Bob: A Forgotten Master of edwardian humour

When I moved to England more than twenty years ago I had no idea that I would not only find a new life but would also become addicted to postcard collecting. In Exeter, where I used to live, there’s a small antiques shop down by the river, in which they also sell vintage postcards, mostly topos but also some comic and children’s cards. I bought my first postcards there. One of these, which I liked particularly well, was signed “Bob.” Of course I had no idea who that was, and, after two decades of collecting Bob’s cards, I still don’t. I don’t even know for sure whether Bob was a man or a woman. However, when I look at the subjects of these cards and the way they are executed I cannot help imagining Bob as a man.

What I do know is that Bob, whoever he was, was one of the most prolific and attractive comic artists of the Edwardian period. He designed more than 600 postcards many of which are very carefully drawn, splendidly coloured and full of detail. He worked for various publishers (at least twenty), among them Birn Brothers, Ettlinger, Hartmann, Millar and Lang, Misch and Co., Henry Moss, Raphael Tuck, and Vertigen. In spite of this, he is virtually unknown among both collectors and dealers, and strangely neglected by those who are regarded as authorities in the postcard world, almost as if his cards were invisible. Toni and Valmai Holt for instance don’t mention him at all in the first three editions of Stanley Gibbons’ Postcard Catalogue, even though they not only provide a list of comic artists that includes many inferior ones but also a list of comic cards published by Misch and Stock. Incidentally, Misch and Stock (or Misch & Co. as they called themselves from 1905 on) were the publishers who issued most of Bob’s comic cards (at least 28 sets of six cards each – which is more than any other artist had, with the one exception of G.F. Christie).

In the 4^th edition of Stanley Gibbons’ Postcard Catalogue (1985), Bob is finally mentioned in the list of comic artists but a qualification is added in brackets: “Irish and other humour”. This gives the impression that the range of his output in terms of subject matter was rather narrow, which is far from true. Although Bob indeed produced some “Irish” cards, those cards cover only about five percent of his total output. So it’s mostly “other humour”. J.L. Mashburn in his Artist Signed Postcard Price Guide (2^nd ed. 2003) claims Bob to be an American artist specialising on “Comics, Boxing, Golf”. Since Bob was certainly not American but British (probably English), and since as yet I have found only one single card with a Golf subject and none at all involving Boxing, either Mashburn’s Bob is some different artist or he got it all mixed up (which wouldn’t surprise me, since Mashburn seems to have had very little knowledge of British artists in general). Terry Hougham in his article on the “Comic Cards from Misch & Stock” (Picture Postcard Monthly, nos. 133 and 134) provides a checklist of Misch’s comic cards but again, none of Bob’s many sets are mentioned. Anthony Byatt in his fabulous Picture Postcards and their Publishers (1978) explicitly mentions two of Bob’s sets – namely the Keyhole Series, published by Howe, Vertigen and Co., and the Daydream Series, published by Ettlinger – but neglects to tell us the name of the artist (one of those sets is not signed, but the other is). And finally, to give one last example, Nouhad A. Saleh in his very useful Guide to Artists’ Signatures & Monograms on Postcards (1993) includes Bob’s signature, but describes him as an artist specializing in “landscape and scenery”, which is quite misleading since, although Bob did in fact produce some nice (though not very exciting) sceneries for Ettlinger and Vertigen, the vast majority of his work is comic in nature.

Now what might be the reasons for this unanimous neglect and ignorance? One reason is possibly that most of the well-known comic artists (such as Phil May, John Hassall, or Dudley Hardy) had already acquired a reputation as competent illustrators before they began to design postcards. In contrast, it seems that Bob worked exclusively for postcard publishers. As far as I know, he did not design posters, illustrate books, or work for magazines like Punch. Also, he did not use his real name or at least not his full name, so his identity could not easily be discovered. Furthermore, many of his cards are not signed. Often it is only one card in a set that is signed, but sometimes there isn’t any signature at all. Fortunately, once you have made yourself familiar with his style, his cards are fairly easily recognizable. Finding these unsigned ones, of course, adds to the fun of collecting his postcards.

Admittedly, Bob was not a great artist. He certainly lacked the sophisticated wit and power of observation that characterizes Phil May’s work. But then, May’s art does not translate well to the postcard medium (which is probably the reason why his cards are hard to sell these days). Neither is Bob a match to John Hassall and Tom Browne when it comes to sheer artistic genius and to highlighting the funny side in almost any situation in which humans can find themselves. FG Lewin is more inventive and playful, and consistently so. But Bob can easily compete with many other comic artists that are far better known, and, in his best work, even with the best. Among comic artists he is unique for his skill in blending his comic figures with a watercolour landscape background. Colours are skilfully and abundantly employed. His humour is kind, never spiteful (like Graham Hyde’s or some of the minor illustrators). He makes fun of human frailty but humbly includes himself. He is interested in basic human emotions and is fascinated by the way our bodies express them. And by our bodies I don’t mean just our faces but also our posture, the way we position and move our bodies. There are at least two sets that show only feet – but how telling they are! Over and over again he portrays what strikes me as a very British emotion: embarrassment. For the British, there seem to be innumerable situations that can cause embarrassment. Bob shows them all and traces them back to the fact that we have a body, one that has an unnerving tendency to undermine our constant efforts to maintain dignity, or at least a dignified appearance. His young women, however, are lovely and lofty and far more dignified than his men who often appear clumsy and are no match to the women they court and attempt to impress. That is why I think that, surely, Bob must have been a man.

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