Hi and Lois

My wife, Abby, cooks in our family, so on Mother’s Day, I usually make her breakfast in bed as a special treat.  We also feature this tradition regularly in Hi and Lois. Mother’s Day and Father’s Day are important holidays, and it would be an oversight not to celebrate these occasions on a family strip like Hi and Lois.  But it does present a challenge to come up with fresh ideas every year.  There are only so many variations on the breakfast-in-bed scenario. In 2006, I thought it might be interesting to look back at mothers throughout history, so I wrote this episode.  Chance did a great job creating convincing juvenile versions of these well-known historical figures and their mothers. Hi and Lois, Sunday page, May 14, 2006. It is always fun for readers to discover more about the backgrounds of our characters than is revealed in the current strips. In this Mother’s Day Sunday page from 2008, Lois reflects on how her aspirations have changed throughout her life and her hopes for the future.  Hi and Lois, Sunday page, May 11, 2008. If you are still looking for a Mother’s Day […]

Hi, all! I hope you are recovering from your Thanksgiving feasts if you celebrate! Today, Saturday, November 26, is a very important day for comics history: the 100th birthday of Charles “Sparky” Schulz, the creator of Peanuts, one of the most beloved comic strips of all time. Usually, we only post about birthdays related to King Features comics, but Mr. Schulz was such an inspiration and good friend to so many of our cartoonists and had so much influence on the direction of not just comics but pop culture in the 20th century that we wanted to celebrate his legacy. Patrick McDonnell, the creator of MUTTS, spearheaded this project in collaboration with the Charles M. Schulz Museum to celebrate this special birthday! As you look around Comics Kingdom today, you will see many of cartoonists have contributed to this celebration by honoring Mr. Schulz in their comic strips. Here is a collection where you can see them all together! Todd the Dinoaur by Patrick Roberts Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis Rhymes With Orange by Hilary Price & Rina PIccolo The Lockhorns by Bunny Hoest and John Reiner Daddy […]

With such a rich history here at Comics Kingdom, what better way to celebrate this Throwback Thursday than by revisiting our timeless Viking Hagar the Horrible. Here are 5 things you should know. The first Sunday page February 4, 1973 1. HÄGAR IS NAMED AFTER HIS CREATOR. Richard Arthur “Dik” Browne started drawing courtroom sketches for New York newspapers. Following an advertising stint where he created the Chiquita Banana logo, among other things, he became the artist for the 1954 Beetle Bailey spinoff strip Hi and Lois. Then, in 1973, Browne set out to create his own comic strip and thought back to how his children called him “Hägar the Horrible.” “Immediately, I thought Viking,” he told People in 1978. Soon after, Hägar was the fastest-growing strip in history, appearing in over 1000 papers. 2. HAGAR WAS CREATED FROM HEAD TO TOE IN ONE NIGHT Hagar was created from toe to head one night in the collar of Dik Browne’s home in Wilton, Connecticut. Dik was looking for a classic cartoon character who was instantly recognizable, universally understood, and easily spotted on the comics page. He figured, “What catches the […]

Comicana is pleased to announce that we will be posting again on our web sites and at Comics Kingdom. There is also a new selection of Hi and Lois products (click below), designed by Eric Reaves, at the Comics Kingdom Shop. https://shop.comicskingdom.com/search?q=hi+and+lois&options%5Bprefix%5D=last Be sure to check back here for new posts, which we will be making on a weekly basis. – Brian Walker

Mort Walker was an avid golfer for most of his life.  He took it up seriously at a pivotal point in his career.  “I worked long hours all by myself and started having back trouble, which kept me from doing a lot of things,“ he remembered in his autobiography, Backstage at the Strips. “I found that walking helped and I thought golf would add some interest to the walking.” Mort talked some of his cartoonist buddies, including John Cullen Murphy, John Fischetti and Dik Browne, into joining him every Friday for a round.  Eventually he was playing three times a week and got his handicap down to single digits. Mort and Dik were members of the Silvermine Golf Club in Connecticut for many years. Its iconic barn can be seen in the drop panel of the 1980 Sunday page above. Not surprisingly, Hi Flagston and Thirsty Thurston are weekend duffers. They struggle with the game but always come back for more punishment.  Below are two classic golfing gags from 1969 and 2008. We can’t assume that all of our readers know the rules of the game but it is a […]

Friday has arrived! To celebrate, let’s take a look at our editorial staff’s top picks for the week.   1) Carpe Diem March 29, 2021 Cats have joined the space race.   2) Hi and Lois March 30, 2021 When your Monday was just THAT bad.   3) Macanudo March 31, 2021 Never hold a boring meeting around Lord Vader.   4) The Family Circus April 1, 2021 Funny or cruel?   5) Zits April 2, 2021 Jeremy won’t take the hint.

In this classic Sunday page from April 17, 1960, Dik Browne showcases the slick style that was typical of the work he did for the Johnstone and Cushing Art Agency during the 1950s.  Lois looks like a model in an illustrated magazine advertisement, glamorous and fashionably attired.  She moves with the grace and confidence of a young mother.  Chip, not yet a full-grown teenager, has a bow-legged shuffle to his walk. Dot, Ditto and Trixie, who are dressed in their Sunday best, are appropriately adorable.  The secondary characters look like people who might live in the same neighborhood as the Flagston family. Dik was an expert at setting up a scene.  The shaded figures in the foreground of the long panel in the middle tier give depth to the composition, as do the flowers in other panels.  Close-ups of Lois and Hi are interspersed with wide shots to vary the pacing.  The aerial view in the last panel is a perfect setting for Hi’s mad dash back to retrieve the forgotten car.  This is truly a masterpiece of comic art. Artist Eric Reaves paid homage to Dik Browne’s genius in […]

Everyone wants to be a prankster on April 1st. With only a few days ’till the big holiday, here’s a list of Top Ten Comics on April Fools’ Day to prepare you and maybe give you some wild ideas!   Don’t forget to stay tuned for new April Fools’ comics coming this Thursday.   1) Take It From The Tinkersons April 1, 2020 It’s a joke, right? RIGHT?!   2) Blondie April 1, 2020 Okay but these kids really should apologize…   3) Hi and Lois April 1, 2015 Have you done your taxes yet?   4) Mother Goose & Grimm April 1, 2015 Funny or cruel?   5) Mutts April 1, 2020 Nooo we don’t wanna see Mooch or Earl leave!   6) Six Chix April 1, 2014 You better hope this trick is performed on April Fools’ Day.   7) Dustin April 1, 2019 What would you do if your doctor said this to you?   8) The Family Circus April 1, 2019 Nice try, kiddo.   9) The Lockhorns April 1, 2013 Should companies start recognizing April 1st as a free holiday?   10) Baby Blues April […]

For most of the history of comics, artwork was produced by cartoonists drawing in pencil on heavy illustration board and completing the final strips with India ink. The result is what is known as an “original.” Many of these were discarded after the images were photographed for reproduction. Some originals survived and are now sought as collector’s items and are sold by galleries and auction houses. Although values have increased in recent years, there are still bargains to be had. The special drawing above was done by Dik Browne in 1963 for a National Cartoonists Society publication. It sold for $149 at Heritage Auction House in in 2005. The Sunday page below, which appeared in newspapers on February 16, 1958 sold for $1314 at Heritage in 2014. This spectacular piece, from July 8, 1962 sold at Heritage in 2009 for $406. These are relatively modest prices for original comic art. Pieces by masters like Winsor McCay, George Herriman, Hal Foster and Alex Raymond can go for tens of thousands of dollars and can even sell for six figures. Original comic art can be fun to collect and a good investment. […]

Dear Loyal Royal Readers, Today we take a peek at the start of Hi and Lois’s early years as a Sunday feature. Dik Browne was a terrific cartoonist, and all the praise he received for his work over the years was not enough. When he joined forces with Mort Walker to produce Hi and Lois, a great strip was born, in humor and art. Here’s more about the back story: http://comicskingdom.com/blog/2012/06/06/ask-the-archivist-the-iodine-t-diet-mystery http://comicskingdom.com/blog/2014/10/09/ask-the-archivist-genesis-hi-and-lois The writing was witty and fresh, with some real human insight. Also, Browne’s skillful, intricate imagery sometimes reached real beauty, which could really come out in the Sunday version. It began two years after the daily, sixty years ago this week. I present for your approval some choice examples of 1956-1960 today: Hi and Lois Sundays. Above: The debut, 18 October 1956. ( From the color “art” proof) Below: 28 July 1957. Browne was always great at nostalgia. He could rely on memories of his youth for thoughtful inspiration. Hi and Lois Sundays: 18 August and 1 September 1957. Dik and Mort often claimed that many of their gags were based on incidents in their real lives, and […]