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Gag Recap is Kaput – A Recap

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D. D. Degg Published: September 3, 2025 Updated: September 3, 2025 2 minutes 2 comments

Ron Coleman sent out a notice a few days ago that he will no longer produce the Gag Recap infozine, an insider trade journal aimed exclusively at gag writers and gag cartoonists.

From Ron:

I have decided to discontinue publishing the Gag Recap after the September and October issues. The truth is it just isn’t profitable.  I earn a profit of around $135 a month, but I spend around 80 hours per month putting it together.  I can do better if I spend my time cartooning, even if I only sell one or two cartoons per month.

As a thank you for your past support I have also decided the September and October issues will be free [emphasis added].  This also simplifies my bookkeeping and distribution of these last two issues.

(Ron says he will be happy to send out, by email, those last two free issues to new subscribers.)

Pages 8-18 recount the gags found in Funny Times. These gag recaps from recent mag issues give cartoonists and gagwriters an idea of what the editors of the magazines and outlets are looking for in terms of humor. Pages 9-17 are bypassed.

Pages 23-27 consist of The New Yorker gag recaps. Pages 24-26 are bypassed.

Pages 27-29 contain New Yorker Daily Cartoon gag recaps. Page 28 is bypassed.

Pages 31-40 are Private Eye gag recaps. Pages 32-39 are by passed.

Spectator gag recaps are part of pages 42-46. Pages 43-45 are bypassed.

Pages 47-49 have The Oldie gag recaps. Page 48 is bypassed.

Pages 49-52 have gag recaps from The Phoenix. Pages 50 and 51 are bypassed.

Wall Street Journal gag recaps are part of pages 52-54. Page 53 is bypassed.

Pages 54-56 include gag recaps from the Weekly Humorist. Page 55 is bypassed.

The last page, page 60, was blank.

Ron also sent out messages via his newsletter about developments in the gag cartooning world. Recently there was a problem with contacting Woman’s World magazine:

Woman’s World There is something strange happening with this market.  Emails I’ve sent have been coming back as undeliverable.  I tried to find out what is going on, but this magazine makes their phone numbers a deep, dark secret.  I finally got about five numbers from Chat GPT, but almost all of them reached recordings saying the number is out of service.  I have talked to two customer service agents there, but they either referred me to one of these no-good phone numbers or one said they don’t have any email addresses or phone numbers for this magazine.

Ron followed up with the resolution:

Everything is okay with Woman’s World.  Shay Trotter is still cartoon editor but she has a new email address: strotter@mcclatchy.com

Apparently some cartoonists were notified and I got the information from them.  Then I emailed Shay Trotter and she also confirmed this is her correct email address. They apparently were changing over their email server and ran into problems in getting everyone notified.

Ron Coleman closed his notice of discontinuing the service with this message:

I have you all on my colemantoons email list and will keep your names unless you unsubscribe. This list is free. If I come across new markets I will share them with everyone in that newsletter. I will also be pursuing some larger projects such as animated cartoons. If I wind up needing help in any of the cartooning or gagwriting I may even hire some of you.

This marks an end of an era.

Cartoonist Mike Lynch has covered Gag Recap news over the years. And while Gag Recap is the last and longest-lived of gag cartooning trade journals it was not the only one. Back in magazine cartooning’s heyday there were others. Mike has given us a sampling of American Cartoonist and The Pro Cartoonist & Gagwriter.

Thanks to Ron Coleman for keeping the information pipeline and tradition going for as long as possible.