Billy the Cat

I didn't name Billy - he had that name already when I got him and his sister from the rescue centre.
However, there are lots of cartoon strips that have been named Billy the cat. And every time I do a google search more seem to come out of the woodwork.

Here's the original...

and here are a few I've found so far.

First off, Billy the Cat, the Beano's late sixties version of Spiderman. This is scanned from the Beano Book 1970 - the first book I ever bought with my own money. (I remember saving up the eight shillings and sixpence it cost in old pennies the size of cartwheels and then dragging a big bag full of coins down to the newsagents to buy it. Eight shillings and sixpence is nowadays the equivalent of 42.5p.) Billy is an eleven year old schoolboy by day, attending an academy in Burnham, one of those DC Thompson anytowns. However, by night he dons leathers and a crash helmet with whiskers and becomes Billy the Cat, Burnham's acrobatic crime fighter, inventing Parkour thirty years early. If the scan makes no sense, it because the story runs across the spread and I've only been able to scan the right hand side.

Meanwhile, from Belgium, here is another Billy the Cat. Serialised in the children's magazine Spirou, the comic follows the story of Billy, a normal schoolboy who often pranks and bullies animals. However, early in the first comic album, he is killed when he carelessly runs out in the street and is hit by a car. Told that his chances of getting into Heaven are slim due to his misdeeds, he is given a second chance by being returned to earth as a young cat. The comic follows Billy's attempts to adapt to living as a cat and chronicle his misadventures while he interacts with other animals. There's a TV series that's been doing the rounds as well, though neither the books or the TV show have yet reached the UK.

Finally, this guy needs no introduction.