The History of Comic Books & comics versions of classical books

A Tidbit of Comic Book History
In 1754, Benjamin Franklin created the first editorial cartoon published in an American newspaper. Franklin's cartoon was an illustration of a snake with a severed head and had the printed words "Join, or Die." The cartoon was intended to goad the different colonies into joining what was to become the United States.

Richard Outcault's Yellow Kid was the first comic strip to use balloons.
According to many experts, the precursors to modern comics were the satirical works of artists like Rudolph Töpffer, Wilhelm Bush, Christophe, or Angelo Agostini (first Brazilian comic artist).

Rudolph Töpffer - Birth of the Graphic Novel
In 1827, Switzerland's Rudolphe Töpffer created a comic strip and continued on to publish seven graphic novels. In 1837, "The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck" was published by Rudolphe Töpffer and it is considered the earliest known comic book. In 1842, "The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck" became the first comic book published in the United States. "Obadiah Oldbuck" was a forty page book. Each page had several picture panels with accompanying text underneath.

Wilhelm Bush
In 1859, German poet and artist, Wilhelm Bush published caricatures in the newspaper Fliegende Blätter. In 1865, he published a famous comic called "Max und Moritz".

Yellow Kid
The 1895 "Yellow Kid" created by Richard Outcault has often been cited as being the first comic strip. The reason being is that Richard Outcault was the first artist to use the balloon, an outlined space on the page where what the characters spoke was written. However, comic strips and comic books were published before "Yellow Kid" debuted in the New York City newspaper "The World".

Are Comic Books Funny?
Around 1900, the terms "comics" and "comic strip" came into common use in the United States. Where did the word come from? The strips of pictures being printed in magazines and newspapers at that time were all funny or comic. At first newspaper comic strips were called "the funnies" and later the term comics became more popular. Early American comic books were often collections of reprints of newspaper comic strips.

Brenda Starr
On June 19, 1940, "Brenda Starr" the first cartoon strip written by a woman was published in Chicago.


The comics versions of these classical books were published as MC Comics. In this series these 36 comics  (Title and Author of the book) were published:


Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Time Machine by H G Wells 
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

Dracula by Bram Stoker
The Red Badge of Courage
The Mysterious Island
The Three Musketeers

The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper
The War of the Worlds by H G Wells
Treasure Island  by Robert Louis Stevenson
Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott

The Count of Monte Cristo
The Odyssey by Homer
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
Frankenstein by Mary W Shelley

The Master of the World by Jules Verne
Food of the Gods by H G Wells
The Moonstone by William Wilkie Collins
She by H. Rider Haggard

The Invisible Man by H G Wells
Iliad by Homer
Kidnapped
The Pit and the Pendulum

The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope
Arabian Nights
The First Men in the Moon by H G Wells
White Fang by Jack London

The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain
Robin Hood by J. Walker McSpadden
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

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Have all these titles as e-books also.
Not uploading this time. Interested persons can ask by e-mail.
These are  c2c and total size 1.3 GB only.
All credit to original uploaders.

Big thanks to KK and Saswat for 6 missing numbers (July2009: 10,11,12,17,27,28) and help in fixing links (in 2008-2009).