+Postage Due+Disney-comics digest #76.

Don Rosa 72260.2635 at CompuServe.COM
Tue Aug 17 15:27:28 CEST 1993


To Dag: thanks so much for the trouble you went to in translating that
VG article. I'm afraid you're not the first to do so for me -- and you
must have missed the Digest that included some other nice fella's
translation. But naturally I appreciate your work as much as his. I hope
someone ASKS me next time before going to so much trouble!
	
Geir: about the Money Bin...
	Well, I'm mighty sorry, but it's far too late to change the part
of my "Life of $crooge" series that has the Money Bin built in 1902/03.
However, though I appreciate your reasonings, I still prefer this
version. In one old WDC&S story, $crooge digs out some ancient barrels
from the bottom of the Bin and thinks "here's my first billion, right at
the bottom where it's been for seventy years." This story was a few
months before the first view of the Bin, but I don't know how else to
treat it than as the Money Bin. I built my story around the construction
of the Bin and the placement of that billion, $crooge's Yukon Billion,
in its barrels at the bottom. Even at that, I had to ignore the "seventy
year" remark... it shoulda been more like fifty. And, yes, a few months
later is the first few of $crooge's "new" (says Donald) Money Bin...
newly REMODELED maybe??? I dunno. But there just MUST be things to
ignore if I'm going to have a snowball's chance in heck to fit Barks'
conflicting "facts" together. If he had thought of the Bin earlier, he
would have used it in the Bear Mountain story. One thing I did which
should please Gier a bit is that I DO have ALL the money in the Bin as
that which $crooge PERSONALLY earns through HIS work. The bin continues
to fill from 1903 to 1930 at which point it is FULL... and THAT'S when
$crooge comes home to personally manage it all, not before. I agree with
the idea that all his OTHER money is being kept in those downtown banks
and such, and that's what he uses to run his company and buy his lunch.
But like I say, MY version is set in stone now, and cannot be changed...
but it's only MY version. I never expected everyone to like it and they
are perfectly free to view my stories as askance as I view all nonBarks
junk. Why shouldn't they?
	But I'll tell ya, I tried for over two years to clear ALL my
ideas with every Barks fan on the planet, and if one of them wanted me
to hear their ideas they can only "blame" themselves for not being in
touch with me. I view these as Barks' characters and I am ENORMOUSLY
reluctant to screw them up too much! No one will ever imagine the
trouble and effort I've put into two years of trying to tell this story
and fit all of Barks material into a sensible SINGLE storyline. The
VOODOO HOODOO story alone with all its historical inaccuracies and
censored characters was a major headache -- but I think I did a splendid
job of it, if I do say so. And like I said, I HAD to ignore certain
things... YES, like the Magic Hourglass! What respectable $crooge fan is
going to tell me that he believes that every cent $crooge ever earned is
because of a magic spell on an old hourglass and NOT due to his OWN HARD
WORK and YEARS OF IT! What an insulting thought! If you don't want to
ignore the existance of the Hourglass story itself, we can just say that
it was all a "big misunderstanding". But still, $crooge KNOWS damn well
that his money was not earned FOR him by no Hourglass or no dang Dime
either. No, I flatly reject that whole "Magic Hourglass" tale as pure
fiction -- it never took place.
	Just think of the headache I have coming next week when I start
trying to make a shred of sense outta "Christmas on Bear Mountain"!!!

	Other matters Geir mentioned: rather than try to explain the
paradox of all the times $crooge has exchanged his money and then had it
restored... rather than hunt for these explanantions which will never
completely work, I (as I said) simply treat any "current" stories as not
having happened by the time the next month's issue roles around. Simple
as that. We MUST take the easy way out and not seek to explain
EVERYTHING, otherwise we'll turn into geeks like those that populate
science-fiction fandom!
	Lifts in the Bin? It seems obvious to me how the Bin is
constructed: since the interior is a cubic container, all the offices
must be contained in a facade section along the front face of the Bin...
and perhaps that's where there's a lift. But I've shown the bin being
filled through the large central hatch in the roof using a roof-mounted
steam shovel/hoist.
	And as for reading John Nichol's essay, I can't. Even though he
lives in the next state over, I've never heard from him and I have no
copies of his magazines. I hesitate to BUY them since I once saw where
he sells new Disney comics and charges his clients double or more for
issues I have a story in -- this is sheer gouging and I don't appreciate
it. (These are not back issues -- he does this with current issues).






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