Saturday, October 28, 2023
One-Shot Wonders: The Chess Playing Automaton by Ens, 1897
Who can resist a robot strip from 1897? Not me, that's for sure. Even when the gag falls about as flat as a blindfolded man trying to negotiate an obstacle course. This one appeared in the New York Journal on April 4 1897.
This strip really gives the impression that the cartoonist planned a series. Check out the vignettes in the headline area. Doesn't that seem to say "Hey, wait 'til you see all the great gags I'm going to pen about this robot." But sadly, it seems never to have been. (On the other hand, I don't know that anyone has good enough files of the early Journal Sunday sections to make that call for certain.)
The cartoonist of this one-shot is a fellow I know only as "Ens". Sometimes there's a little more scribble after the ENS letters in his cartoons, or in this case some sort of stick-figure. He only did two series that I know of, both very short runs in 1904 for World Color Printing. We haven't featured either of them on the blog as yet. If anyone has an idea of "Ens"s identity, I'd be thrilled to know about it.
Labels: One-Shot Wonders
