'Overlord'.

Mister Kit was the pen name of Gilles (Gill) Van Dessel, a Belgian comic artist and modelmaker with a specialization in model aircrafts. Between 1963 and 1966, Van Dessel drew at least 17 aviation-related stories in Spirou magazine's educational series 'Les Belles Histoires de l'Oncle Paul' based on scripts by Octave Joly. These stories were signed with Renard, and generally attributed to Claude Renard. The real artist was however Van Dessel, and the stories were collected in two books by Éditions Pan Pan in 2011 and 2014. As Mister Kit, he had his own section on modelmaking called 'Mister Kit présente' in Spirou magazine in the period 1970-1976. He then wrote a similar section for Tintin magazine from 1977 to 1979.

Oncle Paul by Renard
L'Oncle Paul story 'L'Exploit de James Obenauf' (Spirou #1433, 1965).

Joly also made a couple of short comic stories in the tradition of 'L'Oncle Paul' for Tintin, such as 'La Prodigieuse Évasion de Mike Donnet' (1978) and 'L'Escadrille de l'Espoir' (1983). He wrote new articles under the title 'Images Documents' in 1985-1988. In the 1970s he was also the author of several books about aviation and military warfare for Éditions Fleurus. Van Dessel used his knowledge of aircrafts for the educational comic book he made with writer Serge Saint-Michel about Operation Overlord and the Allied Landing in Normandy during World War II. 'Overlord' was published by Éditions de la Porte in 1984. Gill Van Dessel passed away on 8 February 2014.


Cover for Tintin #34, 1985.

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