amalgamated Press (May 1949 – October 1959)
ScheduleFortnightly, and then weekly
FormatOngoing series
Genre
Publication dateNovember 1947 – 17 October 1959
No. of issues558
Main character(s)Battler Britton
Billy the Kid
Max Bravo
Creative team
Written byMike Butterworth
Artist(s)D. C. Eyles, Geoff Campion, Don Lawrence, Eric Parker, Reg Bunn, Gianluigi Coppola
Editor(s)Leonard Matthews

Publication history

Sun was launched by Cheshire-based publisher J. B. Allen in November 1947, sporting a mixture of adventure and humour strips. In May 1949, J. B. Allen — including their comics titles Sun and The Comet[2] — was acquired by Amalgamated Press (AP), with AP continuing the titles essentially under the same names.

With AP's takeover, Leonard Matthews was appointed editor of Sun,[2][3][4] increasing the publication's adventure content. Matthews hired Geoff Campion to draw Billy the Kid, and introduced new characters like Max Bravo and Battler Britton.[5] Battler Britton first appeared in Sun #362 (January 14, 1956),[5] becoming the cover feature with issue #490 (June 28, 1958) — in fact, from April to September 1959, Sun carried the tagline "Battler Britton's Own Weekly."

In 1959, Amalgamated Press was bought by the Mirror Group and renamed Fleetway Publications (after the name of AP's headquarters, Fleetway House).[3] With the transition to Fleetway, in October 1959 the AP titles The Comet, Sun, and Tiny Tots were all merged into other AP titles; Sun merged with Lion.[3] The merged title was called Lion and Sun for about six months before reverting simply to Lion.[6]

Strips

References
  1. Gifford, Denis. Encyclopedia of Comic Characters, Longman, 1987, p. 241
  2. Clark, pp. 2–3.
  3. "Fleetway – A History". DanDare.info. Archived from the original on 18 August 2010. Retrieved 15 August 2010.
  4. "The Incomplete Science Fiction Comic Guide to British Comics," DanDare.info. Retrieved July 25, 2022.
  5. Clark, pp. 107–108.
  6. "Lion and Sun," Grand Comics Database. Retrieved July 25, 2022.
  7. McNeil, Jamie. "Battler Britton", The Slings & Arrows Graphic Novel Guide. Retrieved April 7, 2021.
  8. Gravett, Paul. "Obituary: Don Lawrence: Comic-book artist who brought the Trigan empire and Captain Marvel to life," The Guardian (20 Jan. 2004).
  9. "Gianluigi Coppola". www.sergiobonelli.it (in Italian). Retrieved 28 November 2019.
  10. "SUN (UK Comic Books) – Comic Book Plus".

Further reading
  • Clark, Alan. Dictionary of British Comic Artists, Writers and Editors (The British Library, 1998).


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