Here’s issue number 10 of Fleischer’s Animated News (September 1935), with cover art by Erich Schenk, who gives us an insight into the Fleischer background department in this edition.
Among its other highlights:
• Tintype bios about Lou Fleischer, Vera Coleman, and Larry Lippman
• Gag cartoons by Ben Solomon, Hal Seeger (now an in-betweener at the studio), Gilbert Fox (another Fleischerite who later worked for DC Comics), and Dave Tendlar.
• An early look at Sindbad the Sailor (brandishing a knife) in “The Animator’s Nightmare.”
• The answer to how Popeye lost his eye!
Thanks to Jerry Beck and Bob Jaques for sharing these rare production materials.
DEVON BAXTER is a film restoration artist, video editor, and animation researcher/writer currently residing in Pennsylvania. He also hosts a 
These Fleischer newsletters have piqued my interest in setback artist Johnny Burks, so it was good to see his name in this issue, along with information about the background department in general. I see that no one managed to guess his five-letter middle name beginning with E. It was Early, and I can’t blame him for wanting to keep it a secret; this bunch seems like the sort who would have given him a hard time about it. I also enjoyed Roberta Whitehead’s limerick about him.
I was also fascinated to see that Hicks Lokey once recovered the remains of a drowning victim in Connecticut. Who knew?
I noticed the name of Warren Foster among the new employees listed on the last page. He was hired as an opaquer, advancing to the story department the following year. In 1938 he would join the Schlesinger studio, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Previous column had confirmed that Foster worked as a storyman on at least two Popeye cartoons: The Spinach Roadster and Proteck the Weakerist. Michael Maltese was said to work in Fleischers and befriended Foster there, and he was the one to recommend Foster to work for WB. (Though it was a shame that Maltese was fired in Fleischer before he could be a storyman, otherwise it would be interesting to see he did one Popeye story and make a fact that the three main WB writers (Tedd Pierce was in Flesicher from 1939 to 1941) had contributed to Popeye cartoons’ stories)
Burne Hogarth, mentioned above, is that Burne Hogarth… I suppose.
(note: possible reason for “lost” Popeye eye depicted in a certain theatrical Popeye episode named “Baby Wants a Battle”)