Alex Toth, The Herculoids, Birdman, Space Patrol, Dick Tracy, Adv. of Captain Marvel, Doomwatch, Doctor Who, Battlestar Galactica, Rollerball, Encounter at Farpoint.

It's Alex Toth's birthday today. Alex has been a favorite of mine for a long time and it was he who sent me a postcard letting me know about the accidental death of Warren Tufts of Casey Ruggles fame.


Enjoy !!!



Birthdays

Jerry Bingham 1953, award-winning American artist who has worked in the fields of comic books, commercial illustration, and design. He is best known for his artwork on Marvel Team-Up and the DC Comics graphic novel Batman: Son of the Demon.

Ken Mayer 1918, actor, Maj. Robbie Robertson- Space Patrol (119 episodes, 1951-1955), Albert - Adventures of Superman (1 episode, "The Brainy Burro", 1958), Clerk - Steve Canyon (1 episode, "Operation Towline", 1958), Pete - My Favorite Martian (2 episodes, 1965), Customer - Lost in Space (1 episode, "West of Mars", 1966), Chief Patton - Dick Tracy (1967) (TV).

Alex Toth 1928, cartoonist, comic book artist, Toth’s work began in the American comic book industry, but is best known for his animation designs for Hanna-Barbera throughout the 1960s and 1970s. His work included Super Friends, Space Ghost, The Herculoids, and Birdman. Toth launched his career at the age of 15, illustrating true stories for Heroic magazine through Steve Douglas’ Famous Funnies shop. Although he initially aimed to do newspaper strips (“It was my dream to do what Caniff, Raymond, and Foster had done”), he found the industry “dying” and instead moved into comic books. In 1947, Toth was hired by Sheldon Mayer at National/DC Comics. He worked there for five years, drawing the Golden Age versions of The Flash, Dr. Mid-Nite, Green Lantern and The Atom. For a brief time in 1950, Toth was able to realize his dream of working on newspaper comic strips by ghost illustrating Casey Ruggles with Warren Tufts. In 1952 Toth ended his contract with DC Comics and moved to California. It is during that time that he worked on crime, war and romance comics for Standard Comics. In 1954, Toth was drafted into the U.S. Army and stationed in Tokyo, Japan. While in Japan, he wrote and drew his own weekly adventure strip, Jon Fury, for the base paper, Depot Diary. Returning to the United States in 1956, Toth settled in the Los Angeles area and worked primarily for Dell Comics until 1960. In 1960, Toth became art director for the Space Angel animated science fiction show. This led to his being noticed (and hired) by Hanna-Barbera, where he worked as a storyboard and design artist until 1968 and then again in 1973 when he was assigned to Australia for five months to produce the TV series Super Friends. He continued to work in comic books, illustrating contributions for the Warren magazines Eerie, Creepy and The Rook.

Reed Hadley 1911, actor, Rahman Bar - Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941)[Ch. 1,11-12].

Kevin Stoney 1921, actor, Calton - Out of the Unknown (1 episode, "The Fosters", 1969), Prof. Hal Symonds - Doomwatch (1 episode, "The Plastic Eaters", 1970), Steen - The Tomorrow People (4 episodes, 1973), Tyrum / Tobias Vaughn / Mavic Chen - Doctor Who (22 episodes, 1965-1975), Talos - Space: 1999 (1 episode, "The Last Enemy", 1976), Prime Minister - Quatermass (1 episode, "What Lies Beneath", 1979), Councilor Joban / Ardus - Blakes 7 (2 episodes, 1979-1981).

George Murdock 1930, actor, Willie - The Twilight Zone (1 episode, "The Dummy", 1962), Damian / Karl / Eric - Tarzan (3 episodes, 1966-1967), Rossi - The Six Million Dollar Man (1 episode, "Run, Steve, Run", 1974), Captain Scopes - The Invisible Man (1 episode, "The Klae Dynasty", 1975), Dr. Salik - Battlestar Galactica (5 episodes, 1978-1979), God - Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989), Admiral J. P. Hanson - Star Trek: The Next Generation (2 episodes, 1990), Judge Caldwell - Timescape (1992), Boss Biggis - Batman: The Animated Series (1 episode, "The Forgotten", 1992), Burton Newcomb - Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1 episode, "Strange Visitor (From Another Planet)", 1993), Senator Riley - Plughead Rewired: Circuitry Man II (1994), Second Elder - The X Files (4 episodes, 1998-1999), Dr. Salik - Battlestar Galactica: The Second Coming (1999), Old Harry Bollston - Smallville (1 episode, "Hourglass",2001), Acme VP, Unfairly Promoted - Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003).

Paris Themmen 1959, actor, Fawning Fan - Star Trek: Voyager (1 episode, "Virtuoso", 2000).

Events

1975, Rollerball is released.

1987, Filming wraps on TNG: "Encounter at Farpoint". The last scenes filmed are various bluescreen shots on the bridge.

1990, NBC decides to air episodes of Quantum Leap for five straight days.

1995, Star Trek:DS9, "The Adversary" airs.