Very desirable group lot of four items signed or annotated by cartoonist Robert Crumb, which includes two ALSs signed “R. Crumb” and “Robert Crumb,” an unsigned typed letter with handwritten postscript, and a vintage 1961 pencil signature, “R. Crumb,” on an off-white 3.5 x 2 sheet. Included with the group lot is an original 1961 Dover High School ‘The Doverian’ yearbook, which depicts Crumb as a high school senior on page 10, crouched over and looking through his locker with caption below: “Now, where did I put those gym shorts!?” Unfortunately, Crumb did not have his senior portrait taken.
The letters are dated to 1986 and 2011, and are addressed to former high school classmates Mary Price (Parker) and her twin brother Thomas Parker. The earliest, an ALS from January 4, 1986, one page, 8.5 x 11, personal letterhead, reads, in part: “Your letter was forwarded to me…I found that it made old memories well up…I remember you mostly as a congenial person, one of the ‘smart’ kids and that you had shapely legs…I spent a lot of time staring at girls’ legs…God, I was a horny pup.” Crumb asks her if she could obtain for him an old high school yearbook, admits that he won’t be able to make the next reunion, and requests the addresses of a few girls he had crushes on: “And Judy Lamb! Where is she?? Another one I had a crush on…and she was actually nice to me in Mr. Ferranto’s art class!!…Anyway, thanks for the sweet letter…hope your life has turned out well…mine has been so much better than I ever dreamed possible in those ‘unhappy days.’” Crumb adds a fantastic "R. Crumb, Then (1961) & Now (1986)” sketch of himself, with the lone difference being a mustache.
The second ALS, one page, 5.75 x 8.25, March 13, 1986, written from Paris, France, in part: “I’m on my second marriage myself…have a daughter 4 ½ years old…I have a son eighteen years old by my first wife (I ‘married the first one who came along’ when I was 21 years old)…my father died in 1982. My mother still lives in Philadelphia…I’m writing to you from Paris, France, where I am right now doing business…it seems they love my work over here and will pay good for reprints.” The typed letter, headed “Email rejected!,” one page, 8.25 x 11.75, November 5, 2011, in part: “Outside of Joan Taber and a brief acquaintance with Ernie Lenhart based on our mutual interest in cartooning, I was a total loner in the two years I attended Dover High School. I was a depressed and alienated adolescent. The closest I got to a girl was playing footsy with Joanne Plunk in Mr. Flicke’s study hall. I had a secret crush on her and used to follow her home from school—at a discreet distance, of course, just to watch her walk, with her loping stride.” In his own hand Crumb adds his address and the date to the upper margin in pencil, and at the conclusion a brief postscript: “I tried to send this to your e-mail address but for some reason it didn’t work, so I’m putting it in the mail to you.” In overall fine condition, with old tape stains to the edges of the signature, and moderate wear to the yearbook; the letters are all fine. The letters are accompanied by their original hand-addressed mailing envelopes, with Crumb incorporating his surname into the return address field on two.
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