But, we don't really care about any of that today - just the beginning.
For the first seven and a half issues, the format was Funny Animal comics. Perhaps most significantly, Cosmo Cat began his first adventures in All Top, starting in the first issue.
Those early issues of All Top featured - we think - four tales drawn by Ellis Chambers, including the aforementioned Cosmo Cat story - though that was is merely presumed, not confirmed.
The first two stories ran previously on the main blog. I suspect we'll copy more over time so as to collect it all here.
All Top Comics #1 - Cosmo Cat / The Lollipop Fiend:
For this second tale, Ellis Chambers is the 'best guess' by historians on who drew the tale. When some are trying to deduce the artist, they note that the bottom of panel two contains what appears to be an box with artist's initials semi-obscured by white-out. While some say it looks like an E.L., they also note that there was nobody with those initials known to be active in the field at the time.
However, that EL could just as easily be a more completely hidden EC, and Chambers was known to draw a box around his initials at times. (He even signed with just an empty box on occasion, but that's not what we're looking at here.)
All Top Comics #3 - Cosmo Cat / The Fourth Dimension:
These next two tales he signed, so there's little doubt to the artist. There are others that he may have drawn during the early run of All Top, but we're sticking with just the four that are presumed to be his work. At least, until convincing arguments are made for other stories.
All Top Comics #5 - Señor Tamale / What Magical Magic!:
All Top Comics #6 - Cosmo Cat / Real Heavy Artillery:
With issue number 8, the format switched to Jungle Comics and Matt Baker was the new look of the book. The animals weren't so funny any more...
page art by Ellis Holly Chambers for All Top Comics #s 1, 3, 5, & 6 (1946, 1947)
