Carl Barks, Black Pete and Peg-leg-Pete

[Luca Boschi]

Hi, all!

Donald Ault is right!

But me too!

Not so much Marco... er...

The problem is that in Italy, Pete's name was always the same: Pietro
Gambadilegno.
As you know, the character's American name, Peg-leg Pete, was changed in the
comic books, since Pete got no more his peg-leg (and his very name was not
politically correct anymore).
But Peg-leg Pete and Black Pete are the same character (later changed into
Big bad Pete, to avoid any possible reference to the "black" race).
Incidentally, try to control the Romano Scarpa's "Tapioco VI" story, in the
MM comic book, where Pete was totally naked in a panel. Do you remember that
famous sequence of panels?
Well, in a comic book of the 90s (and in a story written few years before
the GG Barks' one), under his fake shoe,the nake Pete was still wearing his
old peg-leg of the 30es!
Obviously, SCARPA knows a lot about SHOES... (this sort of joke should be
understandable only to the Italian-speaking memebers, I suppose)...

Donald wrote:

> On page 3 of the original printing of the Gyro story in US #28, in panel 3
> Gyro refers to the character as "that thug, Black Pete!" In the next panel
> the narrative box reads: "Soon Gyro and Black Pete Meet for the prize!"
>
> I see no reference to "Peg-leg Pete."


And that's true, since "Peg-Leg" become "Black", in the Western's comic
books (beginning from the early 50s, or the late 40s, it'd worth to check).
So, in all the stories with the original American name of Black Pete, this
one was translated as Pietro Gambadilegno into Italian. I'm sure you all
know that when Bill Wright redrew the old Gottfredson's story about the
Mystery of Hidden River ("Topolino e il taglialegna" in Italy), he avoided
any explanation about the "brand new model of shoe" which was conceived to
hide Pete's (or I should call him Pierre 8-)?) peg-leg. The reason is that
the peg-leg was not popular anymore at the time.

Al least, the righ question of Marco should not have been:
>>
>> But did Barks ever officially "declare" him to be Peg-leg-Pete?

But:

Did Barks ever officially "declare" him to be Black Pete?

And the right answer is "Yes"!
So, Barks drew and named the arch-enemy of Mickey, as it was "normal" to do
it in that period.




Luca