Four Color | |
---|---|
![]() One of the earlier issues of Four Color (#9 from October 1942), featuring Walt Disney's Donald Duck in Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold (Four Color title below the price) | |
Publication information | |
Publisher | Dell Comics |
Schedule | Various |
Format | Ongoing series |
Publication date | July–September 1939[1] – April–June 1962[2] |
No. of issues | 1,354 |
Four Color, also known as Four Color Comics and Dell Four Color, is an American comic book anthology series published by Dell Comics between 1939 and 1962. The title is a reference to the four basic colors used when printing comic books (cyan, magenta, yellow and black at the time).[3] The first 25 issues (1939–1942) are known as "series 1". In mid-1942, the numbering started over again, and "series 2" began.[4] After the first hundred issues of the second series, Dell stopped putting the "Four Color Comics" designation on the books, but they continued the numbering system for twenty years.[4]
More than 1,000 issues were published, usually with multiple titles released every month.[5] An exact accounting of the actual number of unique issues produced is difficult because occasional issue numbers were skipped and a number of reprint issues were also included. Nonetheless, the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide lists well over 1,000 individual issues, ending with #1354.[6] Comics historian Alberto Becattini cites 1332 issues.[5] It currently holds the record for most issues produced of an American comic book title;[3] its nearest rival, DC's Action Comics, reached the 1,000-issue milestone in 2018.[7]
Four Color published many of the first licensed Disney comics; about 20 percent of the Four Color issues were devoted to Disney characters.[5]