Burt Thomas was the editorial cartoonist for the Detroit News from 1912 to 1951, and he produced a long-running syndicated Sunday strip, Mr. Straphanger, for them. As far as I knew until recently that was the only strip that the Detroit News ever syndicated.
I also had no idea that Thomas did any other strips, but then came across a small cache of Our Neighbors offered on eBay awhile ago, and further determined that this strip was also syndicated. Our Neighbors started on May 31 1915 and ran until at least July of that year (the dates of my samples). For all I know it ran much longer, a question I'll be attempting to answer, along with a thousand or so others, when I next visit the Library of Congress.
Burt Thomas was, at least by informal account of one cartoonist who met him, a consummate jerk whose very family couldn't stand him. I don't know about that, but gawd the man could draw. Fellow cartoonists may look upon the samples above and despair that they will most likely never learn to spot their blacks with such drama as Thomas.
"OUR NEIGHBORS" ran in the South Bend (Indiana) News-Times from 17 May to 24 August 1915.
ReplyDeleteThey too, had the copyright line for Herbert Ponting. Was he the editor of the Detroit News?
Wait- That should read 24 JULY not August.
ReplyDeleteSorry about that, Chief.
He is listed as General Manager in a few places
ReplyDeleteIn that era Mr. Ponting's title was typically given as business manager of the Detroit News and the Booth Newspapers, of which that paper was the flagship. He later was graduated to general manager.
ReplyDeleteThis old post failed to offer my date source, which was the Boston Journal. So we'll never know proper dating until the Detroit News is indexed, but you have better dates than mine.
The Detroit News syndicated the work of Burt Thomas and Sara Moore that I know of, and perhaps others that haven't come to light. When Herbert Ponting didn't get the copyright, it was otherwise given as "Evening News Association" --Allan
Oops, excuse me. I indexed the run in the Boston Journal AFTER this post was done, never came back here to update it. There I came up with a run of 2/5/1915 to 8/17/1915. -- Allan
ReplyDelete