Garth is an adventure character created by Stephen Dowling whose stories across time and space ran once in the Daily Mirror (now, simply The Mirror). The strip features in the newspaper as reprints, coloured by Martin Baines.
Contributors down the years included Frank Bellamy while Peter O’Donnell of Modesty Blaise fame contributed some stories.
Origins
Garth was the brainchild of strip cartoonist and writer Steve Dowling and BBC producer Gordon Boshell. Both were working on the British national newspaper The Daily Mirror and were asked to create a new strip by its editor. The pair came up with the concept of a "strong man" strip, loosely modelled onDC Comics superhero Superman and the first daily strip appeared inthe Mirror on Saturday 24th July 1943.
Recurring Characters
Publication History
• Daily Mirror Story Checklist
• Garth - Norwegian Publication Checklist
Garth has also been re-published in France, India and Australia.
Collections
In spite of the acclaimed talent that worked on the strip, until the Noughties just five official dedicated Garth books have appeared over the years; a flip book (with Romeo Jones on the reverse) in horizontal format in the late 1950s or early 1960s; The Daily Mirror Book of Garth (1975; a softback annual with Frank Bellamy art which had topless girls censored/bikini tops added, and also in 1976; a horizontal format, Frank Bellamy art uncensored, nipples aplenty) and two Titan Books collection in the late 1980s, Cloud of Balthus and Women of Galba.
John Dakin also reprinted some great Steve Dowling/ John Allard/ Frank Bellamy complete strip collections in the 1970s.