Filed under: Comic History

For reasons unexplained I have dozens of cartoonist self-caricatures. Before deleting them thought I’d share ’em. So… Not enough? Hundreds more at…

Below are some comic strip and cartoon books scheduled for June 2025 release (or so).Images and links from a variety of publishers and outlets,though ordering through your local comic shop or independent book store is a good idea. Hägar the Horrible: The First 50 Years by Dik Browne It’s time to set sail with the […]

Cartoons win ‘Best in Ohio’Jeff Darcy won a couple 2024 ‘Ohio Excellence in Journalism Awards’ from the Cleveland Press Club recently. Jason Bredehoeft of The Columbus Dispatch took second in the Best in Ohio: Illustrator category.Jeff Darcy did some humble bragging and posted part of his winning portfolio. To lead this post I chose the Liberty […]

Phil Leeming (ca. 1915 – 1962) has disappeared from the history books, or at least has been demoted to assistant gagwriter after the fact. From the 2004 syndicate promotional ad for the Marmaduke panel: [Brad] Anderson created the character of Marmaduke in 1953. While cartoonist Brad Anderson (1924 – 2015) was certainly integral to the […]

George Herriman and Krazy Kat! Richard Felton Outcalt and The Yellow Kid! Frank Frazetta and Buck Rogers!The surreal brilliance of George Herriman It was sheer coincidence that led to the intersecting of reading “Which Language Is the Richest in Words?,” an article from Interpreters & Translators, full-page Inc. by Toni Andrews, followed by an engaging […]

From Comics Kingdom we check in on The Phantom, Flash Gordon, Mutts, Rosebuds, and The Family Circus plus a trip to The Kingdom of Id. The Plane, The Plane One of our phavourite games to play here at Chronicle Chamber is trying to guess what direction Tony DePaul‘s stories will go. If you have been […]

The Washington Examiner (I know, I know) published an article this morning by Mark Judge titled “Celebrating Superman’s Jewishness.” The writer begins with people doubting Superman’s Jewishness: Yet, in his origins, different names, and even his costume, Superman is a deeply Jewish creation. With a new Superman movie about to be released and American Jews […]

While Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts 75th Anniversary is getting the bulk of publicity this year, a month before that October 2nd, 1950 day is September 4th, 1950 – when Mort Walker’s Beetle Bailey debuted. And Beetle Bailey, unlike Peanuts, has been issuing new comic strips for all of its 75 years. While not the licensing […]

The Doug Wright Awards were held Saturday night in Toronto. A part of the ceremony there are cartoonists inducted into The Giants of the North: The Canadian Cartoonist Hall of Fame. After 20 years of seating cartoonists into the Hall of Fame they finally got around to installing Lou Skuce, aka “Canada’s Greatest Cartoonist,” as […]

Joann Mackenzie for the Gloucester Daily Times talks to local cartoonist Mark Parisi (or here), nominated for the National Cartoonists Society’s 2024 Cartoonist of the Year aka The Reuben Award. Now in its 38th year and distributed daily by United Press Syndicate [sic] to some 100 newspapers, “Off The Mark” [link added] has been described […]

I admit that I don’t follow Brooke McEldowney’s 9 Chickweed Lane religiously due to the weird (to me) arcs. But this week’s amusement with Edda and Amos is sweet and endearing (so far). We’ll see if Brooke can keep it on course, meaning the course I want. Though my favorite individual comic of this week […]

Before the Golden Age comic book size of 7½” by 10½” became the accepted standard there were various sizes. What some consider “the first American newsstand comic book of all original material,” The Funnies, was published in the tabloid dimensions of 10.5″ x 15.5.” By the late 1930s the size of stapled comic books were […]

A roundup of Peanuts items from its 75th anniversary year. For 75 years, Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Woodstock, Lucy, Pigpen and the rest of the gang have been a part of nearly everyone’s life in all corners of the world. Consumer products have played a pivotal role in the evolution and awareness of the Peanuts brand […]

Featuring Shoe, Broom-Hilda, Bizarro The New Yorker, Creature Features, The Phantom, Arlo and Janis, Olive and Popeye and Thimble Theater.I began my comic strip reading with the Comics Kingdom feed today and Shoe was one of the first ones to make an impression. The psychiatrist was good, but the sofa and the Perfessor lounging across […]

Hearst’s International Feature Service The history of newspaper syndication — and specifically the distribution of cartoons and comic strips — is a story yet to be told, and told well. Rick Marschall at Yesterday’s Papers shares a booklet with us about a Hearst/Koenigsberg side hustle. By 1917, Hearst’s lieutenant Moses Koenigsberg split up the syndicate […]