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Life Messengers comics tracts from late '60s/early '70s

Posted by Calvary Comics on August 10, 2010 at 1:36pm in GENERALMISC

Life Messengers sold millions of comics tracts and Gospel booklets from the 1940s-70s.  The art (by Fred Basher) in these tracts is rather crude, but I especially like the script of Tom Skinner's testimony:

 

http://www.breadonthewaters.com/0226_Gospel_Tract_Distributors.html

 

Below is the comic book version of Skinner's testimony, capably drawn by Al Hartley in the early '70s for the Spire line:　

　

http://www.carpsplace.com/spire/Up%20From%20Harlem.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

 

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  • Martin Murtonen August 12, 2010 at 8:14pm
    Y'know, I think I've read each and every one of those at some point in my life.

    Now Al Hartley - master of making a story move. And his art is solid all round.
  • Calvary Comics August 11, 2010 at 2:31pm
    I'm not sure if Chick were even aware of those, or if he intended his format to be like them. The original Chick tracts from 1958-1964 were about 3" x 5" (much larger than the tract booklets of his from 1972-present). Those large, pre-1972 ones are very rare and fetch hundreds of dollars each---if you can find them. Christian comics tracts go all the way back to those drawn by Lucas Cranach the elder for Martin Luther from 1519-1545 (yes, many of Cranach's woodcuts were sequential in nature).
  • Calvary Comics August 11, 2010 at 2:47am
    Comics had a much larger audience in the '60s and '70s than today's. They could also do what no movie FX (then) could do. Now that's changed.

    The Life Messengers tracts were actually published before and simultaneously with Chick's tracts. Chick tracts were a much talked about novelty in the '70s, as they would show up everywhere (on car windows, in telephone booths, in laundromats, etc.) and people at first didn't know what they were. I was 10 years old in 1975, and remember wondering what these cartoon booklets were, then---ZAP!---a convicting Gospel message was there. Many unsaved people were offended at being 'duped' into reading Gospel literature, but many also came to salvation in Christ through those tracts. Now the novelty is long gone, and everyone is 'wise' to what these seemingly innocuous booklets are---so much so that some unsaved cartoonists are producing parodies of Chick tracts.

    Alec
  • David Duarte August 10, 2010 at 3:02pm
    Very interesting! That first tract in the first link looks similar to Jack Chick's art style. And the comic book about Skinner's testimony is pretty good too.

    Is it me, or were Christian comics at their best or most noticable during the late 60s and 70s?
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