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<HEAD><TITLE>Don Markstein's Toonopedia: Timmy Time </TITLE> <script language="JavaScript"></script> <META name = "author" content = "Donald D. Markstein"> <META name = "description" content = "Hypertext encyclopedia of comics and animation"> <META name = "subject" content = "Hypertext encyclopedia of comics and animation"> <META name = "keywords" content = "comic books animated cartoons animation comics comix syndicated comic strips"> <META name = "publisher" content = "Donald D. Markstein"> <META name = "format" content = "text/html"> <META name = "language" content = "EN"> </HEAD><BODY> <body onload="if (self!= top) top.location = self.location"></body> <BODY BGCOLOR="FFFFFF" TEXT="000000" LINK="0000EE" VLINK="551A8B"> <TABLE><TR><TD WIDTH=310 VALIGN="CENTER"><IMG GALLERYIMG="NO" ALIGN="LEFT" HEIGHT=364 WIDTH=300 ALT="Timmy and Traveler turn up on the scene. Artist: Ernie Colón." SRC="tim-time.jpg"> <TD VALIGN="CENTER"><H1>TIMMY TIME</H1><FONT SIZE=4> <B>Medium:</B> Comic books <BR><B>Published by:</B> Harvey Comics <BR><B>First Appeared:</B> 1977 <BR><B>Creators:</B> unknown writer and Ernie Colón (artist) <FONT SIZE=3> <! BEGIN DONATION CODE> <HR><FONT SIZE=2 COLOR="993366"><CENTER> If this site is enjoyable or useful to you, <BR>Please contribute to its necessary financial support. <BR><A HREF="http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/pay/T1237L0BCY25QA" TARGET="_blank">Amazon.com</A> or <A HREF="https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=don%40toonopedia.com&no_note=1&tax=0&currency_cod e=USD" TARGET="_blank">PayPal</A> </FONT></CENTER><HR> <! END DONATION CODE> <P><A NAME="cont"> Tying a new character to a popular old one is a time-honored method comic book publishers use to promote the new one. When <A href="dc.htm">DC Comics</A> introduced <A href="capmarv1.htm">Captain Marvel</A> to modern comics readers in 1973 by putting <A href="superman.htm">Superman</A> on the cover of <I>Shazam!</I> #1, it was just copying the way <A href="fawcett.htm">Fawcett Publications,</A> Cap's original owner, had used The Big Red Cheese himself in 1942, when it put him on the cover of its first issue of <I><A href="dwinslow.htm">Don Winslow of the Navy.</A></I> <A href="richie.htm">Richie Rich</A> didn't just appear on the  <P ALIGN="RIGHT"><A HREF="#cont"><FONT SIZE=2><I>continued below</A></FONT> </TABLE> <CENTER><! BEGIN ADSENSE "LEADERBOARD" CODE> <script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script> <! END ADSENSE CODE></CENTER> <P><TABLE><TR><TD VALIGN="TOP"> cover of the comic book that introduced Timmy Time in 1977, but actually shared Timmy's first adventure. But the principle was the same. <P> Timmy was one of two new characters that <A href="harvey.htm">Harvey Comics</A> introduced that year by co-starring them with Richie. The other, Billy Bellhops, was dated October, 1977. <I>Richie Rich & Timmy Time</I> #1 was dated September. In neither case did the date appear on the cover; also, neither launch succeeded. In Timmy's case, this may have been because the publisher was trying to tie the new guy to an established icon that simply didn't rope in the demographic they were aiming him at. <P> Timmy (with his robot friend, Traveler) first turned up on Richie's private beach, appearing out of nowhere. At first, Richie thought he'd merely struck gold, which happens to him so often, at least in places not accessible to the public, he regards it as a nuisance. But it turned out to be tholarine, a substance that can be used as spaceship fuel in the far-flung future era of 2019. A moment later, there was Timmy, time-traveling from 2019 in search of tholarine. <P> Timmy's back-story would do credit to any <A href="glossary.htm#superhero">superhero.</A> Space travel was so advanced by that time, a generation or so in the readers' future, that vast spaceships, so big their captains have room to take their families along, were common. Timmy's father was commanding a peaceful mission to Mars, when the ship was attacked by an unknown enemy. Timmy grabbed the detachable lifeboat (every spaceship should have one) in an attempt to save it, and fell in with a time-traveling robot named Traveler. Next thing you know, Timmy and Traveler were turning up on Richie's beach. <P> As was common for that publisher at the time, the writer's name wasn't recorded. But the artist, who broke precedent by signing his work here, was Ernie Colón, who had done a great deal of work in the past on Richie and other Harvey characters. Colón later drew <A href="dcontrol.htm">Damage Control</A> for <A href="marvel.htm">Marvel Comics</A> and <A href="arak.htm">Arak, Son of Thunder</A> for DC in a style similar to that of those companies' other products, but at Harvey in 1977, was using the <A href="glossary.htm#bigfoot">bigfoot</A> style he'd been using there for years. He drew Timmy in a style at least marginally more realistic than his previous work, but Timmy was still pretty bigfoot. <P> A coupon printed right after Timmy's story invited readers to tell the publisher whether Timmy was great, so-so, or not so hot. The results of the survey were never made public, but reader response was clearly indicated by the fact that he appeared only in that one comic book. After that, he was gone for good. <P> Timmy isn't the least bit related to Timmy Time, who stars in a British animated series from Aardman Animations (<A href="walgromit.htm">Wallace & Gromit</A>). <P ALIGN = "RIGHT">— DDM <P><A HREF="index.htm">BACK</A> to <I>Don Markstein's Toonopedia</I> Home Page <BR><A HREF="today.htm">Today in Toons:</A> Every day's an anniversary! <P><! BEGIN ADSENSE BANNER CODE><CENTER> <script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script> </CENTER><! END ADSENSE CODE> <TD WIDTH=10><TD WIDTH=180 VALIGN="TOP"> <! BEGIN ADLINKS CODE><script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script><! END ADLINKS CODE> <P><! BEGIN ADSENSE REFERRAL CODE><script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script><! 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