Don Martin & Frank Jacobs" "The Month Before Christmas"

From MAD #132, January 1970, Golden Age Comic Book Stories presents the entire "The Month Before Christmas"  (EDIT: Oops. That blog is now long gone. Try here.) by Frank Jacobs with art by Mad's Maddest artist Don Martin.

What with all the fretting about how stores being open on Thanksgiving Day now, this seems timeless. Sad to see that the spirit of the season is buy, buy, buy.

I remember ogling all of the great Don Martin art. The image of the linebacker-type ladies (complete with stubble on their thighs) has stuck in my mind since I was a wee lad.

I was too young to have bought MAD #132 when it came out. I lived in the great Midwest back then. In Lawrence, Kansas, there was, back in the mid-70s, a second-hand book & magazine shop called Buzzy's, conveniently next to the Granada movie theatre where I would be dropped off for matinees from time to time. Buzzy's had stacks of comics and old MAD Magazines. Some of these I still have. (I gave away my MAD's to friend's brother in 1984.) Checking Doug Gifford's MAD Cover Site, I do remember owning this one. I must have bought it at Buzzy's.

This is MAD at its peak: the best stories, the greatest gags, and its highest circulation. 

Hat tip to Tom Spurgeon!