Knockout (UK comics)

Knockout
Issue 723 of original series, 1953, cover featuring "Deed-a-Day Danny"
Publication information
PublisherAmalgamated Press
Fleetway Publications
IPC
ScheduleWeekly
FormatLimited series
Genre
Publication date4 March 1939 to 16 February 1963 (original series)
12 June 1971 to 23 June 1973 (relaunch)
No. of issues1251 (original series)
106 issues (relaunch)

Knockout may refer to one of two British comics.

1939 series

The first, published by the Amalgamated Press (later Fleetway Publications), was launched by editor Percy Clarke and sub-editor Leonard Matthews in 1939 to compete with The Dandy and The Beano, launched by DC Thomson in 1937 and 1938 respectively. Like its rivals, it featured a mixture of humour and adventure strips and illustrated prose stories. Matthews recruited Hugh McNeill,[1] a former Beano artist, as the title's main humour artist, and his strips "Our Ernie" and "Deed-a-Day Danny" were very popular.[2] Two characters were imported from the prose story papers - Billy Bunter, formerly of The Magnet, initially drawn by C. H. Chapman,[3] later by Frank Minnitt, and Sexton Blake, initially drawn by Jos Walker, later by Alfred Taylor,[4] Roland Davies and definitive Blake illustrator Eric Parker.[5] After the Second World War the title featured more adventure strips, and Matthews, who was promoted to editor in 1948, recruited artists including Sep E. Scott, H. M. Brock, D. C. Eyles and Geoff Campion to draw them.[1] The title lasted 1251 issues, from (cover dates) 4 March 1939 to 16 February 1963, absorbing The Magnet in 1940 and Comic Cuts in 1953, before being merged into Valiant.[6]

Other strips included:[4]

1971 series
Second series, publication date 30 October 1971

The second ran from (issues dates) 12 June 1971 to 23 June 1973, when it merged with Whizzer and Chips. Its strips included:

  • Beat Your Neighbour
  • Boney
  • Booter
  • Dead Eye Dick
  • Fuss Pot
  • Joker
  • Pete's Pockets
  • Sammy Shrink
  • Stinker
  • The Group
  • The Haunted Wood
  • The Super Seven
  • The Toffs and the Toughs
  • Thunderball
  • Wanda Wheels
  • Whistler
  • Windy

Second run: 106 Issues.

References
  1. Alan Clark, Dictionary of British Comic Artists, Writers and Editors, The British Library, 1998, p. 106-107
  2. Alan Clark, Dictionary of British Comic Artists, Writers and Editors, The British Library, 1998, p. 103-104
  3. C. H. Chapman on Lambiek Comiclopedia
  4. Denis Gifford, Encyclopedia of Comic Characters, Longman, 1987
  5. Norman Wright and David Ashford, Masters of Fun and Thrills: The British Comic Artists Vol 1, Norman Wright (pub.), 2008
  6. Complete AP/Fleetway Comic Index
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