Firsts and Lasts: The Final Small Society

 

Thanks to Mark Johnson, here we have the last Small Society daily, which was published on February 27 1999. 

The Small Society debuted in 1966, a sort of lightly editorial gag cartoon that focused on an everyman character trying to deal with modern society, politics and relationships. The marketing for this strip must have been masterful because it started with a very healthy client list, and managed to keep a decent roll call of papers right through the 1960s, 70s and even 80s despite the lack of strong characters or audience-grabbing hooks. Perhaps its popularity had something to do with it being an early adopter of the panel-in-strip-format look, but that seems a stretch. . 

The strip was created by Morrie Brickman, who used a very pleasant minimalist style on this feature -- a change from his earlier more detailed cartooning work. Bill Yates began getting credit as co-creator in 1985, and then got sole credit starting in 1989, but the art and writing style of the strip never faltered. 

In 1999 Yates was in poor health and decided to drop The Small Society. The final installment gave only an oblique nod to the end of the series. Thanks to Mark Johnson for supplying this final strip.