Featured Reviewer: Matt Tauber

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During the researching and writing of the Miss Mizzou book, I stayed tuned to various people who were writing about Caniff online. Matt Tauber comes out head and shoulders above other Caniff aficionados on the web. His eye is ever sharp to Caniff happenings going on around the world, and I always seem to learn something new whenever I read his writing. He has also helped out as a contributing editor to the Library of American Comics volume “Caniff: A Visual Biography.”

Tauber wrote a review of the Miss Mizzou book that I had to shorten for the intro, but I wanted to share the full review with you here:

The notion of a celebrity cartoonist is hard to convey to modern audiences. Yes, there are still hundreds of comic strips, but most creators dwell in relative anonymity or face fading name recognition from fame earned decades ago. During Milton Caniff’s heyday, there was a platoon of popular and famous cartoonists. The newspaper was a daily household object, and some artists became as well-known as their creations, and their creations took on lives of their own.

This is the period mined with vigor by J.B. Winter in his new book – “Miss Mizzou: A Life Beyond Comics.” Mizzou was one of many femme fatales Caniff created for his “Steve Canyon” comic strip. “Steve Canyon” debuted in 1947 and could not have come out any later. The diffusion of television, the shrinking of strip size on the comics page and the decline of the adventure strip were all waiting in the next decade or so. He had just enough time to put “Steve Canyon” into the minds of the mass national culture. Caniff’s eagerness and enthusiasm for his new strip sold it to the public as much as mastery of his craft.

Caniff took the name Mizzou from a nickname he’d heard for the Missouri University in Columbia. His Miss Mizzou arrived in the strip in 1952, wearing nothing but a trenchcoat. Miss Mizzou gave the front of a worldly, independent woman, but under the façade was the broken-hearted girl next door looking for a shoulder to lean on.

Experienced at publicity, Caniff hired a model to do public appearances as Miss Mizzou. As the book relates in detail, this led to the model being invited to MU where she was feted like royalty. This led to the creation of campus traditions based on Miss Mizzou that would last for decades. The heart of the book uncovers the controversy created by citizens and students torn over how MU and Columbia could benefit by this association. Was this daring damsel with her suggestive outfit too sexy for Columbia, Missouri? These passionate feelings for Caniff and Mizzou set the city on its ear.

This book knocked me right in the cerebellum sweet spot. Winter looked at what most would call an interesting anecdote and said, ‘There’s way more to this.’ We dive in right with him and explore Mizzou on a molecular level. As a Caniff devotee, most of what I read was new to me, as were most of the pictures and news clipping reproduced in the book. This is what we need more of, a work of comics scholarship that isn’t dry and eschews academic blather. A story well told from a period in time when a comic strip heroine could come to flesh and blood life.

Thanks for the review Matt! You should all check out his blog, where he blogs about pop culture things, but also passionately (and predominately) blogs about Caniff.

Recommended Reading:

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As I said above, Matt was a contributing editor to the Library of American Comics volume “Caniff: A Visual Biography.” He helped out Dean Mullaney and Lorraine Turner go through some of the collection at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum and find some amazing Caniff pieces for this book. (You can read about this adventure on Tauber’s blog.) This book is a highly recommended visual treat!

Featured Reviewer: R.C. Harvey

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R.C. Harvey is a cartoonist, critic, and author of many books on cartooning. I first came upon his work through his Rants and Raves column in the now defunct “Comic Buyers Guide,” which is probably where I first heard about Milton Caniff. Yes, R.C. Harvey is probably to blame for my interest in Caniff. You can still subscribe to his ongoing Rants and Raves column on his website.

I asked Harvey to send me an advance review blurb for the book, and he provided a wonderful quote. I had to truncate it slightly for the book, but here’s the whole quote below:

In his Steve Canyon comic strip, Milton Caniff tried hard to create a character as provocative as the Dragon Lady or Burma in his Terry and the Pirates. The closest he came was Miss Mizzou, who shows up only five times, each time wearing a trench coat and, she assures us with a knowing wink, little, or perhaps nothing, else. In this slim and impressively researched volume (the footnotes are as fascinating a read as the main narrative), we find out that Mizzou had an equally tantalizing life beyond the borders of the comic strip, and J.B. Winter never fails to remind us of what she was wearing (or not) beneath the trench coat.

I like that he references the Dragon Lady and Burma in regards to Miss Mizzou. I didn’t mention much of this relationship between Caniff’s past characters in the main text of my book, so this was a perfect compliment to include in the front of the book as a blurb.

Recommended reading:

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Book Reviews: Columbia Daily Tribune & St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Two reviews of the Miss Mizzou book showed up on the newsstands on Sunday:

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There was a long review of the book in the Columbia Daily Tribune by Aarik Danielsen. It’s a great review, which features various meditations on the book’s themes as well as a quote or two from me as well. So happy to see Miss Mizzou back in the newspaper that made her a local celebrity many years ago.

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The St. Louis Post Dispatch also printed review of the book by Harry Levins. The book is the first of four reviews on books by regional authors, and it’s an excellent short overview of the book. Mizzou-RAH!

Featured Reviewer: Max Allan Collins

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Max Allan Collins is a multifaceted mystery writer with a long list of titles to his credit. He’s probably best known for graphic novel “Road to Perdition” which was the basis of the Academy Award-winning 2002 film. He’s also been a writer for the “Dick Tracy” comic strip and was also the creator of the long running “Ms. Tree” comic book. Beyond comics, he has a long novel writing career, which includes his “Quarry” series, which is currently in development to be a TV show on Cinemax.

After Mickey Spillane died in 2006, Collins started co-authoring several Mike Hammer novels started by Spillane. During my Miss Mizzou research, Collins helped with some information when I was researching a character Mickey Spillane wrote into his book “Kiss Me Deadly” that was similar to Miss Mizzou. When it came to thinking about people to get advance quotes for my book, Collins was definitely on my list. Here’s what he wrote about the Miss Mizzou book:

“Milton Caniff was inarguably the 20th Century’s most influential cartoonist in the story-strip field. Marilyn Monroe was the quintessential movie star of that same century. The impact of both continues to be felt. When the two collided, it had to be worth writing about and J.B. Winter has done that very thing, in a tome as entertaining as it is well-researched.”

I love this summary of the character and how it relates to Marilyn Monroe. Collins has written a little about Monroe himself, which we’ll get to in our next section…

Recommended reading:

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  • If you’re a fan of Miss Mizzou, you might be a fan of Marilyn Monroe. Collins has written a volume in his Nate Heller series that deals with the death of Marilyn Monroe called “Bye Bye, Baby.” It’s a riveting read, chock full of real life research about Monroe put into fictional form.
  • One of Collin’s latest books that would interest comic fans is “Seduction of the Innocent.” In this book he takes a look at the real life 1950’s comic book scare started by Fredric Wertham and puts a fictional spin on situation with a pulp mystery at its core. Only someone as steeped in comics and 1950s nostalgia as Collins could have written such an intriguing book. The book stands alone, but is the third book in a series that began with “A Killing in Comics” and was followed up by “Strip for Murder.”

Recommended viewing:

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  • If you’re a Columbia, Missouri, comic fan, you’re probably familiar with Alley Oop, who was created by a former MU student V.T. Hamlin. Collins created the documentary “Caveman: V.T. Hamlin & Alley Oop which I remember being shown in town during the 75th anniversary of Alley Oop events that happened in 2008.
  • You might also want to catch the Collins documentary “Mike Hammer’s Mickey Spillane” from 1998 that was repackaged in the 1955 film “Kiss Me Deadlyreleased by the Criterion Collection. Watch the beginning of “Kiss Me Deadly” for a glimpse of a character similar to Miss Mizzou that I reference in my book.

Advance Praise for Miss Mizzou Book

Here’s some advance praise for Miss Mizzou: A Life Beyond Comics as it appears in the front of the book:


MAC“Milton Caniff was inarguably the 20th Century’s most influential cartoonist in the story-strip field. Marilyn Monroe was the quintessential movie star of that same century. The impact of both continues to be felt. When the two collided, it had to be worth writing about and J.B. Winter has done that very thing, in a tome as entertaining as it is well-researched.”

MAX ALLAN COLLINS—bestselling author, “Road to Perdition,” “Quarry,” & “Nathan Heller”


RCH“In his ‘Steve Canyon’ comic strip, Milton Caniff tried hard to create a character as provocative as the Dragon Lady or Burma in his ‘Terry and the Pirates.’ The closest he came was Miss Mizzou, who shows up … wearing a trench coat and, she assures us with a knowing wink, little, or perhaps nothing, else. In this slim and impressively researched volume (the footnotes are as fascinating a read as the main narrative), we find out that Mizzou had an equally tantalizing life beyond the borders of the comic strip.”

R.C. HARVEY—critic, cartoonist, and author of “Meanwhile… A Biography of Milton Caniff”


BC“In her high heels and trademark trench coat, Miss Mizzou stands tall in the long list of beauties Milton Caniff created to enliven his comic strips ‘Terry and the Pirates,’ ‘Male Call,’ and ‘Steve Canyon.’ J.B. Winter has crafted a spritely, well-researched look at the effect one cartoonist and his curvy creation had on the original ‘Mizzou’—the University of Missouri—and its environs. Caniffites, MU alumni, and residents of Columbia, Missouri will surely enjoy what they find in these pages.”

BRUCE CANWELL—essayist & associate editor, IDW Library of American Comics “Steve Canyon” reprint editions.


MT“This book knocked me right in the cerebellum sweet spot. Winter looked at what most would call an interesting anecdote and said, ‘There’s way more to this.’ As a Caniff devotee, most of what I read was new to me, as were most of the pictures and news clippings reproduced in the book. This is what we need more of; a work of comics scholarship that isn’t dry and eschews academic blather.”

MATT TAUBER—contributing editor, “Caniff: A Visual Biography”


MP“In ‘Miss Mizzou: A Life Beyond Comics,’ J.B. Winter deftly assembles the whole story of the comely newspaper strip character that seduced a Midwestern college town.  The story is a fully satisfying, well-researched narrative that not only entertains, but casts an intriguing light on our own relationship to fame and popular culture. ‘Miss Mizzou’ would still be a compelling read if I had never heard of Milton Caniff or Columbia Missouri, but being a fan of one and a resident of the other, it was a rare treat.”

MARTIN POPE—Mid-Missouri cartoonist of the Caniff-inspired webcomic “Vorto the Pirate”