Manga's Papa!

Thanks to a brief interruption by a little event called the Oscars, I'm still playing catchup on that weekend in Omiya/Tokyo. I managed to hit a couple of Museums in Omiya just so I could boast about being culturally enlightened. I'll speak of the Saitama Museum of History & Folklore later, for now it's time to mention
北澤 楽天 Rakuten Kitazawa. Click his name to learn more about him, but he is the dude who coined the term Manga to refer to comics & cartoons and started his own magazine in 1905 called Tokyo Puck. His work is a cross between Punch Magazine, The Yellow Kid and The Katzenjammer Kids.

Here are some scans of his more famous works. The coolest ones (like this cover of Tokyo Puck showing a guy biting his own navel), I'll present individually. The others will be en masse. (Give them a click to MAGNAfy them!)

























I'm considering buying a piece of history by bidding on this unless you beat me to it!