Memories of The BULLETIN

The old 'Bullie' was a great market for free-lance cartoonists way back to the last two decades of the 19th century. Though not primarily a 'gag' cartoonist, I first submitted some free-lance work whilst living in Perth during the mid-1950s... I must confess, more in hope than certainty of acceptance. Sure enough, a week or so later they were rejected along with a short note, which thanked me for my interest... but, 'no thanks'. Sadly, there was no reason given, so I naturally figured they were not up to their required standard... and, moved on to other things.

After turning full-time professional in 1990, I thought it might be a bit of a diversion to send off another batch of speculative gag cartoons. Especially for the purpose, I decided to sign the 'toons with the pseudonym 'Hob'... not really sure now why that was done but, probably to separate the work from other regular contracted stuff I was doing for a number of other publications at the time. This time I had 3 of 5 accepted, a strike-rate of 60%! Best not to get carried a way by sudden wind-falls in this business though. Soon after that initial success, the magazine started limiting their cartoon content to the work of a few established 'toonies who had been contributors over a long period.

Sooo, here's a sample of some of the toons which made it into the 'bullie'. These are copied from the actual magazine pages. I have the originals somewhere in my chaotic archive, but failed to find them at first attempt. They appeared during 1991-92.