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Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Obscurity of the Day: Hagen, Fagin and O'Toole




Here's an innocuous little strip about a trio of animal pals, Hagen (the dog), Fagin (the cat) and O'Toole (the bird). The art by Chuck Bowen is nice enough, but the gags tended to be more cutesy than actually funny. The writer was Wayne Brinkerhoff, who apparently is the son of Robert M. Brinkerhoff, a comic strip career man who did Little Mary Mixup.

The strip was syndicated by the Chicago Tribune-New York News Syndicate, but was taken by few papers other than the Daily News. The strip began as a daily only May 4 1964, a Sunday was added on September 13, and the pet show came to a close on July 2 1966.

Although I don't see anything all that memorable about the strip, I've received occasional inquiries about it over the years, so evidently it did have its fans.
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4 comments:

  1. Ger Apeldoorn5/17/2011 3:13 PM

    There was another animal strip that has a similar effect on me, I think it was called The Comic Zoo.

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  2. Allan Holtz5/17/2011 3:54 PM

    Oh Ger, say it ain't so! George Scarbo was such a great cartoonist in my book. Sure, Comic Zoo was about as brain-dead as it comes, but oh the art!!!

    --Allan

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  3. Ger Apeldoorn5/18/2011 1:02 AM

    I agree, every time I see one I have to have a look at it. But I never managed to read one all the way through.

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  4. Kitster6/12/2015 10:59 PM

    Just a little Hagen, Fagen & O'Toole tidbit here. I dated Chuck Bowen's daughter Brenda for 3 years (best 3 years of my life by the way). I was like family and Chuck often fashioned his work by watching, listening and studying the interactions between Brenda and myself and somehow incorporated us into his work! They lived in Bay Village, Ohio at the time. Miss those days greatly!

    ReplyDelete

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