Polls is a Matter of Interpretation

Sorry to have dropped the posting schedule for a while. I'm awaiting more wonderful scans of vintage tear sheets and I can't be pushy when someone as generous as David Burd is making time in his busy schedule to accommodate us.

In the meantime I'll try posting some other Kelly goodness here and there. This from one of the latter day Pogo books.

There were plenty of issues in Kelly's day that are still haunting us today, making his satire just as relevant as we look at it fresh. Man, he would have had a field day with the political climate of nowadays. 

The Un-Natural Born Truan' Officer

Another early Sunday strip, generously provided by DJ David B.

October 8, 1950

The World's Serious Condition

I have a headache and need to get to sleep, so I'm posting on Saturday nite so's you have this first thing on Sunday.

Here is another gorgeous Sunday strip that is also in the new Fantagraphics volume (if you haven't yet, go buy it!), but here we showcase the handsome tabloid format, courtesy of my friend and yours, DJ David B.

As Chris points out in the previous Pogo Sunday post, Deacon sometimes spoke without Gothic lettering in some early strips. When he first became a cast member he started out all Gothic, so I think somebody just forgot.

October 1, 1950

"One more word and you'll be sold to the Milwaukee Brewers!"

Now, he's not talking about the big league Milwaukee Brewers that was formed around '69 or'70, but the minor league baseball team that played in the American Association from 1902 through 1952 with a Triple-A class-level from 1946 to 1952. They hadn't been doing all that well at the time of this strip in 1950, but the following year they held their class and league titles. Among notable managers were Casey Stengel and Red Smith. Among notable players were Alvin Dark, Johnny Logan, Rudy York and Jim Thorpe.

Baseball was an ongoing ritual in Kelly's Okefenokee.

Black, Wet or Indiffermints

Another spin of a 'toon from the grade A DJ — DJ David B.

If it's Deacon you're seekin', you've come to the place where this is the case.

Hey Chris! Swish, Ploop! More slapstick!

September 17, 1950

The Squirrel Squats Low in the Hoorah Bush

This is the last page of the arc that's been playing out for weeks. Boom, it just ends here, and the following week a whole new arc started, just like that.

Kelly pays tribute to his fellow comic book cartoonist, Dan Noonan, one of Kelly's early style influences.

Pooed Out

"Scurrilous lagamuffins, poltroons, spalpeens"—woosh, lotta name-callin' goin' on here.

Even if it is a case of mistaken identity, sorta grisly thinking them boys are eating bun's two heads.

Chasin' the Bun-Nappers

We're skipping past two Sundays now, cuz those two had nuttin to do with this storyline. But if ya gotta see em, I already posted em some time ago. They had somethin to do with Easter eggs that hatched into googley birds, or somethin like that.

Anyway, happy Sunday, Kelly Sunday!

ARNK

The horse keep on runnin' A-way, and Grundoon keep on sleepin'.

You folk out there keep on readin'?

My Own Cosa Nostra

So we've already skipped the strip that I'm missing, just prior to this one. Yet for story continuity it doesn't seem to harm us.

I'm not sure of the significance of Deacon's head being hidden by balloons and Sam peeking out from under one, other than to show us that Kelly is fully aware of how wordy the strip is.

Cosa Nostra, of course, refers to the Mafia, a Sicilian criminal society.

Clandestine Meeting

When I was a kid of eleven, I was clipping and keeping newspaper comics, but not obsessively. If I skipped a week or two here or there, it didn't mean anything to me. So what, I thought, comics will always be around, and new Pogo Sundays will be printed forever. Continuity? Completism? What are those things?

In short, I'm missing some pages at the early end of my Pogo Sundays. What you see below is a storyline that is 'already in progress'. But so what? We're lucky to see this much. Amidst the seven pages of the arc that you will see, there will be a couple more Sundays missing. Again, so what? The story still flows, thanks to Kelly's genius of 'running in place' with his stories.

I so want to get in Mr. Peabody's Wayback Machine, and go back to have a talk with my younger self. There are many things I would tell him/me. Among other things, I would say, "be more aware, pay attention to what you think is unimportant, cuz really, ultimately those things will be important. Don't take anything for granted". And of course I'd tell him/me to go out and buy as many Action #1's that he could find.

Realize that when this Sunday strip was printed, John F. Kennedy was still alive (though only with 2 and 1/2 weeks left to his life). The world felt young and optimistic, even to a boy of 11.