May 1st, 2014

Ask the Archivist: “Krazy’s First and Last”

by The King

Greetings Archivist Readers!

 GEORGE  HERRIMAN (22 AUGUST 1880-25 APRIL 1944) IN 1918, WITH KRAZY KAT CAST MEMBERS.

We just passed the 70th Anniversary of the passing of one of the greats of comics past, George Herriman. His strip, Krazy Kat, would outlive him, but only by a few weeks, until the cartoons he left behind were published.

Krazy and Ignatz started as tiny characters that ran around in the lower edges of Herriman’s earlier family sitcom strip, “The Dingbat Family,” in 1910. They soon graduated to a separate strip that ran below the Dingbats, and then became a series all by themselves in 1913.

 THE DEBUT OF KRAZY & IGNATZ IN THE DINGBAT FAMILY, 26 JULY 1910  (ABOVE) AND THE LAST KRAZY KAT DAILY STRIP (BELOW), SHOWING OFFICA PUPP DOING HIS DUTY ON 3 JUNE 1944.

The Sunday version was initially only seen in Hearst newspaper’s “City Life” sections, starting in 1916. It was not offered in color and did not appear in any comic section until 1922. I show some interesting examples below, followed by the final Krazy episode of all, which ran two months after Herriman’s death.

 THE FIRST KRAZY KAT SUNDAY, 23 APRIL 1916. (The Chicago Examiner ran it a week late. Why? Don’t know. Great introduction, though. Didn’t know Krazy was Paranoiac, either.)

                                                                   29 October 1916.

23 December 1917 

20 January 1918 

  28 May 1922

3 December 1922 

 23 June 1929.

 25 June 1944.

 Other Krazy/ George Herriman entries are to be perused at:

 http://comicskingdom.com/blog/2013/07/17/ask-the-archivist-krazy-kat-after-herriman

 http://comicskingdom.com/blog/2012/11/28/ask-the-archivist-stumble-inn

 http://comicskingdom.com/blog/2011/11/09/ask-the-archivist-here-kitty-kitty

 Moving along to reader email:

To Keith Robey,

There is fresh material, that’s why you might look into the new Dynamite Entertainment comic book. And, there could be a new TV or film version soon. Flash is still very much an active property.

To Andy,

The Universal serials, even after all this time, are the definitive Flash Gordon on screen. Even in their day, they were an extra expensive production for a serial. If you have any familiarity with the typical product, you’ll see what I mean when I say some can be pretty shoddy and repetitious.  But Flash was intended to be top rate, and it was. They were re-released a few times as well before it came to television. My father saw them when they were first run, and today still loves them. They’re still great.

Yours truly,

The Archivist