Barnaby - A Boy and His Fairy Godfather

The 1940s newspaper strip "Barnaby" by cartoonist Crockett Johnson reads like a low key comedy directed by Preston Sturges combined with the vaudeville antics of a kid with his semi - imaginary friend and/or Flim Flam - Con Artist Uncle.  Early comic strips like Little Nemo in Slumberland 1905 and Mr. Twee Deedle 1912 both had similar interactions with impish cigar chomping fairy like companions who acted as guides to the unseen landscapes of Slumberland or of wood sprites mingling with country meadow creatures.  In the case of Barnaby the Fairy Godfather Mr. O' Malley dealt strictly in events taking place in 1940s suburbia.  Magical visitors like invisible leprechauns, shy ghosts or mental giants made the trip to Barnaby's neighborhood to help the kid find adventure and give advise on daily life.

The 2013 Fantagraphics newspaper reprint book "Barnaby VOL. 1: 1942-1943"

One of the few examples of two adult lady shoppers actually seeing Mr. O' Malley and mistaking him for a little person disguised as a department store Christmas elf or holiday gnome.

Pathos of Maggie and Jiggs - Of Cabbages and Kings 1937 / 38 from Bringing Up Father by George McManus

 Maggie showing Jiggs who's boss in her own subtle fashion while Ethelbert AKA Sonny and daughter Nora look on.

The Pathos of Maggie and Jiggs is the stuff that makes certain Newspaper comic strips timeless.  On the surface Maggie and Jiggs of Bringing Up Father is a light domestic couples comedy between a happy to be comfortably lowbrow husband and a social climbing keeping up with the Jones wife.  Not quite similar to the detective couple Nick and Nora Charles but closer to an Atlernate Universe version of 1950s TV show The Honeymooners.  Maggie and Jiggs are a former poor immigrant couple now rich with two grown children while the Honeymooners were ever struggling financially and perpetually childless.  Both couples are constantly wrangling with how to attain a peaceful coexhistance.  In the case of the Honeymooners it is always Ralph Kramden with the get rich quick social climbing ideas and in Maggie and Jiggs case it's not getting rich but finding acceptance with old money Blue Bloods that is Maggie's quest to the path to Nirvana.

In this volume Of Cabbages and Kings (1937-1938) we find our Irish couple experiencing vaudeville comic scenarios beginning with a trip to London England to attend the Coronation of King George VI because everyone else seems to want to make the trip, Jiggs trying to figure out how to use his 16mm movie camera, Maggie facing the thrill of Jury Duty, Jigg's business / social rivalry with jerky corporate baron Mr Hateshimself, and breaking in a few new dimwitted butlers.  These scenarios are teeming with bizarrely named characters such as Sir Von Platter a forgetful personal business assistant, Miles O' Fillum a movie director, Bill Jurhows an architect, Rex Holmes a construction worker, Van Nanstorage a truck driver,  Police officer Cal Linalcars, Mrs Fern Nature a house wares sales person, Bud Jett an accountant, Mr Roominbord a hotel concierge, Prof Ivar Ekeys a piano teacher, Doctors Phillip Graves - Hugh Cuttem - Will Killem - Tod Dedrinker - Phillip Ponpils - Hugh Shudlive and some toughs named Mr Burr Glarr, Mr Steve Adore, Mr Jimmy Desafe, Mrs Betty Hitserlots, Miss Marian Handevorcum, Mr Armond De Barr, Sir Rounded, Sir Tanley, Mrs Maude Destie, Party guy Ben Noutlate, Miss Turtrain, Mrs Lotsagaul, Mr Hugh Herdit, Mrs O' Watnow, Mrs Gladys Nottus, Count Tussin, Mr Hugo Gettit, and Miss Annie Skandlegossip.

What was unexpected in this volume was a very subtle story arc covering Maggie and Jiggs return to poverty or just lean times.  This brief incident finds the family moving back to the old neighborhood and readjusting to the cycle of unemployment and under employment not unlike the current economic woes of the United States in the years leading up to and including 2013.  For weeks Jiggs is seen pacing in his office mooning over how he will break the news to his proud Maggie.  But the daily strips show Maggie sensing their financial distress.  She responds by not wanting to confront the reality head on but making casual statements about economising and how moving to another location would be a refreshing change.  It's the reading between the lines and slow realization of what is to come that takes the reader by surprise.  So few current comics like to break format with what has already been established.  A comic strip like Garfield when it first appeared in 1978 was wonderful with its slovenly, grousing Sydney Greenstreet-esque cartoon feline making tart observations about the gormless individuals orbiting his central ego.  On occasion tripping himself up Garfield was fully fallible and able to learn some lessons in humility.  Unfortunately only after a few years the Garfield character was redesigned, lost weight and became lobotomised into a narrow humor structure that no longer allowed for pithy observation but only flat joke-a-day shtick that left the strip the repetitive zombie bore that it is today.  Nothing is sadder than to see a comic strip decide to no longer take chances and cash in on repeating the same ten jokes without change into perpetuity.   Maggie and Jiggs may have some comedy patterns stretched or repeated over a period of weeks but the clever commentary is still there and the sly observations shine through.

This second bound entry in the IDW Publishing Comic Strip reprint series of Bringing Up Father / Maggie and Jiggs is by cartoonist George McManus with assistance by Zeke Zekley and is the best so far in representing the highs and lows of the daily lives of the upwardly mobile Irish Sweepstakes winning family.  Below is a gallery of the semi violent shenanigans one can expect from this loving couple.  Mostly involving the throwing of breakable dinner ware.

Jiggs attempting to avoid an onslaught of dishes propelled by anger.

 Maggie with her rolling pins of vengeance and her target Jiggs.

 Jiggs again dodging a swarm of dinner plates.

 L to R daughter Nora, her husband Duke Nevere Worthnotten, Maggie, Ethelbert AKA Sonny, his unnamed wife, Baby Jiggie, Lord Worthnotten and Jiggs

Young Newlyweds Maggie and Jiggs surrounded by their future every day arguing married selves.

by Brechtbug

So...... Andy Gump is a Proto Version of Homer Simpson?

What's Up With Andy Gump?  Yeah...... he's kind of a jerk.

I just finished reading the recently published 2013 (republished?) "The Saga of Mary Gold" segment from the 1928-29 run of the comic artist Sidney Smith's newspaper strip "The Gumps" from IDW's Library of American Comic Essentials.  The storyline is an early example of a love triangle in a "printed on paper" soap opera happening to the neighbors of the Gump family - Andy, his wife Min and their witch-like sarcastic housekeeper Tilda.   The family watches and comments on the daily evolution / devolution of Mary Gold's wobbling romance between "down on his luck" inventor Tom Carr and sneaky banker's son Henry J. Ausstinn.  Min and Tilda are fairly open minded and sympathetic in their assessment of the relationship's trials and tribulations.  Andy, on the other hand, reacts in the way a mob of villagers greets a Frankenstein's monster.   No thought or introspection just bursts of emotional speculation and superficial observations.  Tom Carr doesn't have much money so to Andy he must be a loafer / daydreamer while Henry Ausstinn has a bank job so he must be a brilliant financial wizard.  These feel like the aside comments one would expect from bit players on Popeye's Thimble Theater and not what you would expect from a popular comic strip's main character.

The word "Gump" is a slang term for an urbanite who is also a rube.  Andy is a boastful know-it-all who is smug in the misapprehension that he is always right.   An Archie Bunker without remorse or regret.  How can a character like this have had a 42 year run in the funny pages?   Isn't this a one note burnout type character that would annoy the comics readers after the first few months?  There have been a raft of sketchy flim-flam artist characters to appear in the dailies over the decades - Baron Bean was a scoundrel, Mutt and Jeff were slackers, B.O. Plenty was unbalanced, Barney Google was a gambler, J. Wellington Wimpy was an inveterate coward, Polly and Her Pals Paw Perkins was hot tempered, Jiggs was easily henpecked and F Opper's common man was a meek wimp.  What they all had in common was remorse, guilt feelings and the ability to admit they were occasionally wrong.  The human quality that made them all endearing despite their bad judgement.  Homer Simpson's "D'oh" sums this quality up neatly in just one utterance.  But Not Andy Gump!

Now this is just one year of published continuity from 1928-29 for a strip that started in 1917 and ran til 1959 so it is possible the other years are filled with well rounding remorse for Andy but this volume doesn't seem to show it.  Hopefully there will be other reprintings that will prove Andy less obtuse.  Or maybe that is the point of the satire.  An unrepentantly gormless character built of emotional teflon whose robotic insensitivity is to remain unsullied into perpetuity.  I hope I am wrong in this observation and can have the opportunity to repeal it after future readings of other Gump Sunday and dailys story arcs.

by Brechtbug

Now Random Thoughts on the Mary Gold Story line - spoilers will be involved so be warned.

Oh yeah - there are several characters that I didn't mention above that appear in this strip but don't seem to make much impact on it's story line.

Of some impact are Mary Gold's parents Jeremiah Gold and his unnamed wife Mrs. Gold.  Initially pleasant neighbors who lose their life savings and begin to lean on Mary to wed the banker's son Henry Ausstinn for future financial support.  Mary's "anything for a laugh" party girl sister Claryce and Joe Carr - Tom Carr's brother - a former bootlegger on the lamb from angry ex employers.  These characters serve more in advancing the plot that appearing as well rounded individuals. 

The next two are the Gump's children - Chester and Goliath.  Chester only appears briefly around Christmas of 1928 - maybe he attends boarding school the rest of the year.  Goliath is the baby that creeps around the house like a family pet.  Hopefully his character develops into something more in the coming years.

The last two are rich Uncle Bim from Australia and a mysterious detective known only as The Eagle.  Uncle Bim phones the family around Christmas time to say he can't come but sends a check for $5000.00 bucks.  The Gumps seem to appreciate Bim soley on a monetary level.  The Eagle is a weird red herring character that appears around the edges of the strip looking for the fugitive Tom Carr.  Several dailies promote the Eagle wandering the desert and catching trains hot on Tom's trail only to end up shot to death cleaning his own gun in a dingy Texas hotel room.  Wow, what was the point of that exactly?

Finally the Mary Gold character herself seems to have been designed by Sidney Smith simply as a symbol of lost innocence.  She is a wide eye, blank faced China doll with few facial expressions and very little personality beyond her conviction that she loves Tom Carr.  Like the first victim in a formulaic  murder mystery who is portrayed as unlikable so the audience won't feel to sad for their passing, Mary is left sketchy - a semi blank slate so her demise is mourned in a milder sense than if it had been a major character that had appeared in the strip longer than one years time.

The true romantic victim here is Tom Carr.  A handyman, struggling frustrated inventor wrongly accused of a crime to the point of becoming a fugitive and a mistakenly incarcerated long suffering prison inmate.  He's the character Sidney Smith seems to most identify with and leaves at the end of the story arc pondering the infinite and his lost romance on a rocky seacoast under the light of a crescent moon.