"Amazon Andy" - A recurring-character of the Rip Kirby strips

 Every comic-strip has it's own strong-suit regarding the side-characters. In the strips like Phantom, Mandrake & Flash Gordon, we have seen many iconic characters - both friends & foes - reappeared for the several times throughout the respective periods of these strips. In the Rip Kirby, on the other hand, we have seen many colorful one-off characters in every new adventure and only few of them have made multiple appearances. In the Raymond's era, we were introduced with Pagan Lee & Mangler(personally I felt he was over used & later plots were repetitive) and in the Prentice era, we have Amur sisters(Tutu & Mumu) & Wiggers(who later became almost a regular character). Relatively lesser known but another interesting recurring character was "Amazon Andy".

 Amazon Andy was introduced in a 1970 strip titled "When Rubber Turned to Gold"(IDW title; D085), as a guide of the great Amazon rainforest. Rip and his friend were looking for a guide for their treasure hunt, and that's how Andy joined with them(Andy was first mentioned, as well as seen, in the strip dated 10-14-1970).

 While little rough and gabby at the exterior, old Andy was gradually revealed as a friendly & efficient guide. And at the end of the adventure, they have parted as friends(and later reunited for few more time). 

Now, as Rip Kirby was introduced in the Indrajal universe in 1982, we couldn't have this adventure there but fortunately, when Andy reappeared, quite unexpectedly in the Alaska as 'Bush-pilot', that strip(D139 - The Maluk Indians) was reprinted in the Indrajal in 1986 as the 2nd story in the issues of Vol. 23 No. 15-16.

And the strip-version, dated 2-21-1985..

After this adventure, Andy reappeared again few years later in the strip titled "Trip Through the Amazon(D148)", when he found an old map of hidden treasure, published in the Indrajal in 1988(Vol. 25 No. 37). Any adventure around the mysterious Amazon rainforest has to be interesting, and this was no exception! Indrajal fans were fortunate to read the colored book-version of this engrossing tale(also the fellow treasure-hunter "Pamela Forbes", who was introduced in the same 1970-strip with Andy, returned in this strip. So it was kind of re-union for all of them!).

                             
          

In fact, in the strip dated 4-30-1987, Rip made a reference of their previous adventures in the Alaska & Amazon. 

A few strips thru the journey..

While this was the last time we have this fascinating man in the pages of the Indrajal, Amazon Andy returned again in the '90s strips(D179 & 190, respectively).