Smelling a rat, Kevin lingers to see what sort of plan is afoot. Thord quickly schemes to get Kevin out of his way, but as usual, the Irishman is one step ahead of his foe.

Pretending he has passed out from too much drink, Kevin leaps at an opportunity to search for Freya. Bound and vulnerable, Freya doesn’t know who her rescuer is, but she appears to like what she sees. Kevin hastens her away in the nick of time. Thord, with the menacing prow of the dragon ship looming over his shoulder, sets off to grab Freya.

Instead, he finds Kevin, and becomes enraged. Luckily, Freya is not only beautiful, but quick thinking and surprisingly strong.

The July 20 episode is one of a few from 1958 for which I don’t have a half-page example. I’m fortunate to have a crisp black and white proof, and it reveals all the cropping that took place when one-third-page versions were created. Some nice details are lost, such as the fuller illustration of the house in the final panel, but the comparison also shows that Kreigh Collins had learned to deal with the inevitability of the third-pages. Several of the wider panels’ sides are rather empty, and ready to be sacrificed for the truncated version. Interestingly, the penultimate panel has been extended upward, with the caption moving up and over, so the overall width can be reduced without obscuring the fetching Freya’s face.

Now available!

Visit the Lost Art Books website to place your order for The Lost Art of Kreigh Collins, Vol. 1: The Complete Mitzi McCoy. In addition to the entire run of “Mitzi McCoy,” the book includes the opening sequence of the comic strip “Mitzi” evolved into, “Kevin the Bold.”

The book also features an extensive introduction by Eisner Award winner Frank M. Young and previously unpublished artwork and photographs.

For more information on the career of Kreigh Collins, visit his page on Facebook.