Hey Gang,
I'm doing a little research on a blog post for a 1926 magazine called Spice O Life that was mostly and profusely illustrated by Worth Carnahan partly inspired by an inquiry from a descendant. I've seen Carnahan's illustrations in Joey Burten's pubs from around this time (Follies, Follies Quarterly) and then more work he did on some of Harry Donenfeld's early entries into the girlie pulp field. In 1933, he published his own girlie pulp title called Wild Cherries though I haven't actually seen a copy.
David Saunders has a bio up here with art examples:
http://www.pulpartists.com/Carnahan.htmlSaunder's bio says he went to work for Adolphe Barreaux's advertising agency (it doesn't say when) who is probably best remembered for his Sally the Sleuth strip, but he also apparently managed other artists in addition to his own work in an art agency. His bio at David Saunders site seem to suggest that Harry Donenfeld held a controlling interest in that agency:
http://www.pulpartists.com/Barreaux.htmlAnyways, the GCD gives Carnahan publishing credits thusly
http://www.comics.org/publisher/7618/His individual GCD issue credits seem to show him sharing editing work on Champion with Barreaux:
http://www.comics.org/credit/name/worth%20carnahan/sort/alpha/There's an interview in Comic Book Marketplace 71, where Carnahan's daughter, Cynthia Woody, says he ran his publishing outfit out of his apartment and that Bilbara Publishing, Hit Publishing, and Worth Publishing were all owned by him and that Worth and Charles Quinlan were partners on the books.
Seeing Barreaux as the associate editor on the issue credit for Champion Comics - I have to wonder, is there a probability that Champion was bankrolled by Donenfeld? The GCD says there is likely a Leo Greenwald/PDC connection. Just curious whether anyone knows how Carnahan ever so briefly got into publishing... (Artists included in the GCD indexes perhaps point to it being Donenfeld related, - H.L. Parkhurst, Henry Kiefer, Carnahan, all worked for the Barreaux agency - maybe it was Barreaux's undertaking - or maybe Carnahan was giving artists he knew work) Just looking for any info on Carnahan as publisher.
Please excuse if we've pondered this elsewhere...
Beau
PS if any of you scanners out there have any issues of Wild Cherries, I'd love to see a scan....
