Superboy--John Sikela/George Roussos--1946

In spite of the signatures above, this is longtime SUPERMAN and SUPERBOY ghost artist John Sikela inked, according to GCD, by George Roussos. The super strips almost always did special Christmas covers and stories in the early years, in spite of the fact that many of the creators who worked on the series were themselves celebrating Hannukah.

Bucky Bug-Roger Armstrong-1951

Premiering in comic strips in 1932, Walt Disney's BUCKY BUG was never a film star (he appeared in only one film early on) but became a longtime fixture of Dell's Disney comic books and specials. This particular holiday appearance comes from WALT DISNEY'S CHRISTMAS PARADE in 1951.

Santa's New Suits-Frank Jupo-1948

Frank Jupo was a children's book author and illustrator from the mid-forties into the seventies. Here he offers up a fun and educational fable of Santa in Dell's SANTA CLAUS FUNNIES.

Albert and Pogo's Christmas-Walt Kelly-1949

 Walt Kelly's POGO had just graduated from ANIMAL COMICS to his own title when he and Ol'Albert the Alligator turned up unexpectedly with this typically wonderful holiday story in the back of SANTA CLAUS FUNNIES, an annual Dell publication to which Kelly was often the main contributor.

Suzanne-Al Hubbard-1959

 Meet Suzanne Bright, an ersatz Chuck Jones character who had a fairly extensive career as a backup strip in several of Dell's LOONEY TUNES titles of the fifties and early sixties. The big-headed kids and the black and white dog, of course, signal that this was, in fact, a PEANUTS ripoff...albeit a pretty good one.

Sticky Mitt Stimson-Russell Cole-1938

 Here's one of the back-up stories from ACTION COMICS # 1 that the in the news anonymous buyer of the best surviving copy ever (at more than two million dollars) will never see and probably wouldn't care about if he did. "Alger" was Russell Cole and loaded down all four of DC's books at the time with these types of lovely if only marginally funny strips.

The Little Sheriff-Dave Berg-1951

 I've long been amused by the fact that artist Dave Berg's earliest work in comics is more like early MAD than his earliest MAD work where he quickly developed his now-classic LIGHTER SIDE and pretty much just stuck with it forever. This pre-MAD but recognizably Kurtzmanesque madness is from the generic title, KID COWBOY.