From the archive of oddites, here are Terry & the Pirates tattoo transfers. They feature a nice array of 22 characters from the run of the strip, mostly from war years. 'Terry' was no stranger to merchandising, being not only a popular comic strip, but also adapted to comic book form and a long-running serialized radio show. I'm not sure of the origin of these. Online clues point to them being a cereal premium, but the packaging itself gives us little to go on. There's no name of a product to promote or name of the manufacturer or printed them. One gimmick I like is the way the envelope the tattoos come in can double as a mailer. What a nice gift!
The other intriguing thing to me is the designation "Pack no. 9." Hmmm, what are packs 1 - 8, or even 10+? A little digging and help from other comic fans led to filling in some of the gaps, but not all.
PACK #1 - CAPTAIN MARVEL
PACK #2 - CAPTAIN MARVEL
PACK #4 - FUNNY ANIMALS (all from Fawcett, publisher of Captain Marvel)
PACK #5 - DICK TRACY
PACK #8 - CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT (another Fawcett hero, mostly unseen since 1948)
Here are a couple more that do not have pack numbers and may or may not be related to the other series...
BATMAN
BLUE BEETLE
Late to the party but thanks for this post. I have one Pack #10. I was trying to find a year on these and the closest guess is that Pack #1 shows the cover from Captain Marvel #32 from February 1944. I'm going to guess these packs came out roughly over a one or two year period, maybe even monthly like the comics? So that puts them around 1944-1945. If you search "All Hero Comic Tattoo Transfers" there is a mailer sans tattoos listed on eBay right now. I picked mine up over 10 years ago and have seen very few since.
ReplyDeleteI have pack #3 of the Captain Marvel's Tattoo transfers. Any idea how I find someone that might want to add these to their collection?
ReplyDeleteThanks,
Jody R.
Jody, I would try selling it to your local comic book shop or on eBay.
ReplyDelete