Here’s how the publisher describes this forthcoming book: “Noel Sickles drew comics for three brief years, yet his groundbreaking work on the 1930s aviation adventure series Scorchy Smith is a milestone in the history of newspaper comic strips. Over the past 70 years, however, readers have seen only occasional excerpts of this seminal work. Now, IDW’s Library of American Comics presents Scorchy Smith and the Art of Noel Sickles, a comprehensive, oversized volume that collects, for the first time, every Sickles Scorchy strip, from December 1933 through November 1936.”

That’s over 300 pages of some of the most beautifully drawn adventure strips ever created. Although Sickles wasn’t in comic strips anywhere near long enough to become a household name — after he left Scorchy Smith, he spent the next forty years in magazine illustration and (later in life) Western painting — he has long been revered among the small group of aficionados who know their comic-strip history as an “artist’s artist,” i.e., an artist whose work other artists — greats like Milton Caniff, Alex Toth, John Romita, and Frank Robbins, as well as scores of other, lesser lights — have looked to for inspiration, instruction… and swipes! Marvel stalwart John Romita has remarked that, during the 1950s, when he was in his 20s, “the whole industry was copying from photostats of the Scorchy Smith dailies by Noel Sickles.” And now, with the publication of this book, you have an opportunity to see what all the fuss was about.

Bonus Links:

Leif Peng’s Noel Sickles Flickr Set

Scorchy Smith and the Art of Noel Sickles by Leif Peng, Today’s Inspiration – introducing a week devoted to the art of Noel Sickles, with highlights from the new book.

Noel Sickles: Early Years by Leif Peng

Noel Sickles and the Art of War by Leif Peng

Alex Toth on Noel Sickles by Leif Peng

Noel Sickles: an “inquisitive, restless genius” by Leif Peng