Yaffa Syndicate
Yaffa Syndicate was founded by David Yaffa in 1928 to distribute editorial content from America’s King Features Syndicate to the local newspaper and magazine market.
History
The company was responsible for introducing Australian audiences to some of the best American comic strips of the 1930s, including Mandrake the Magician and The Phantom, which became successful features in the Australian Women’s Weekly and the Australian Woman’s Mirror, respectively.
At some point during the early 1960s, Yaffa Syndicate formed its own magazine publishing division, known as Photo-Type Press. From 1965 known as Page Publications, and from 1967 Yaffa Publishing Group.
These self-covered, 24-page comic books from Page Publications first appeared around 1965 (prior to the introduction of decimal currency in Australia), but by the following year, they began displaying the Page Comics/Silver Star logo on their covers.
Many of the covers for Page Publications’ adventure titles, such as Red Ryder, Big Ben Bolt and Secret Agent X9, were drawn by the Australian comic artist, Keith Chatto – who also drew the half-page panels used as introductory ‘space-fillers’ in these comics.
Chatto also drew the covers for Page Publications’ edition of Air Hawk and the Flying Doctors, which reprinted episodes from John Dixon’s adventure strip of the same name. The Page Comics series (which debuted in 1966) not only began with issue #21, but the title was altered to The Hawk and the Flying Doctors on the following issue.
Page Publications appears to have discontinued its early attempt to market its comics under the Page Comics/Silver Star brand by early 1967. While its competitors were still reliant on using American material, Page Publications took the unusual step of expanding its comic book range by obtaining reprint rights to a selection of Australian-drawn comics.
