The Fantastic River Race is a comic story written and drawn by Carl Barks. It features Grandma Duck, Scrooge McDuck, Ratchet Gearloose, Blackheart Beagle and a few other Beagle Boys. It is part of the frame story Uncle Scrooge goes to Disneyland.
Plot[]
Grandma Duck asks Scrooge why he was in such a hurry to get aboard the Mark Twain, Disneyland's very own steamboat. Scrooge replies that it was out of nostalgia because he used to skipper such a boat himself in his youth, and he proceeds to tell her the story of one of his fights with Blackheart Beagle when he was the captain of the Dilly Dollar on the Mississippi.
Continuity[]
- The story is part of the frame story Uncle Scrooges goes to Disneyland (1957).
- It, combined with The Great Steamboat Race (1955), served as the basis for Don Rosa's story The Master of the Mississippi (1992). It is also the first appearance of Blackheart Beagle and Ratchet Gearloose.
Behind the scenes[]
This story was first printed in August of 1957 as part of Uncle Scrooge goes to Disneyland in an eponymous issue. It was reprinted as a solo story in Walt Disney Comics Digest #28, under the title Fantastic River Race, and then in The Adventures of Uncle Scrooge McDuck in Color #34, Uncle Scrooge #313 and Disney Magic Kingdom Comics #1. The whole of Uncle Scrooge goes to Disneyland was also reprinted in 1985 by Gladstone Publishings as a standalone book.