Jeffrey Lindenblatt's Paper Trends: The 300 for 1996 -- Results

In 1995 we lost 4 additional papers, three of them merging with other papers which included the Lincoln Star (August 4), Evening Sun (Baltimore, MD) (September 15) and Times-Advocate (Escondido, CA) (December 2). The fourth paper, the Vidette Messenger (Valparaiso, IN) is not archived past July 31, 1995. The paper itself would only last another four years before its demise. So, this survey is down to 255 papers.

As with last year’s survey when Far Side ended, a major upheaval has again happened in the daily paper. That was the end of Calvin and Hobbes, which in the last survey had 213 papers, the 3rd highest total of any feature. As mentioned in Winners and Losers yesterday, the strip that reaped the most of its clients was Dilbert, which added 69 papers. So it comes as no surprise that Dilbert enters the 100 paper club and tied in 11th place with B.C. Other big moves are Cathy moving up 3 places to number 7, Fox Trot also moving up 3 places to number 15. Blondie rising back to the number 3 spot and For Better or For Worse moving up 2 spots to number 4. Andy Capp continues its downward spin falling from #25 to 29. I’m betting it will fall off the Top 30 by next year’s survey.

It is notable that the top ten strips got no benefit from the end of Calvin & Hobbes -- they barely moved. That would seem to show that these features were either already appearing in most of the papers that ran Calvin, or that newspaper editors were almost unanimously looking to add newer, fresher features to their pages.

Also making it into the top 30 along with Dilbert are three additional features. Mallard Fillmore at #24, Non Sequitur at #25 and Baby Blues at #27.  The three strips that fell out this year are Funky Winkerbean, Crankshaft and Rex Morgan, which all failed to capture papers in the post-Calvin bonanza. With Rex Morgan falling out that leaves Mary Worth as the only continuity strip in the Top 30.

Another huge event comes this year -- Peanuts has been #1 on all these surveys for 18 years, but we now have a tie for first place. Garfield added one paper to its total and now is in a tie for the number 1 spot. Will Garfield take over the number 1 spot next year?

Title	Rank	Rank Change +/-	Papers +/-	Total Papers
Garfield	1	Up 1	1	220
Peanuts	1	Same	0	220
Blondie	3	Up 1	-1	205
For Better or For Worse	4	Up 2	26	197
Beetle Bailey	5	Same	-1	177
Hagar The Horrible	6	Up 1	1	155
Cathy	7	Up 3	11	154
Family Circus	8	Same	1	148
Doonesbury	9	Same	-1	144
Wizard of Id	10	Up 1	-3	106
B.C.	11	Same	-4	105
Dilbert	11	Entering	69	105
Hi and Lois	13	Up 1	3	101
Frank and Ernest	14	Down 1	-4	98
Fox Trot	15	Up 3	21	91
Born Loser	16	Down 1	-4	88
Shoe	17	Down 1	0	87
Dennis The Menace	18	Down 1	-2	80
Marmaduke	19	Same	3	63
Mother Goose and Grimm	20	Up 2	3	60
Sally Forth	21	Same	-1	57
Close To Home	22	Up 1	2	54
Ziggy	22	Down 2	-5	54
Mallard Fillmore	24	Entering	25	49
Non Sequitur	25	Entering	13	46
Mary Worth	26	Down 2	-4	43
Baby Blues	27	Entering	9	39
Barney Google and Snuffy Smith	27	Down 1	-1	39
Andy Capp	29	Down 4	-3	38
Arlo and Janis	30	Down 3	-1	37

 

 E&P Survey vs. Stripper's Guide The 300 Survey

Now let's check in with a comparison of my two surveys for 1996; the current one and the one I did for Editor & Publisher back in the day; the E&P survey was of the top 100 papers in the US, by circulation. There’s an important difference in the criteria for the two polls – in the E&P survey strips got ranked with Sunday papers included; in other words if a given daily or Sunday paper ran Peanuts, that paper got counted. This allowed Sunday-only strips and strips with more popular Sundays than dailies, to get in the running. The 300 poll covers daily features only.

As with last year we can compare what I researched for Editor and Publisher in 1996. Most of the information turns out to be basically the same with a few minor changes in the Top 10, mostly due to skewing based on the popularity of Sunday versions. All the newer strips were moving up the chart in both surveys, and the same rookies had big debuts.

Title	Strippers Guide Rank	SG Total Papers	E & P Rank	E&P Total Papers
Garfield	1	220	1	92
Peanuts	1	220	4	Unknown
Blondie	3	205	2	90
For Better or For Worse	4	197	3	89
Beetle Bailey	5	177	9	Unknown
Hagar The Horrible	6	155	6	Unknown
Cathy	7	154	7	Unknown
Family Circus	8	148	8	Unknown
Doonesbury	9	144	5	Unknown
Wizard of Id	10	106	13	Unknown
B.C.	11	105	12	Unknown
Dilbert	11	105	10	80

 Universal Comics Page

Over the past 80 years when you picked up a paper from another town or city in most cases you would read some of the strips that appeared in your local paper but mostly you would see strips that you have never seen before. By the 1980s, with the slow demise of newspapers beginning and less papers around to compete for features, more papers had the opportunity to buy strips that were not available to them before. This could lead to more variety from one paper to another, but instead, the editors of these papers would do the opposite and just pick the most popular strips. As this way of filling a comics page became more and more prevalent, you would now see many of the same comics in every paper.The Universal Comic Section is a measure of how many papers run the most popular strips. 

With the ending of Calvin and Hobbes the universal comic section had its biggest drop, with papers opting to try out newer features instead of just plugging in a member of the popular old guard. However,  we have one paper that uses the top 26 strips and that is the Colorado Springs Gazette. 

The average number of comic strips per paper moves up to 17.33, a small increase.

Top 2 – 204 (Up 2)
Top 3 – 174 (Down 10)
Top 4 – 149 (Down 12)
Top 5 – 122 (Down 7)
Top 6 – 92 (Down 12)
Top 7 – 76 (Down 3)
Top 8 – 58 (Down 2)
Top 9 – 46 (Down 3)
Top 10 – 30 (Down 12)
Top 11 – 23 (Down 4)
Top 12 – 12 (Down 12)
Top 13 – 10 (Up 1)
Top 14 – 2 (Down 4)
Top 15 – 1 (Down 1)
Top 16 – 1 (Down 1)
Top 17 – 1 (Same)
Top 18 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 19 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 20 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 21 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 22 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 23 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 24 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 25 – 1 (Up 1)
Top 26 – 1 (Up 1) 

Here are the number of papers per feature, the rest beyond the top thirty:

36 - Rex Morgan (-2)

35 – Crankshaft (-2)

34 - Funky Winkerbean (-3)

32 - Rose Is Rose (+5)

31 - Alley Oop (0), Lockhorns (-1)

28 – Marvin (-3), Rubes (-4)

27 – Curtis (+3), Jump Start (+3), Luann (0)

25 - Gasoline Alley (-1), Grizzwells (-1), In The Bleachers (+2), Real Life Adventures (0)

23 - Kit N' Carlyle (+1)

22 – Geech (-2), Tank McNamara (-2)

21 – Mutts (+13)

20 – Bizarro (0), Eek & Meek (-4), Judge Parker (-2)

19 - Berry's World (-5)

18 – Heathcliff (-3), One Big Happy (+10), Overboard (-2)

17 - Beattie Blvd. (-6), Farcus (-3)

16 – Ernie (-2), Over The Hedge (R), Robotman (-3)

15 - Fred Basset (+1), Mixed Media (-5), Nancy (0), Sylvia (0)

14 – Pickles (+3), Pluggers (0)

13 – Adam (-3), Amazing Spider-Man (-2), Drabble (+1), Tiger (+1)

12 - Mark Trail (0)

11 - Apartment 3-G (-3), Betty (+4), Big Nate (-7), Bound & Gagged (+4), Dave (0), Mr. Boffo (+4), Phantom (-1), Us & Them (R)

10 - Dick Tracy (0), Rhymes With Orange (R)

9 - Crabby Road (R), Dunagin’s People (-5), Herb and Jamaal (-2), Middletons (0), Speed Bump (+3), Zippy (+1)

8 - Brenda Starr (0), Buckets (-1), Chaos (-9), Gil Thorp (0), Hocus-Focus (+1), Kudzu (-1), Sherman’s Lagoon (+3), Stone Soup (R)

7 - Against The Grain (NR), Archie (0), Duplex (0), Fusco Brothers (-1), Ralph (R), Thatch (+1), They’ll Do It Every Time (0)

6 - Grin and Bear It (0), Momma (-1), Safe Havens (-2), Terry and The Pirates (R), Tumbleweeds (-3)

5 - Citizen Dog (R), Comic For Kids (+1), Committed (-1), Donald Duck (-1), Ghost Story Club (R), Horrorscope (-3), Motley’s Crew (0), That’s Jake (0)

4 - Broom Hilda, New Breed, 9 Chickweed Lane, Quigmans, Steve Roper and Mike Nomad, Willy ‘N Ethel

3 - Agatha Crumm, Ballard Street, Bent Offering, Crock, I Need Help, Mickey Mouse, Off The Mark, On The Fastrack, Rip Kirby, Wit of The World

2 - Animal Crackers, Better Half, Bottom Liners, Chubb & Chauncey, Culture Shock, Hazel, Little Orphan Annie, Love Is, Outcasts, Out of Bounds, Reality Check, Redeye, Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, Tundra, Two Toes, Walnut Cove, Winnie Winkle, Word for Word

1 - At The Zu, Belvedere, Bent Halos, Ben Wicks, Best Years, Between Friends, Don’t You Just, Family Business, Flintstones, Francie, Good Life, Graffiti, Ick, Lack of Focus, Laffbreak, Meet Mr. Lucky, Modesty Blaise, Moose Lake, Moose Miller, Our Fascinating Earth, Penmen, Pete & Clete, Playing Better Golf with Jack Nicklaus, Rural Rootz, Single Slices, Small Society, Sports Hall of Shame, Suburban Cowgirls, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Tribune Toon, Trudy, Twins, What A Guy, Wild Life 

As always, if you would like the more detailed version of this list, which includes which papers run each feature, just email strippersguide@gmail.com, and do include which years of the detailed list you would like.