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Joe Sinnott Interview — October 15, 1977

Joe Sinnott is one of the greatest comic book inkers of all time. Actually, he’s the greatest. No finer hand has ever held pen and brush. I’ve been a fan of Joe’s work for over 40 years. Thirty years ago, when Joe made an appearance at a Boston comic book convention, I called him “a God of the industry,” and he still is.

Being a radio announcer at the time, I had access to a good quality portable tape recorder, making it possible for me to record an impromptu interview with Joe and a group of enthusiastic fans, including my best buddy, Dennis F. Rogers. Out of half an hour of tape I’ve spliced together a couple of clips.

In this part of the discussion, Joe Sinnott comments on comic books. That’s me asking the first question, sounding overly hyperbolic and just plain hyper.

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And in this segment, Joe talks about being a lifelong fan of Bing Crosby, who had died the day before this recording was made! That’s Dennis asking Joe about his hobby.

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In retrospect, Dennis and I have always kicked ourselves for not spending the entire time talking with Joe about Bing, because we were plenty interested in the subject, and it was what he wanted to talk about. In recognition of Joe Sinnott, Der Bingle fan, here is Bing from one of Joe’s favorite periods, the early 30’s, singing “Pennies From Heaven.”

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Additional Note: This recording of “Pennies From Heaven” came from a 1973 German LP that I own. D.F. Rogers, an amateur but highly proficient musicologist, believes this performance is most likely the original version, recorded for the Decca label on August 17, 1936.

3 comments October 15th, 2007

Don’t Miss “Good Ol’ Charles Schulz”

AMERICAN MASTERS “Good Ol’ Charles Schulz”
Monday, October 29, 2007
9:00-10:30 p.m. ET

David Van Taylor, the director of the upcoming, highly-anticipated American Masters documentary Good Ol’ Charles Schulz has written with a couple of corrections for an earlier post.

I’m the director of the documentary. Just wanted to say that “Johnson” is Donna’s maiden name; “Wold” is her married name. Al Wold is alive and well. Our interview with her is a critical part of the film. Hope you all can watch.

Saying that “Johnson” is Donna Wold’s “married” name instead of “maiden” was a typo. My bad. But I had read some time back that her husband, Al, had passed away. Bad information, obviously. I should have double-checked that before repeating the erroneous information, especially if I couldn’t find confirmation. My apologies.

I may be just a guy who blogs, but a long time ago I was a news reporter, so I know better. My thanks to Mr. Van Taylor for the corrections, and thank you for the tip-off about the interview with Donna. I’m glad that Al is so understanding about her critical role in the genesis of Peanuts.

3 comments October 15th, 2007