Eagle (British comics) Riders of the Range and P.C. 49 helped ensure a weekly circulation of almost a million copies, but it was the adventures of Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future, which most captivated readers. Created by Hampson—now a full-time staff artist with his own team—Dan Dare was the UK's first science-fiction comic strip of any significance. Readers were thrilled by the square-jawed British spaceman's weekly exploits, and his struggles with The Mekon. While Morris (who by now had resigned from St James) edited the magazine from Hulton's premises at Shoe Lane in London, the comic was created in a converted bakery
Eagle (British comics) in the Churchtown district of Southport. The building was described by "Eagle" artist Greta Tomlinson as "very basic, a flagstone floor and a tin roof; there was cold running water in the corner. It was freezing cold in the winter and boiling hot in the summer". Working to a tight schedule, Hampson created each Dan Dare episode first in pencil, and then in ink and colour. He and his team of artists posed for photographs, in the positions drawn in his pencil sketches (Hampson usually posed for Dan Dare). These photographs were combined with the rough sketches, and his colleagues