{"id":18072,"date":"2010-02-18T22:37:16","date_gmt":"2010-02-19T03:37:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/?p=18072"},"modified":"2015-01-19T23:02:12","modified_gmt":"2015-01-20T04:02:12","slug":"happy-birthday-johnny-hart-and-gahan-wilson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/2010\/02\/18\/happy-birthday-johnny-hart-and-gahan-wilson\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy Birthday, Johnny Hart and Gahan Wilson!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not only do I<\/i> want to wish Johnny Hart<\/a> and Gahan Wilson<\/a> each a happy birthday—but apparently my wall does, too!<\/p>\n

As I read on various comics-related sites of the shared birthdays (though not shared birth years) of the two men, I realized that there was a party going on for them right here in my office.<\/p>\n

Hanging over the door is this B.C.<\/i> strip which originally ran June 26, 1973, and which Hart gave me either that year or the year after. We met at the annual Reuben Awards weekend run by the National Cartoonist Society where I had been a guest of Bill Kresse. Hart sent me this strip a few weeks later.<\/p>\n

He didn’t know me save from our brief conversation, yet I don’t believe he could have given me a B.C.<\/i> installment better suited to my personality had he known me for years. Give it a few clicks to bring it to a readable size and those who know me will see what I mean.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, Hart passed in 2007. Had he lived, he would have been 79 today.<\/p>\n

\"BCOriginal\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Luckily, Gahan Wilson is still with us. He turned 80 today.<\/p>\n

I bought the watercolor below in 2007 at the World Horror Convention in Toronto. I’ve loved Gahan Wilson since I was a kid, and always wanted to own an original of his, but could never afford one. I mean, have you seen what those Playboy<\/i> cartoons go for? <\/p>\n

But kindly Gahan, who knows that not all of his fans are made of gold, has in recent years started whipping up watercolors deliberately meant to be put into the art shows of the various cons he attends. This one, titled “Helping Him Smile,” made me<\/i> smile, and luckily I was quicker on the draw than David Morrell (a story for another day), so it ended up on my wall rather than his.<\/p>\n

\"GahanWilsonOriginal\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And even better than looking up from where I work to see this image is having gotten over the years to know the man himself.<\/p>\n

\"GahanWilsonScottEdelmanSPX\"<\/a>
\nHappy birthday, guys! Glad I got to spend the day—and every day—with you both!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not only do I want to wish Johnny Hart and Gahan Wilson each a happy birthday—but apparently my wall does, too! As I read on various comics-related sites of the shared birthdays (though not shared birth years) of the two men, I realized that there was a party going on for them right here in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[151,18,584,610],"class_list":["post-18072","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-birthdays","tag-comics","tag-gahan-wilson","tag-johnny-hart"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18072"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18072\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18076,"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18072\/revisions\/18076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}