Stripper's Guide

When Walt Disney decided to tag along with the boom in TV westerns with a mini-series about Davy Crockett for his Disneyland show in 1954, he unleashed an unexpected mania among the pre-teen boy set. Coonskin caps, fringed jackets and leather moccasins became a full-fledged marketing bonanza, and the theme song of the program became a #1 hit.

Columbia Features recognized a golden opportunity. Disney had made the mistake of making a pop culture phenomenon out of an historical figure. You can't copyright and trademark a real person, so Columbia was within its rights to offer a comic strip about Crockett, piggy-backing on the craze.

The Columbia Features strip, titled Davy Crockett, Frontiersman, debuted as a daily on June 20 1955* to a lukewarm reception from newspaper editors, a victim of the fact that there were already so many western strips already on the market. Editors were doubtlessly saying that sure, Crockett is a hot property, but am I supposed to turn over the whole blamed comics page to cowboys and their ilk? There was also the factor that papers running Disney's Treasury of Classic Tales series (and there were a lot of them) had been put on notice that they were going to do the 'real' Disney version of Davy Crockett in a six month Sunday strip series starting in July.

Columbia's new strip was created by Jim McArdle, a journeyman artist who spent nearly the whole decade of the 1940s drawing the adventures of Dr. Bobbs (an obscurity that we'll discuss here one of these days). McArdle's art was nothing to write home about, but it got the job done. Never known as a writer, McArdle was soon joined on the strip by Ed Herron, who took over scripting duties on July 18 1955**.

Despite the appearance of the Disney version in Sunday papers, Columbia decided to go head to head with their own color version, which debuted on October 16 1955***. Although it never appeared in many papers, the Sunday got a few plum sign-ups, from the Chicago Tribune and New York Daily News, which alone can keep a strip afloat.

The Columbia strip told the sort of non-historical but semi-plausible baloney that you would expect, expanding even more on Disney's truth-in-advertising Legend of Davy Crockett -- accent on the Legend part.

What could have been just another ho-hum 'me-too' strip becomes a minor celebrity and cause celebre for comics fans when Jim McArdle was in the process of bowing out from the art duties. In late 1956 the Sundays start to look like the product of various hands, although generally not in a positive manner. Then in December someone fabulous shows up. Here is the December 30 1956 Sunday, sporting some superb art that I cannot identify (though Al Williamson sorta comes to mind):




Then in January the King weighs in. And by the King, of course I mean Jack Kirby. Working under McArdle's signature, Kirby drew the dailies for January 14 to February 2****, and the Sundays of February 24 and March 3, before giving way to the new regular artist, Jim Christiansen. If you'd like to see the Kirby Sundays, you'll find them here on Michael Vassallo's blog.





I think Christiansen's art is a real breath of fresh air, but it was too little too late for the strip. As far as I know by the time he came on board there might well have been only a single client left -- the New York Daily News. And when they told the syndicate that they were dropping the strip in favor of The Heart of Juliet Jones, Columbia knew they were sunk. The final Sunday appeared on August 25 1957, followed by a week of dailies to finish off the last story, ending on the 31st****.

Columbia continued advertising all of their strips for many years in Editor & Publisher, but there was no new material created, nor were there any takers that I know of for reprinting the existing material.



* Sources: Chronology of American Comic Strips, Cleveland News.
** Source: Orlando Sentinel.
*** Source: Chicago Tribune.
**** Source: New York Daily News.

Labels: Obscurities

Animal lover and television director/producer Joe Camp decided in the early 1970s to combine his two passions. He tried to sell Hollywood on the idea of a family-friendly movie about a scruffy little dog and had every door slammed on him. Not to be denied, Camp rounded up his own financing and shot the film Benji on a shoestring. The movie became a monster hit, grossing $45 million, and that scruffy mutt became a star.

More successful movies and TV appearances ensued, and in 1981 Camp was approached about the possibility of a Benji newspaper comic strip.  The realization of the strip took three companies -- Camp's own Mulberry Square Productions, the Dallas Morning News (the publisher lived next door to Camp), and New York Times Special Features. The Times had recently dipped a toe into the comic strip syndication world with very modest success, and Benji was destined to be the final feature introduced by them.

Harland Wright, art director at Mulberry Square Productions, was chosen to handle the art on the strip, with Camp writing the gags himself. Wright was a capable cartoonist, but his sense of character design was a bit bizarre. Benji himself looks okay, but his co-stars are straight out of a freak show. Dustin the dog is drawn as a collection of random squiggles, and Clawd is a cat with a monstrous growth on his face (is it a nose? a fat lip? elephantitis? who knows).

The daily-only strip debuted on October 5 1981 in a very small number of papers (perhaps less than fifteen), but Camp was no stranger to swimming against the tide, so the strip soldiered forth.

Harland Wright was apparently never intended to be the permanant artist on the strip, and he bowed out not long after the debut. A new artist was found, an art student at North Texas State University named Casey Shaw, and he was groomed to take over the art. He began drawing the strip on November 2 1981. Wright continued to oversee and sign the art until December 19. Thereafter the strip was unsigned for the rest of its year-and-a-half run.

At the end of the first year of the strip's life, New York Times Special Features called it quits from the comic strip business. Despite a tiny client list that could not have made the balance sheet look too attractive, Benji found a new home at Field Enterprises. At this time Dustin and Clawd were banished from the strip, Benji began walking on all fours, and real life trainer Frank Inn was introduced as Benji's main foil. The changes were all positive, but it was a case of closing the barn door after the horse has bolted. Field offered the strip for just about seven months, until May 28 1983. Here are some samples from year two, courtesy of Casey Shaw:






I was able to track down Casey Shaw, second and basically main artist on the strip, and he offered me a lot of the information for this essay. I asked Shaw how he felt about not getting to sign his work on Benji, and he had this to say:

That's a tricky one. I was a college kid just happy to be working on a syndicated comic strip and Benji was such a creation of Joe Camp that I was kind of surprised that Harland ever got to sign it. I equated it to working on a strip for Disney, which the artists never seemed to sign. If they had offered, I'm sure I would have accepted just for the opportunity to have my name become more a part of the comics community, but I never pushed or lobbied for it.

One of my most treasured possessions is a letter from Berke Breathed excoriating me for not signing the Benji work. This was during the time period after Breathed had graduated from the Univ. of Texas, but right before the launch of Bloom County. Breathed had been drawing Academia Waltz at UT while I was a high school student in San Antonio and the paperback collections of his college work had inspired me to start a daily strip at North Texas State when I went there (which is what eventually led to the Benji gig). I had sent Breathed some samples of my college work and corresponded a couple of times and then sent him a few of the Benji clips. His response to my working part-time illustrating someone else's strip with no credit was written in that exquisite exuberant exasperated style that we all came to know from Breathed.

Noting the varied and wonderful art on his website, I asked for an update on his career:

After Benji ended, I went on to full-time graphic design and computer graphics work, but I always continued to also spend at least part of my time doing cartooning work. While in Dallas, I freelanced humorous illustration for numerous companies and contributed regularly to the Dallas Observer alternative weekly newspaper.

I later moved on to USA Today and became Creative Director for their USA Weekend Magazine Sunday newspaper supplement. During that time, I was also the magazine's cartoon and puzzle editor and I drew weekly gag cartoons for the magazine's Wit & Wisdom column.

These days, I'm doing less cartooning and more gallery fine art work, though I also still work full-time as a designer for the local newspaper, which is owned by Berkshire-Hathaway Media Group, and one of my jobs is building the newspaper's comics pages.

When I was a kid, the thing I dreamed of most was becoming a syndicated newspaper comic strip cartoonist ... and now I fear, with the direction newspapers are taking, that it may actually be possible that a generation from now, kids will have no idea what newspaper comic strips were! My dad instilled a real love of the art form in me and I used to spend hours in the library pouring through old newspaper archives and micro-fiche in amazement at the work created in the early 20th century.

Thanks very much to Casey Shaw for his invaluable help with this mini-history of the Benji strip.

Labels: Obscurities

September 23 1909 -- After a two week layoff Herriman is back, and his first large cartoon is on a topic that he rarely covers -- football. That season is just getting started, and George takes a few broad swipes at it.

Labels: Herriman's LA Examiner Cartoons

Here's a St. Patrick's Day card from Gene Carr. It was published by the Rotograph Company, and numbered 'F.L. 189'. It is undated, but was postally used in 1908.

The message on the reverse is rather interesting. A friend who signs himself only as "Authority" is warning Mr. Delmer Homer of Cortland NY that a mutual friend of theirs,  of the female persuasion, has targeted him for matrimony. He is warned by "Authority" to beware of her 'bear trap.'

Labels: Wish You Were Here

Bertram Robinson Elliott was born on September 8, 1889 in Tokyo, Japan, according to his United States Petition for Naturalization, at Ancestry.com, which he filed July 15, 1918. His parents were Canadian. It’s not known when he returned to Canada. Elliot was counted in the 1901 Canada census. He resided in Brandon, Manitoba.

Elliott’s artistic achievement was reported in The Victoria Daily Colonist (British Columbia, Canada), April 27, 1906, on page five, column five.

Won Royal Prize.—Bertram Elliott, who is studying with Miss L.M. Mills, of this city, has been successful in gaining the highest award from the Royal Drawing society. Miss Mills was so pleased with the boy’s work that she sent samples to the exhibition of the Royal Drawing Society, Caxton Hall, London, England. Two thousand seven hundred sheets of drawings were sent from various parts of the British Empire and out of this competition Bertram Elliott’s worked gained the highest prize, viz., H.R.H. Princess Louise prize. Had this boy been in England he would have had the honor of receiving his reward from the hands of H.R.H. herself.

Elliott’s award was also reported in The Journal of Education, May 1906.

The Victoria Daily Colonist, November 2, 1907, covered the graduation at Victoria High School. Elliott graduated in the Arts with an average percent of “73 2-3”.

According to Elliott’s petition, he sailed on September 1, 1910 from Vancouver, British Columbia to Seattle, Washington. Elliott attended the University of Washington and was in the class of 1914. He was on The Tyee yearbook art staff in 1912 and 1914; the 1913 yearbook was not available for viewing but he was probably on the art staff, too. Elliott was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon and the Biological Club.

After graduating, Elliott returned to Canada for a brief time. A border crossing manifest, dated June 1914, said Elliott was an Irish Canadian commercial artist. His father was W.E. Elliott who lived in Cumberland, B.C. Elliott returned to the United States through Blaine, Washington on his way to the Seattle-based Electric Engraving Company.

Elliott signed his World War I draft card on June 5, 1917. He was a self-employed commercial artist residing in Chicago, Illinois at 109 West Huron Street. His description was medium height and build with blue eyes and light-colored hair.

When Elliott filed his petition he was in the army at Camp Walter R. Taliaferro, San Diego, California. The date of his discharge is not known. Elliott returned to Chicago.

In the 1920 U.S. Federal Census said Elliott lived at 245 North Avenue in Chicago and operated a commercial art studio. Elliott also pursued fine art.

The Arts, January 1922, reviewed the Arts Club annual exhibition in January and said “…There was a crayon sketch of Ben Hecht by Bert R. Elliott, a lively cartoon with strong linear balance, conveying an impression of Chicago’s latest literary limelight in a character of sardonic humor that undoubtedly was satisfactory to the sitter….” The same issue reviewed the “Twenty-sixth Annual Exhibition by Artists of Chicago and Vicinity” and opined, “There is good drawing in Bert Elliott's ‘River, Road, and Tower’ though one feels that his interest in the sky has made him neglect the tower a bit.” The Chicago American, February 4, 1922, mentioned the same drawing and identified the tower as the Wrigley Building.

The Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago, December 1923, said Elliott joined its school faculty.

Writer Ben Hecht included Elliott in A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago (1922).

In the mid-1920s Elliott moved to New York City.

The New York Times, December 29, 1925, published an advertisement for the Master Institute of United Arts which included Elliott’s class in illustration and poster design.



Editor & Publisher and The Fourth Estate, January 28, 1928, published a McClure Syndicate advertisement that included Elliott’s Animal Ways and Wonders, a “daily strip telling drama of animals; authentic, fascinating, curious”. It’s not known if any newspaper published the strip. 

No evidence has yet been found that "Animal Ways and Wonders" was successfully syndicated.

American Newspaper Comics (2012) said Elliott and John Hix were the artists on the series, O. Henry’s Short Stories, which was distributed by McClure. The series ran from June 11 to July 29, 1928. Elliott drew these adaptations: “Iky’s Love Philtre”; “Springtime a la Carte”; “The Ransom of Mack”; “Sisters of the Golden Circle”; “Service of Love”; “Lost on Dress Parade”; “Buried Treasure”; and “Makes the Whole World Kin”.

The 1930 census recorded self-employed artist Elliott and his Japanese English wife, Sumi, in Manhattan at 202 East 43 Street. They married around 1926 and were naturalized citizens.

Bertram Elliott, who contributed by far the most drawings to volumes I and II was born in 1889 in Tokyo, the son of a minister. He attended commercial art schools in Victoria, B.C., Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and Los Angeles. He attended the Art Institute of Chicago’s evening division sporadically from 1917 to 1920. A 1931 issue of an art publication noted: “Bert Elliott, well-known member of the liberal group of Chicago artists ten years ago, died recently in New York.”

Art Institute of Chicago

Two drawings: “Portrait of a Man” and “An Eminent Journalist”

Labels: Ink-Slinger Profiles

O. Henry's stories are some of the most beloved and popular American literature this side of Mark Twain, so it's no surprise that they eventually found their way into the kingdom of comic strips. Interestingly enough, the same syndicate, McClure, offered comic strips based on Twain and O. Henry.

Unlike the much better received Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, which had a successful run of a decade and a half, O. Henry's Short Stories was not embraced by newspaper editors or readers. No wonder, though, when the series distilled most of the stories down to two or three daily strips in length. Granted, Porter's stories are short, but to boil down a beautiful story like The Love Philtre of Ikey Schoenstein into two daily strips is a criminal offense. What's next -- the complete Shakespeare plays in three weeks? Considering that I see no copyrights on the strip to the estate of O. Henry, I have a sneaking suspicion that these adaptations were unlicensed. Maybe McClure thought they could get away with thievery if they were quick about it?

I have yet to find a newspaper that ran the strip with perfect consistency, but the Brooklyn Eagle came close enough that I offer this index as my best guess. The scripts are uncredited (as well they ought to be), but the two cartoonists who double-teamed the series did take credit:

Title	Artist	Start Date	End Date	# of Strips
The Cop and the Anthem	John Hix	6/11/28	6/13/28	3
Jimmy Hays and Muriel	John Hix	6/14/28	6/16/28	3
A Double Dyed Deceiver	John Hix	6/18/28	6/23/28	6
Tobin's Palm	John Hix	6/25/28	6/28/28	4
Iky's Love Philtre	Bertram Elliott	6/29/28	6/30/28	2
Springtime a la Carte	Bertram Elliott	7/2/28	7/3/28	2
The Ransom of Mack	Bertram Elliott	7/4/28	7/7/28	4
The Skylight Room	John Hix	7/9/28	7/11/28	3
Sisters of the Golden Circle	Bertram Elliott	7/12/28	7/14/28	3
Service of Love	Bertram Elliott	7/16/28	7/19/28	4
Lost on Dress Parade	Bertram Elliott	7/20/28	7/20/28	2
Buried Treasure	Bertram Elliott	7/23/28	7/26/28	4
Makes the Whole World Kin	Bertram Elliott	7/27/28	7/28/28	2

Here's a quick comic strip quiz for you: what other comic strip is based on a character created by O. Henry?

Tomorrow, Alex Jay weighs in with a profile of Bertram Elliott. You'll find his profile of John Hix here.
 

From 1901 and stretching back to the 1896 inauguration of the International Syndicate weekly page, only C.E. Toles seemed to have any interest in producing a cartoon series. Mr. Toles was also by far the most prolific contributor, but I don't sense that series cartoons were disallowed of the other contributors.

Above we have a sample of the Toles series Reverend O. Shaw Fiddle D.D. I previously thought he had produced this series for the Philadelphia Press, but it turns out they were simply using bits and pieces of the International material in their paper. This series is a revival of the series Reverend Fiddle D.D. that Toles produced for the New York Journal in 1898.

This is the first real series, in the sense of using a continuing character, that ran on the International page. It is also the first series that ran on a regular basis. It ran each week from June 9 to July 14 1901.



The cartoonist who signed himself "Midget" produced many cartoons about bugs, and his style strongly resembles that of Gus Dirks. I thought for awhile that it might be Dirks using a pen name, but much later on, the same 'bug cartoonist' started signing himself as Joe Hanover on the International page.

Although I suppose you could make a case that all the bug cartoons are a sort of series, I didn't count them as such. "Midget" did manage to produce two episodes of Buggum and Snailey's Sideshow (2nd installment titled Buggum and Snailey's 20th Century Show). The first episode ran on June 23 1901, the second not until August 11. Committed to the series concept Mr. Midget certainly was not.


C.E. Toles produced six episodes of Tales of the Orient (later retitled Tales of the East) but it took him the better part of a year. The first episode appeared on November 12 1899, the last on October 14 1900. Each installment was rather text-heavy, just like the first one shown above.



The first continuing series on the International weekly page appeared so infrequently that I nearly didn't recognize it as such. Koon Tracks, a strip about stereotypical blacks with a hunting theme appeared on October 29 1899, December 17 1899, March 4 and March 25 1900.


Our last sample from the International Syndicate weekly page is its first installment in the Rochester Democrat-Chronicle, April 26 1896, and the earliest found in which it is a full page with masthead. Jeffrey Lindenblatt finds good evidence that a page existed as early as July 1895 in the Cincinnati Enquirer, but they chopped it up just enough so as to be uncertain as to the complete contents that were being distributed.

As you can see in the sample above , the early version was a little more text-heavy than it would be later, but right from the first it offered both panels and comic strips. The prolific C.E. Toles was its most frequent contributor right from the start.

Labels: International Syndicate

Working our way backward now, we find W.M. Goodes making some contributions to the International weekly page. His only series, which managed just two installments quite far apart, was Illustrated Interviews. Above is the first installment on October 12 1902, and the other was on December 7 of that year.

On this page we also see cartoons by F.L. Fithian and William F. Marriner. Lillian Steinert and Jean Du Bois are both unknown to me, but pretty good cartoonists.


A longer series was Mr. Henry Peck, also known as The Henpecks, and Mr. Peck. As with other series that went by this same name, it is the tale of a henpecked husband. This series couldn't make up its mind whether it wanted to be a panel or strip, appearing three times in each guise. The series ran from July 6 to September 7 1902. The series was signed only "McK", which I suppose is most likely to be McKee Barclay. He was active in Baltimore at this time.

This page has a contribution from C.A. David, about the latest he'll be found on International's page.  He was a major contributor to the page in the 1890s, though he never once deigned to pen a series.


Going back to 1901, we finally get to see a series by the great C.E. Toles. This one is a panel series titled The Summering of Miss Frivolity, and each pretty girl picture is accompanied by some verses by Toles. This series ran for ten episodes from July 7 to September 15.

Labels: International Syndicate

September 7 1909 -- A packed fight card at Naud Junction tonight, with some up-and-comers and local favorites. According to Boxrec, the marquee fight between Frank Picato and Phil Brock was won by Picato, and Young Solomon lost his bout.

Apparently Herriman went on vacation for a few weeks after this, as his next large cartoon won't appear until the 23rd.

Labels: Herriman's LA Examiner Cartoons

Here's a Grace Drayton (signing Weiderseim at this time) card from Reinthal & Newman, this one marked #120 on the reverse. The maker hasn't dated it, but Grace hand-lettered a copyright notice under her name, and dated it 1909.

This one is a play on the then-current fad saying, "I love my wife, but oh you kid.", immortalized in many postcards by Albert Carmichael.

Labels: Wish You Were Here

Mr. Absent Minde (or Mr. Absen T. Minde) by William F. Marriner is one of those many strips about an absent-minded man. These things sprouted like weeds in a garden back in the day. It ran from September 4 to October 9 1904*.

In the upper lefthand corner of the sample above you'll see one of the earliest contributions of Ryan Walker to the International Syndicate page.


On the page above we have samples of two series. Mr. B.Z. Boddy by William F. Marriner appeared only twice, on October 30 and November 20 1904*. The interesting thing about this series is that Marriner had already done a short-lived series of this title for the New York Evening Journal in 1902. Not having access to those strips outside a microfilm room, I can't say if Marriner was reselling the same strips to International, or if he came up with new installments of the same series.

Also on this page is a series by a mystery cartoonist. Adventures of the Merry Dingbat, a panel and rhyme series featuring fanciful animals, 'officially' ran from October 30 to December 12 1904*, but the same creators contributed panels about bizarre animals on many additional pages. This is some really weird and wacky stuff, both art and poetry, and its a shame that the creators saw fit only to sign themselves as H & L,when they bothered to sign at all.



Here we come to the latest of the series that I found in the International Syndicate page. For some reason (change of editor?), series material pretty much stopped dead in 1905. I tracked the page through most of 1906 and never saw another series.

This last series, Mr. City Man Tries the Country, is appropriately half-hearted, running a grand total of two times, on June 11 and 18 1905*. Mark Fenderson was the cartoonist.

Next week we'll continue this series on the International Syndicate, now working backward from where I started my search in early 1903.


* Source: Rochester Democrat-Chronicle

Labels: International Syndicate

Mr. Lookin was by Mark Fenderson, who started contributing to the page with this series. This strip about a fellow who dives into situations without thinking, ran from April 24 to June 12 1904*. It was always a two-panel strip -- set-up and denouement with no extra frills.


Grouchy Gregory, a strip about a kid with anger issues, was contributed by William F. Marriner. It ran from June 5 to July 31 1904*. Also noteworthy on this page is the top central cartoon, by Florence Pearl England Nosworthy. She made a name for herself in magazine cover and children's book illustration.

Unfortunately there are many contributors to these pages whose signatures I cannot decipher. Anyone who can ID these folks is very much welcome to chime in. Even some whose signature is plain elude me -- who was Fayette, or the colorfully named Foe Feroux?


Oddly enough, this is the only International series by A.Y. Hambleton, who was a major and constant contributor to the page for a long while. Sports of the Summer Girl, a pretty girl panel series, ran from July 24 to September 4 1904*. Hambleton is a real bright spot on these pages whose bold line really makes an impression.

Note in the bottom right is a panel by Carl Anderson, who was an infrequent contributor to the page.

* Source: Rochester Democrat-Chronicle

Labels: International Syndicate

We'll quickly cover three more William F. Marriner International Syndicate series today.

First up,  Rollo and his Tutor (above), which ran each week from April 19 to June 28 1903*. This one offers a daffy teacher who gets his facts mixed up.


Above we have Stunts of Strenuous Sammie, a satire based on President Theodore Roosevelt's flamboyant calls for men and women to engage in physically strenuous outdoor pursuits. Most kids were crazy for Teddy and many took his example and philosophy to heart. This series ran from July 12* to September 27** 1903.

Note on the page above that Dwig is now contributing to the page (upper right), and a fellow named Hugh Morris is doing a passable imitation of F.M. Howarth. I'm told that this is one of the many  pseudonyms of C.E. Toles,  but he was dead by this time. Were these 'Hugh Morris' cartoons material from the slush pile, previously printed, or is Mr. Morris actually a living breathing person?


Above is the first installment of Holdup Harold, about a light-fingered hobo. This series changed titles to Holdup Herbert with the second episode through November 8, then returned on December 27 with the fellow's name changed back to Harold. The series then ran through April 17 1904*. In 1905 he popped up again for two episodes, on February 26 and March 5***.


* Source: Louisville Courier-Journal
** Source: Oakland Tribune
*** Source: Rochester Democrat-Chronicle

Labels: International Syndicate

Baltimore's International Syndicate was one of the earliest distributors of newspaper cartoon content, starting in 1899*. Unfortunately their output is hard to track because the syndicate very rarely displayed a copyright on their material. The earliest features I was able to include in my book were Zimmie (a weather cartoon) and the long-running Scoop the Cub Reporter, both of which debuted in 1912 (Zimmie had been distributed earlier but not by International).

That leaves at least a decade of the International Syndicate unaccounted for before the advent of their first known series. That was in no way alarming to me, because it was my belief that the syndicate specialized in non-series gag panels.

International Syndicate did in fact specialize  in gag panels and text jokes. In that I still seem to be correct. However, what I didn't know until very recently is that they offered this material not only as a collection of bits and pieces for newspapers to use willy-nilly, dropping in a panel here, typesetting a joke there, but also as a cohesive page. This page went under the consistent title The Funny Side of Life for many years.


The above page is among a small selection I purchased recently. All from the Detroit Free Press of early 1903, the pages have a recurring series by William F. Marriner on many, plus a selection of gag cartoons and text jokes. The text jokes are all credited as originally appearing in various publications.

A question you may be asking is why I believe that these pages came from International Syndicate. After all, there are no copyright stamps on them. The thought came to me based on this page and several others having cartoons by 'Hamb' -- that's A.Y. Hambleton, a Baltimore cartoonist.

That wasn't nearly enough to pin the blame for those pages on International, but it piqued my curiosity enough that I selected some nice clear text from one of the cartoons and started searching online. To my surprise, I found a few newspapers that ran the complete page on a regular weekly basis, some for long periods. Many others cut the material apart, but these papers offered the material as I imagine it was supplied by the syndicate, masthead and all.

I began tracing the page backward and forward in time, and I had to get back all the way to 1901 for the real "ah-ha" moment. In that year The Funny Side of Life was replete with cartoons by the fabulous C.E. Toles, who we know from John Adcock was the editor of the International Syndicate. As far as I'm concerned, that sewed up the case.

The fun part was that although the vast majority of the cartoons on these pages are one-shot gags, the syndicate did actually offer some half-hearted series. In the coming days I'm going to feature these series on the blog. All of our samples from here on will come from digital microfilm, so bask in the quality of today's sample, which comes from real live pulp paper. Today we'll start with the first series I found ...

Tweedledum, Tweedledee and the Other Triplet

This series by William F. Marriner has been featured on the blog before, way back in 2006. That previous appearance, unfortunately, turns out to have offered only misinformation. At the time I believed that this series originated with the Chicago Chronicle. The Chronicle called their 1903 comic section a production "by Chicagoans for Chicagoans", so you can see where I could have been misled.

Tweedledum, Tweedledee and the Other Triplet offered the typical Marriner big-headed urchins. In this case it's a trio of little terrors who send their victims into a neurotic fit thinking that they've been drinking too much and are seeing triple. This series first appears in the January 3 1903 page, and is last seen on April 5 of that year**.

~~~~~~~


* This date and lots of other info provided in John Adcock's biography of C.E. Toles. My spidey sense says that the real start of the syndicate is 1892, though, when it was known as the Comic Sketch Club of Baltimore.  Adcock doesn't say that the two companies are related, but the similarity of their business models and personnel make the connection seem very likely. I prepare to stand corrected. In my favor, though, I'll let the cat out of the bag now and say that I was able to trace the International page back to 1896, so no matter what company name it went by then, it was active in distributing this page. Jeffrey Lindenblatt has traced it even further, to July 1895 in the Cincinnati Enquirer.

** Source: Louisville Courier-Journal.

Labels: International Syndicate

August 29 1909 -- Jim Jeffries continues to get the royal treatment while Jack Johnson is shunned by most of the world. The big fight is now less than a year away, although no date was set as of this time.

Labels: Herriman's LA Examiner Cartoons

For such a popular collectible, postcards seem to have a lot of unexplored history -- at least if that history is known it has avoided being reported on the 'net. This very nice Dwig postcard is from what I'll call the "Want Ad" series, all of which were copyrighted to "A. Blue" and indicated as being in series #500. I can find no info on A. Blue, but they published a very high-end card here, with nice embossing. The cards in this series are quite common, so they were evidently well-received by postcard buyers in 1909.

Labels: Wish You Were Here

Hazen Conklin was born on April 21, 1883, in Chelsea, Massachusetts, according to the Massachusetts Birth Records at Ancestry.dom and Conklin’s World War II draft card. His parents were Charles Conklin, a clergyman, and Lillian Hazen, who died when Conklin was almost seven years old. Her death was reported in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 10, 1890.

Conklin has not yet been found in the 1900 U.S. Federal Census.

Conklin followed in his father’s footsteps. The Universalist Register for 1905 said Conklin was preaching in Canton, New York. The 1906 Register said Conklin was located at 16 Clifton Street in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Boston Herald, February 12, 1906, reported Conklin had resigned from the First Universalist Church in Plymouth and accepted a call from the Universalist Church of West Lynn. Also mentioned was Conklin’s education as a graduate of Tufts College and the Universalist Theological Seminary in New York.

Before leaving Plymouth, Conklin married Marcia Thomas Manter on March 1, 1906 as recorded in the Massachusetts, Marriage Records at Ancestry.com.

The Universalist Register for 1907 listed Conklin at 27 Mall Street in Lynn, Massachusetts.

Our Paper, February 9, 1907, said “The First Universalist Church of Nashua has extended a call to the Rev. Hazen Conklin of West Lynn.” Conklin and his wife were among the New Hampshire representatives who attended the Universalist General Convention. The 1908 Register said Conklin resided in Nashua, New Hampshire.

The 1910 census said Conklin, a widower, was in North Attleborough, Massachusetts at 25 High Street.

Several newspapers including the Washington Herald (District of Columbia), June 10, 1910, reported Conklin’s bankruptcy. Conklin said he wanted “to give up the ministry and take up writing.” The Spokane Press (Washington), November 4, 1910, said Conklin wanted to be a newspaper reporter.

On March 10, 1911, Conklin married Anna Esther Hilsebusch in Quincy, Massachusetts. The couple and their daughter Edith were counted in the 1915 New York state census. They lived in Brooklyn at 4404 Sixth Avenue. Conklin’s occupation was editor. In the 1920 and 1930 censuses, the Conklin family was in Brooklyn at 580 East 22nd Street.

American Newspaper Comics (2012) said Conklin wrote several comic series, from 1914 to 1916, for the New York World’s Press Publishing. Some of the series were Comickettes, Evening World’s Success Movies for Young Men, Sammy Says, Sammy’s Sayings and Sammy’s Slate.

Labels: Ink-Slinger Profiles

The New York Evening World published hundreds of in-house produced comic strip and panel series in the 1900s-10s, and two of the most interesting of those series involved Hazen Conklin. Sorry but we're not going to discuss them today. Instead today we cover Conklin's much less interesting triptych of 'Sammy' series, Sammy's Slate, Sammy Says and Sammy's Sayings.

Offered in the series were peeks at the scribblings and doodlings of Sammy, a grade school kid. The first two series had those doodlings on the kid's school slate, so everything is shown in negative, white lines on black. Since daily papers rarely had really inky blacks, reading the contents of Sammy's slates was like squinting through a fog. In the top sample above I have played with the contrast on the scan quite a bit just so that you can see the contents, but on the original tearsheet (which granted, appeared in a syndicated outlet paper) is all but impossible to make out. An earlier and better executed version of this idea is Dwig's Ophelia's Slate, in which Dwig always made sure that the slate material was drawn very bold so it could withstand weak inks.

Printing difficulties notwithstanding, Sammy's Slate ran for quite awhile as a weekday strip in the Evening World, March 7 to December 12 1914. Conklin then took time off from his Sammy activities in order to work on those aforementioned much more interesting series, but then came back to his slates with Sammy Says. This version didn't try to cram so much onto the slate, and was therefore much more legible. However, it ran a mere four times in the period June 26 to July 13 1915.

The final Sammy series was Sammy's Sayings, in which the slate conceit is thankfully dropped. It also had a very short lifespan, running weekdays from December 6 to 29 1915. Sammy work was expelled from the Evening World after that third attempt.

Labels: Obscurities

Albertine Randall Wheelan was born Albertine Randall in San Francisco, California, on May 27, 1863, according to a California State Library biographical index card filled out by Wheelan, and a family tree at Ancestry.com. Wheelan’s parents were Albert Gallatin Randall and Anne Augusta Frost Soule. An 1862 San Francisco directory said her father was a notary public and involved in real estate. The family tree said he passed away January 12, 1869, in San Francisco.

In the 1870 U.S. Federal Census, Wheelan was the youngest of four siblings. Her mother was a housewife and her brother was a store clerk. The 1871 San Francisco Directory listed her mother with the address 911 Howard. Directories for 1873 to 1875 said the family resided at 6 Harriet.

The 1880 census recorded 430 Oak in San Francisco as the address for Wheelan, her mother and siblings.

According to volume 27 of the American Art Annual (1928), Wheelan was a pupil of Virgil Williams at the San Francisco School of Design. In Artists in California, 1786–1940: L–Z (2002), Edan Milton Hughes said Wheelan studied privately with William Keith. Wheelan exhibited at the Mechanics’ Institute in 1879; the San Francisco Art Association from 1887 to 1905; San Francisco Guild of Arts & Crafts, 1904; the San Francisco Sketch Club from the 1890s to 1906; and the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

The San Francisco Call, May 23, 1887, reported Wheelan’s marriage. (The announcement was transcribed at San Francisco Genealogy and had the year wrong, 1886. Wheelan’s biographical index card had the date May 18, 1887. In the text below, the wedding was on Wednesday which corresponds with the 1887 calendar. In 1886, that day was a Tuesday.) A marriage notice appeared in the Daily Alta California, May 20, 1887.

On Wednesday afternoon [May 18], at the residence of the bride’s mother on Bush street, Miss Albertine Randall of this city, and Mr. Fairfax Wheelan of San Jose, were married according to the impressive rite of the Episcopal church, the Rev. Bishop Kip reading the marriage service. The home was beautifully and artistically ornamented for the happy occasion, and after the solemnization of the ceremony a wedding breakfast was served, during which many congratulations and good wishes for a happy future were offered to Mr. and Mrs. Wheelan. In the afternoon the bride and groom left on a wedding tour to the Yosemite valley.

So far, Wheelan’s earliest published work, “The Japanese Dolls”, in St. Nicholas was found in the July 1887 issue. A partial list of Wheelan’s illustrations for St. Nicholas is here.

According to the 1900 census, Wheelan and her merchant husband had two sons, Edgar and Fairfax. Also in the household were Wheelan’s mother and sister-in-law. They lived in San Francisco at 1915 Baker Street.

Wheelan’s move to New York City, in 1906, was explained in The Argonaut, November 5, 1921. 

…But the earthquake and fire came, and the local atmosphere was not favorable to art. Thus did Albertine Randall Wheelan go, as do so many of our gifted ones, to New York, and there for a number of years she has devoted the major part of her time to designing costumes and sets for the David Belasco, Henry Savage, and other theatrical productions.

The Book-plate Booklet, May 1908, profiled Wheelan and said: …Mrs. Wheelan has spent the past year and a half in New York City, giving her time chiefly to the designing of costumes for David Belasco’s productions. She has designed a book-plate for Mr. Belasco…

The American Magazine of Art, April 1921, explained how Wheelan met Belasco.

…[Wheelan] came East to do some special work for St. Nicholas Magazine. Mr. Belasco, at that time was bringing out the “Rose of the Rancho,” portraying Spanish California in the early forties. He sent his Art Director to the Century Company to ask if they knew of anyone familiar enough with California history to make costume plates, and he was referred at once to Mrs. Wheelan.

Wheelan’s New York theater credits are here.

The 1910 census said magazine illustrator Wheelan, her sons and sister Frances were in New York City at 9 Fort Washington Avenue.

Wheelan illustrated works by Anice Terhune including Colonial Carols, Dutch Ditties, A Chinese Child’s Day and Barnyard Ballads. Wheelan illustrated The Secrets of the Elves by Helen Kimberley McElhone, and Nell K. McElhone’s The Surprise Book.

In 1914 Wheelan crossed the Atlantic Ocean. On the return she sailed from Dover, England, June 20 and landed in New York July 1.

Wheelan’s husband passed away March 26, 1915 in San Francisco. He was remembered in The Pacific Unitarian, April 1915, and the Harvard College Class of 1880, 40th Anniversary Report 1920, which has two photographs of him between pages 196 and 197. An obituary was published in the San Francisco Examiner on March 27.

Wheelan and her son Edgar lived in Manhattan at 19 West 31st Street. Both were artists who had studios. They were at the same address in the 1925 New York state census which included Wheelan’s sister, Frances, a teacher.


American Newspaper Comics (2012) said Wheelan produced Dumbunnies for the George Mathew Adams Service. The strip, also know as In Rabbitboro, ran from May 1922 to October 1, 1927. The Fourth Estate, May 27, 1922, noted Wheelan’s entry into comics. The Official Gazette of the United States Patent Office, October 25, 1927, published the following entry. 

Ser. No. 254,653. Albertine Randall Wheelan, New York, N. Y. Filed Sept. 12, 1927.
THE DUMBUNNIES

Particular description of goods.—Comic Strips. Claims use since June 21, 1926.

The American Art Annual said Wheelan’s studio was at 337 Fourth Avenue and her home at Life Chambers, 19 West 31st Street. She was a member of the American Association of Cartoonists and Caricaturists. At the 1926 International Exhibition of Book Plates, in Los Angeles, her design was awarded an honorable mention.

Wheelan has not been found in the 1930 census. A passenger list recorded her departure from Kobe, Japan on December, 24, 1930. She arrived in Seattle, Washington on January 7, 1931. Wheelan may have been out of the country during the 1930 census enumeration which began in April.

The New York Evening Post, March 8, 1932, noted Wheelan’s new location: “H. B. Hillyer & Co. rented apartments to Mrs. A. R. Wheelan at 21 Fifth Avenue….”

Wheelan and her sister, Frances, an art teacher, shared an apartment at 51 Morton Street in Manhattan according to the 1940 census which said Wheelan was a housewife who had four years of college. At the same address was Wheelan’s son Edgar.

Wheelan sent her portrait to Edwina Dumm in May 1943. 

Labels: Ink-Slinger Profiles