The
Longest-running Comics
And the
Oldest Continuously Appearing Daily Cartoon Character
The
oldest American comic strip still being published and not in re-runs is
The Katzenjammer Kids, which started December 12, 1897. Others of the elderly
include, in descending order of vintage, Gasoline Alley, which
began November 24, 1918, Snuffy Smith
(which debuted in 1919 as Take Barney Google,
F’instance, a title shortened almost immediately to the
protagonist’s name), Popeye (which started as Thimble Theatre
in 1919), Nancy (which commenced as Fritzi
Ritz in 1922), Annie (first titled Little Orphan Annie
in 1924, its run includes some re-run time after its creator, Harold Gray,
died), Tarzan (1929, but its 74 years include a number of re-run
sequences), Blondie (1930), and Dick Tracy (1931). Incidentally, two of
the oldest strips are, today, continued by the same cartoonist: Hy Eisman produces both Popeye
and The Katzenjammer Kids, both Sunday
features.
Alley Oop,
born in a bush league syndicate in 1932, is the next in line, but Alley’s
publishing history was interrupted briefly: the initial Bonnet-Brown
distribution ceased July 21, 1933, and while the NEA picked it up immediately,
distribution didn’t begin until August 7, 1933. Moreover, the NEA incarnation
revisited and streamlined the Bonnet-Brown inaugural sequence, in effect
repeating it. And after that, celebrating their 70th birthdays
next year and shortly thereafter, we have Mandrake the Magician, Flash
Gordon, Mary Worth (who was Apple Mary in those days)–all starting
in 1934–then Steve Roper/Mike Nomad (starting as Big Chief Wahoo
in 1936), The Phantom (1936), and Prince Valiant (1937).
Even at three-score-and-ten, however,
these strips have a way to go before surpassing the all-time records set
by strips no longer being published. The first daily comic strip, Mutt
and Jeff, reached a mellow 75 years before it was discontinued in
1982; and Bringing Up Father (“Jiggs
and Maggie”) just passed 87 before it ceased in 2000. Although The
Katzenjammer Kids is the longest-running American comic
strip still being published, it and Tarzan appear only once a week,
on Sundays. The others in this litany are (or were) published seven days
a week. Of these, Gasoline Alley is ostensibly the oldest at 85,
but it didn’t begin daily publication until August 1919, so, in this highly
technical arena of longevity records, it is merely 84 this fall. Still
appearing seven days a week thanks to the loving ministrations of Jim
Scancarelli, the Alley may yet surpass
the record set by Jiggs and Maggie. But the
oldest continuously published daily cartoon character isn’t found on the
funnies page.
The oldest continuously published daily
cartoon character in American newspapering is
the Weatherbird that perches in a half-column
box on the front page of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The Weatherbird
celebrated its 100th anniversary on February 11, 2001, so as of this writing,
it’s 102 years and 8 months old.
The newspaper “weather icon” is an
intricate part of comics history. James Swinnerton is often credited as one of the three “founding
fathers” of American comic strips, and his contribution to the vital ingredients
of the medium—a character whose repeated appearances built reader loyalty—was
a “little bear.” Working at the San Francisco Examiner in 1894,
Swinnerton started drawing a bear cub (dubbed
“Baby Monarch” after the state’s grizzly mascot) in various corners of
the paper to publicize the forthcoming Midwinter Exposition at the end
of January. The bear was an overnight success with readers, and after
the Exposition closed, Swinnerton kept right on drawing the beast—in the weather
forecast box on the paper’s front page.
Swinnerton’s
bear established the importance of repeat appearances at least a year
before Richard Outcault launched the Yellow
Kid in the New York World. But neither bears nor Yellow Kid are
around anymore. The Post-Dispatch Weatherbird
is.
The anthropomorphic fowl of indeterminate
species was invented by Harry B. Martin on a train ride from Montana to
St. Louis in December 1900. He’d been studying a magazine photograph of
some baby birds (possibly blackbirds) in a nest with their beaks wide
open, waiting to be fed. Believing (as he put it) “there was an idea there
some place,” he started sketching birds and beaks, and when he got back
to work at the Post-Dispatch, he drew up six little chirpers attired
in different weather-related apparel—for snow, clouds, hot, cold, sunny,
rain. The idea was to repeat the drawings in keeping with whatever the
weather was.
Martin soon learned two things: first,
the weather came in more than six varieties; second, readers, particularly
children, were loud in their disappointment if they saw a bird drawing
repeated. Lo, a tradition was established—a different bird, differently
clothed, for every daily appearance.
At first, the bird didn’t say much.
And then when he began talking, he spoke only of the weather. But later
the Weatherbird began commenting on the day’s news, deploying
a maximum vocabulary of six words. The Weatherbird’s
comments often take the form of gawdawful puns.
When the world was gaga over the King of England’s relationship with an
American divorcee in 1936, and everyone wondered whether Edward VIII would
flout tradition and marry Wallis Simpson, the bird’s comment punned on
the British national anthem: “Will Britannia waive the rules?” And when
Edward abdicated in order to marry “the woman I love,” the bird said:
“Heavy reign fall in London.”
These “bird lines” (as they are termed)
are not invented by the cartoonist who draws the picture. Very early in
the bird’s history, his remarks were being concocted by editors and reporters
and the like. Today, the task falls to the copy editors. The process begins
about 5 o’clock in the afternoon when the news editor gives the copy desk
a list of the stories that will run on the front page. The news editor
and the copy editor decide which story the bird will remark about, and
then the copy editors are invited to conjure up something pithy for the
bird to say. The copy desk is quiet most of the day, but at “bird line
time,” the vicinity is full of chatter as the ingenious wordsmiths compete
for the “honor” of contributing the day’s comment. The winner gets paid
a buck.
The Weatherbird
has become a symbol of the paper in much the same way as Eustace Tilley
is The New Yorker’s symbol or Esky, the
google-eyed rue, is Esquire magazine’s.
The bird even appeared for a time on the tail of the newspaper’s corporate
jet. He’s been merchandised nearly as much as Snoopy. And Louis Armstrong
wrote a song, “The Weatherbird Rag,” recorded
by King Oliver in 1923.
Only five cartoonists have limned the
feathered fellow since Martin left the paper in 1903. One did it for fifty
years. Currently, another Martin, Dan (no relation), is doing the drawing.
The history of the Weatherbird has been published in a little $8.95 booklet,
The Story of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch Weatherbird,
published by Virginia Publishing (4814 Washington Blvd., Suite 120,
St. Louis, MO 63108; 314-367-6612). Mike Peters, who grew up in St. Louis,
wrote the Foreword and emphasized the instructive importance of the Weatherbird in his career:
“I learned a lot from that Bird. It
taught me the power of a cartoon to convey a message. It taught me how
important a cartoon character can be to your daily routine. A great comic
strip character can be like a member of your family. [And] it taught me
that a cartoon no bigger than a postage stamp
could convey a totally different idea and emotion every day.”
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For more about the history of the funnies,
consult a book of mine, The Art of the Funnies, which is previewed
here.
