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COMICS
STEVE CANYON
Steve Canyon was a long-running American adventure comic strip by writer-artist Milton Caniff. Launched shortly after Caniff retired from his previous strip, Terry and the Pirates, Steve Canyon ran from January 13, 1947 until June 4, 1988, shortly after Caniff's death. Caniff won the Reuben Award for the strip in 1971.
By 1946, Caniff had developed a worldwide reputation for his syndicated Terry and the Pirates. However, the rights for the strip he had created, written and drawn (for Chicago Tribune newspaper syndicate editor Captain Joseph Patterson), were entirely owned by the syndicate. Seeking creative control, Caniff approached the Chicago Sun-Times with the idea of a new strip on which he could retain ownership. The last Caniff episode of Terry and the Pirates appeared in December 1946, and then George Wunder took over the strip. Caniff's new strip, Steve Canyon, debuted in 168 newspapers.
Many strip creators before and since employ uncredited assistants or ghost artists, and Caniff was no exception. In 1952, he hired comic book artist Dick Rockwell (nephew of famed illustrator Norman Rockwell) as his assistant. While Caniff scripted and drew the main characters, Rockwell penciled and inked secondary characters and backgrounds. Rockwell continued on Canyon until Caniff's death on May 3, 1988.[1][2]
Steve Canyon statue in Idaho Springs, Colorado
The strip was adapted into a filmed, half-hour television series of 34 episodes on NBC in 1958–59 (with reruns on ABC in 1960). Dean Fredericks played Canyon as a troubleshooter for the Air Force, spending half the season travelling from base to base before becoming the commanding officer stationed at the strip's fictitious Big Thunder Air Force Base in California. With the exception of General "Shanty" Towne (in the pilot episode), none of the other supporting characters from the newspaper strip appeared in the series.
A statue of Steve Canyon was erected in Idaho Springs, Colorado, and a nearby mountain canyon was renamed "Steve Canyon." Happy Easter was reportedly modeled after an eccentric who lived in nearby Central City. A mosaic of Steve Canyon's ward Poteet Canyon stands in front of the city fire station in the town of Poteet, Texas.
Canyon was featured in a series of novels published by Grosset & Dunlap in the 1950s. Harvey Comics reprinted the strip in a half-dozen 1948 comic books, and Dell Comics published seven issues of original stories (1954-59) by former Caniff assistant Ray Bailey (who had anticipated Steve Canyon with his own Bruce Gentry about a charter pilot). Steve Canyon was reprinted by The Menomonee Falls Gazette, Kitchen Sink Press and Comics Revue.[7]
MORE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Canyon
MORE: http://www.animationarchive.org/2007/03/comics-milton-caniffs-steve-canyon.html
STEVE CANYON TV SHOW
Episode 1: OPERATION TOWLINE
Saturday 8:00 - 8:30 p.m. September 13, 1958
This is a new weekly half-hour series dramatizing the adventures of Milton
Caniff's comic-strip character Lt. Col. Stevenson B. Canyon. Dean
Fredericks is seen as Canyon. In this debut episode Canyon is given
command of a mission which calls for a fueling ship to tow three jets which are
to be cut loose when an enemy missile is sighted. But on the test flight,
one of the planes develops engine trouble and endangers all four of the planes
on the mission (Film) Brig. Gen. Towne: Harry Townes;
Durkel: Paul Frees.
MORE: http://home.earthlink.net/~joesarno/tvcomics/steve.htm
http://www.cyberattic.com/directory/Character_Collectibles:Comic_Book.html
REPRINTS OF STEVE CANYON AVAILABLE FROM FANATGRAPHICS
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