Honk! Harpo, Honk!

Adolph "Harpo" Marx was born this day in 1888, 121 years ago today.

Adolph was the second oldest of 5 brothers who would become one of the greatest musical-comedy teams that ever lived. Leonard "Chico", Adolph (who changed his name to Arthur in 1911 to not sound so German with the outbreak of WWI) "Harpo", Julius "Groucho", Milton "Gummo" and Herbert "Zeppo".

Pictured above left to right, Groucho, Gummo, Minnie (Mother), Zeppo, Frenchy (Father), Chico and Harpo.

All five appeared on stage in the 1910's though Gummo dropped out early to pursue a career off the stage. Zeppo appeared all during their stage career and into their film career, but left after five films, leaving the core group of Groucho, Harpo and Chico to continue on.

Harpo was probably the first of the brothers to become any one's favorite. Though his did speak early in their stage shows, it turns out he just wasn't very good at delivering lines. So he developed a silent persona and found he had a great ability at pantomime.

This silent clown was at once very appealing to kids and his women chasing and lecherous leer a hit with the men of the audience. His non-verbal and childlike (actually a pure personification of the id) mannerisms, made him acceptable to the ladies as well.

Check it out.

Harpo also tempered his feral and horny screen persona by showing a sensitive musical side. He was, after all, named Harpo because he played the harp.

Harpo also led an erudite social life. His grand home on the country club at Rancho Mirage and the Palm Springs night club life as well as jet setting the the right coast and being a member of "The Algonquin Round Table", invited by Alexander Woolcott himself.

He and his wife also adopted 4 children, Harpo's seen below clowning with three of them all adorned in "Harpo" wigs.

And did I mention he was freakin' funny? Oh yeah, I did. Check him out again.



Harpo was a gateway drug for me, leading me to the more verbal humor of his brother's Groucho and Chico as I grew older and to the interactive comedy of the team itself. I never tire of watching the Marx's on film and hopefully never will.

Thanks Harpo!

Roy Crane: Adventure Comic Strip Giant!

Born today in 1901, Roy Crane would be 108 years old today.

Roy Crane was a comic strip artist who was one of the inventors of the adventure strip.

It's hard to imagine in today's comics page full of gag-a-day comic strips that are almost too small to be read without a magnifying glass, but back in the 1930's-40's, adventure strips were all the rage. The continuity of these continuing sagas ensured readers would come back and buy tomorrows paper. That's right, back in the days of cities having multiple newspapers, the features would be what often bought reader loyalty.

Crane didn't begin his career that way of course, he was one of the inventors of the genre. It didn't much exist before him. Crane began with a humor strip entitled "Washington Tubbs II" in April 1924, later shortened to just "Wash Tubbs". That's the main character below:

It didn't take long for Crane to become bored with the daily humor format though. That's how it happens. The person who creates something doesn't just have the idea full-born in his head, it is usually born out of the person doing what seems most natural to him. Out of keeping himself interested.

Late in 1924, Wash Tubbs set off on a treasure hunt and the daily continuity, while still having plenty of gags, became more and more adventuresome.

It set itself in stone in 1929 when a roguish soldier of fortune was introduced into the strip named "Captain Easy". That's him below:


Soon the partnership became permanent and the strip was renamed "Wash Tubbs with Captain Easy.

That's just a great friggin' name! Say it with me. Captain Easy.

After Captain Easy, other adventure strips followed. Buck Rodgers, Flash Gordon, Tarzan, Prince Valiant, etc.

But, like "Thimble Theatre" with Popeye...Wash Tubbs seemed to be more fun than those. The humor and deeper characterization which comes from showing the human part of the hero, makes it all the more interesting if you ask me.

Below is a sample of the Wash Tubbs Sunday strip...

...and after it changed titles to featuring Captain Easy alone. (on Sundays only. This was a separate continuity from the dailies which still featured our man Tubbs.):

Roy Crane and his strip are not the household name that those who followed in his footsteps are, but were it not for him, they would have had no trail to follow.

For a time, whenever Charles Schulz (creator of "Peanuts") would do lecture tours to colleges about his life as a cartoonist, he would sometimes begin by asking the auditorium full of students if they knew who Roy Crane was. When they answered with their silence, he would give a sad little half grin and remark that he wasn't sure if he really wanted to talk to them at all.

Roy Crane was funny, he was a masterful draftsman and he told gripping adventure tales. All the things a cartoonist should be.

In 2010, Fantagraphics Books will began a full printing of Roy Cranes "Captain Easy and Wash Tubbs" strips in hardcover with the Sunday pages in full color. Roy will once again be influencing budding cartoonists.

All for the good, I say.

Thanks Roy! For all the adventure.

Gimme A Woman - an Uncle Jeffy Classic!

As I referenced back in my "Pookie-Eyed Baby" post, about a zillion years ago I would whittle away the hours with my old pal Loren Christopher Michaels in his garage and write songs. A country song, a stripper-rock-&-roll song, a reggae song, a rap song, a 1920's style lullaby...most all with a humorous point of view.

At some point we had about 11 songs and we recorded a for-fun album for our friends, and going on the premise that we had covered every style of music, we titled the album "Walkin' Boy & The Scratch: Pissin' Off the World!".

Here's a re-imagining of the cover art work:

Loren was the musician on all tracks (I hadn't popped my guitar cherry yet) and I nick-named him "Walkin' Boy" as a reference to his fingers "walking" up and down the frets of the guitar. Pretty neo-pseudo-hip, huh?

Loren nick-named me "The Scratch" because, at the time I was working in a sandwich shop, and used to tell long drawn out stories at the end of the day, about how I had made the daily soup, the chili, the salsa, et al, from scratch. Pretty Alton-Brown-hip, huh?

I think the first song we truly collaborated on was "Gimme A Woman", the song you're about to see and hear.

I had made up the first stanza and was annoying people for months as I walked around singing it.

Over and over.

and over.

One night after I got off work, Loren and I got a silly bug up our kiesters to drive to Las Vegas. We had about 40 bucks between us, but seeing as I had to be back at work in 12 hours, we wouldn't be there long enough to spend much more than that anyway.

We got to Vegas about 10:30 p.m., wandered up and down the strip for 3 hours, then at 2 a.m. it was time to head back. This would give me time to shower and go make more soup at the sandwich shop.

On the way home we were both ready to sleep pretty hard. We were passing through Barstow, CA. and still had 2+ hours to get home. Knowing that the car couldn't drive itself, and feeling pretty punchy, we decided to finish the obnoxious, misogynistic, foul song I had been beating into the ground and my friends' heads for months, as an excercise to keep ourselves awake.

"Gimme A Woman" was born. Here it is:



This is not really a misogynistic song. It's a love song. All songs are love songs...you can't write a song unless you're in love.

So get over it.

Besides, we were just doing our job. Doing our best to piss off the whole world.

Chester Gould - CRIMESTOPPER!

Born November 20, 1900, Chester Gould would be 109 years old today.

Chester Gould created, wrote and drew one of the most iconic comic strips of all time, Dick Tracy. The strip inspired 4 movie serials, no less than 5 feature films, a Saturday morning television cartoon, a radio show and a live-action television show. He wrote and drew the strip from 1931-1977 and it continues to run in newspapers to this very day.

A true example of the glorious work one mans vision and one mans talent can have on a work, Dick Tracy was at once realistic mystery with crime-stopping tips given to readers each week and truly cartoony and fantastic in it's characters.

Below is an example of a Christmas time strip full of winter season crime-stopping tips.

Below an example of how violent the strip could get. These types of strips were edited sometimes by local newspapers. This is how you might see it in Chicago, but in Salt Lake City the blood spewing from the suspects face under Tracy's clenched fist would be edited out.

Gould's/Tracy's villains were a real highpoint. Always evil looking, sometimes horribly disfigured, this was Gould's take on the world. Evil is ugly, good is handsome and square-jawed like Tracy.

As he grew older, Gould began to move farther and farther to the right of the political and idealogical spectrum. Oft criticized for staunch right-wing views, he refused to back down. I consider myself to be quite liberal and don't agree with allot of what Gould had to say, but I give him big props and cred because he remained what he was. A man of conviction.

During the 1960's he was often ridiculed by his peers and also by young up and comers. Al Capp never seemed to tire of spoofing Chester and his politics in his own "Li'l Abner" comic through the character of "Fearless Fosdick". Below is a strip by a couple of underground cartoonists epitomizing peoples view of Chester as he became more and more a viewer of the world in black and white.

Chester Gould drew a great comic strip with great characters in a writing and drawing style all uniquely his own. It was his own pen and his own voice. It's always a pleasure to drink in that kind of stuff.

Thanks Chester!

Mickey Mouse Squeaks!

Today is the 81st anniversary of the release of "Steamboat Willie".

At New York's 79th Street Theatre on today's date in 1928, the first Disney cartoon with synchronized sound opened the bill for the film "Gang War" and took the nation by storm.

Remember "Gang War"? Me neither, and I remember EVERYTHING! Know who Mickey Mouse is? Yep!

I wonder though, how many of you have ever seen the entire cartoon? Every one's seen snippets of it, but I'll bet most have never seen it soup to nuts.

Don't worry, that's what I'm here for.

Enjoy:




Thanks Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks!

You created a legacy and a masterpiece, by just doing what you were going to do anyway, even if no one had been looking. Thankfully, we WERE looking.

Good stuff!!!