More Exquisite and Lush Than Usual

This 1966 period was truly a major high water mark in comic strip history. To have this kind of art delivered to my doorstep every day was exhilarating, and I've saved every one of the strips to this day.

Spread 3 of 7

YEOWK!

A case of matter over mind . . .

April 15, 1962

Jump an' Throstle with Joy

This is another Easter Sunday strip that has avoided being posted until now. It's silly and sweet. I do believe that Lulu Red-Ride-An'-Hood is really Li'l Awry who played a big part in the dailies around this time of 1965 —wow— fifty years ago!

The Day Before Nothin'

This is weird! I was 100% positive I posted this post late last night, but apparently (and I'm not kidding) I fell asleep here at the computer and dreamed that I posted it. I was surprised as heck to look in right now and not see it. My sleepiest apologies for those looking for it earlier in the day!

March 7, 1965

Champeen Cigar Smoker

I'm posting this Pogo strip late Saturday Night, so's you can see it bright'n'early Sunday morn. Cuz it's Sunday, Kelly Sunday, and as per SKS, this strip saw print 45 years ago this morning.

So, the NEXT post will be Peter Wheat #1, yeah yeah finally.

A Spottled Waggle-Butch

Yes, it's Sunday, Kelly Sunday—a time to hearken back 45 years, to the day, when Walt Kelly was delivering fun and color right to living rooms all over our nation, with a little help from stalwart paper delivery kids (of which I was one). Your computer may not be in your living room, but here I am making Sunday deliveries again, no charge.

A Post-Prandial Pox

Sunday, Kelly Sunday! Forty-five years ago this morning:

That Fierce Bandit in the Copse

This strip is from the very next day, yet it refers to the fierce bandit as if we had witnessed the encounter. Well, we didn't. And you would think that with the camaraderie that these two have, we would see them again. But we don't. The next daily jumps back to Owl's school, and we don't see these two fine fellows again (at least not in the remaining months of sequential strips that I have. Kelly's stories and characters meander where they will, sometimes with no rhyme or reason.

A Lion! A Alligator!

Sometimes I forget that Albert really is supposed to be an alligator--he's such a lovable doofus. Kelly had such a way of blending human bean characteristics with animal physiology. Here the lion is close to the size of a beaver, stands with human aplomb, runs like Barney Google—and yet seems entirely believable as a character.

Kelly fits so much substance (a full tree house) and action (the lion has run 10 yards) into these fairly tiny panels, and yet still has room to breathe.

All That Dangormley

What a Exciting Scene!

Me an' My Bay-Bee

Isn't there just something, indefinable, but really evident of the special quality of Kelly's artwork? Looking at this strip. . . the facial expressions, of the lamb in the 2nd panel and of Li'l' Awry in the last panel, the characters feel somehow real, even though we know they're only cartoons. I feel comforted by looking in on the characters in Kelly's Whirled. Most other comic strips have a superficial quality, the art seems manufactured.

Oh gosh, I'm not explaining this right. Somehow I need to come up with the words that communicate this. Anyone want to give it a whirl, if you even get a hint of what I'm saying here? Many many of you feel Kelly's art and style is more than just good art--what is it, why is it that it reaches us on an emotional level? This is something I just have to find the words for.

Boy, that lamb really has the patter down of a promotional campaign.

The Month of March

OK, to be timely I could've/should've/would've posted this grouping of strips at the beginning of March. But I didn't, and it's not gonna hurt anybody that I'm doing it now. And it's better now, maybe, then, oh, say August. But even if I had waited 'til then, so what, right? My mission here is to jump all over the place—Kelly here, Kelly there. Still, it's not even the middle of March, so this is sort of timely, not that I need to be, mind you.

This is the first of ten consecutive strips. They're old and brittle (like me), so please don't mind the yellowing newsprint.