Posted By Dan Greenfield on Feb 19, 2024 | 3 comments

A BIRTHDAY SALUTE to the late Henry Boltinoff, who was born 110 years ago, on Feb. 19, 1914…

By WALT GROGAN

When I was growing up, Henry Boltinoff’s art was all over the DC Comics of the 1960s. Henry specialized in half-page gag strips like Shorty, Professor Eureka, Varsity Vic, Casey the Cop, and Super-Turtle, to name a few. And if that last name is familiar, Henry was the brother of longtime Brave and Bold editor Murray Boltinoff.

Henry’s credits are impressive: He was active at DC from the late 1930s through the late 1970s. But for this birthday celebration I want to focus in on the ubiquitous feature that he’s most famous for… Cap’s Hobby Hints!

Cap’s Hobby Hints started out as Cap’s Hobby Center, a feature that ran from 1964 through 1970 while its sister feature, Cap’s Hobby Hints ran from 1966 through 1968, often switching off with the Center.

Cap’s Hobby Hints was a half-page filler that provided guidance to model makers and slot-car enthusiasts. It encouraged clipping the hints out of the comic to be placed in a scrapbook (Holy Moley!). And sometimes the hints were questionable!

Why? Because the fictional Cap amassed his hints from the readers of DC Comics by promising them $5 and the original art for a hint that saw publication!

My pal Dan has tips, too!

Now that didn’t matter to me back them because the only models I wanted to make were the 1966 Batmobile, Green Hornet’s Black Beauty and the phaser, tricorder, and most importantly, the communicator from Star Trek. My models had hardened gluey fingerprints all over them and when I did paint them, they had fingerprints in the paint, so, for me, Cap’s Hints were just fun to read!

With that in mind, here are 13 of Cap’s Hobby Hints by the redoubtable Henry Boltinoff. You’ll find a few surprise submitters at the end of the list — two of whom would not need the $5 prize!

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MORE

— JOHNNY DC: An Anniversary Salute to Comics’ Greatest Mascot. Click here.

— Dig This Complete Gallery of Finished DC COMICS Treasury Edition 3-D Dioramas. Click here.

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A 10-year-old Walt Grogan fell in love with the Big Red Cheese thanks to essays written by Dick Lupoff and Don Thompson in the paperback edition of All in Color for a Dime, released in 1970 and bought for him by his father off a paperback spinner rack in a liquor store on the South Side of Chicago. Walt runs The Marvel Family Web Facebook page devoted to all incarnations of the Fawcett/DC Captain Marvel and blogs about Captain Marvel at shazamshistorama.com.