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Home , Chicago American, Cliff Sterrett, Comic strip, Eugene the Jeep, Jimmy Swinnerton, Krazy Kat

Artwork from the Sunday page of January 24, 1926 (Courtesy of Bernard Mahé/Galerie du 9ème Art)

A Segar Family Album Clockwise from left: Segar as an infant (c. 1897); Segar’s daughter, Marie, on the family’s first Christmas in (1925); a self- by Segar from a card for his wife (an early study for ?); Segar with his parents and son, Tom, in Santa Monica (1930). From the collection of George Michalski Loops, Gooks, and Desert Madness: The pre-Popeye life of E.C. Segar

By Paul C. Tumey

POPEYE THE SAILOR ENTERED THE WORLD inspiration for Pop- his merchandising failing to put across the strip’s gags. in the winter of 1928, on a day when E.C. eye was a pugnacious, and advertising inter- Shortly after he started the Sunday Chaplin Segar almost didn’t go to work. His wife pipe-smoking Polish ests. Segar credited comic, Segar contributed additional Sunday begged him to stay home due to a bad cold. man named Rocky Outcault with getting work for the Herald’s syndicated Sunday Wanting to keep ahead on his workload, Fiegle, who worked him a job at the Chi- magazine, including , spot , Segar dragged himself to his studio in down- part-time at a saloon cago Herald. and even a few artistically ambitious story town Santa Monica, cartooned a hilariously in Chester. A few months earlier, illustrations. The comics included original ugly one-eyed man in a sailor suit and—as Reportedly, the young the Herald had lost Segar creations: The Mistakes of Mr. Muddle Popeye might put it—hiskory was made. Segar sent cartoons its star , and the imitation, And They The pop culture icon’s entrance happened in to a local paper with Stewart Carothers. Get By With It. a day, but it was preceded by a dozen years of a note: “Please pub- Creator of the li- When the Sunday page for ’s hard work by Segar to develop his singular lish my cartoons on censed Charlie Chap- Comic Capers ended, Segar replaced it with visual style and master the art of unfurling account of I have an lin’s Comic Capers, Barry the Boob (enlisting Rube Goldberg’s an extended serial comic narrative. uncle working in your the gifted young car- pet word), which ran from September 1917 Elzie Crisler Segar was born December 8, press room.” He also toonist was visiting to April 1918. Barry is an inept soldier in the 1894, on a farm located on the outskirts of sent cartoons to Life friends late at night Army. Overall, Segar’s work Chester, Illinois, a small town with a popula- magazine. Segar re- when he tragically showed little growth. tion of about 850. Later, his family moved to ceived only rejections, fell out a fourth-story In the fall of 1916, Segar was courting Myr- the heart of the community, into a house at but he persisted. To window of ’s tle Johnson, an attractive young daughter of the end of Harrison Street, just two blocks gain the skills he De Jonghe Hotel. Norwegian immigrants. Segar drew sweet, from the Mississippi River, next to a long needed to make it as The paper tried out a awkward cartoons for her, signing them flight of public steps that led up from the a - couple of “Dick.” In one such cartoon, Segar drew a river bank. Segar was the youngest of eight ist, Segar enrolled in as replacements and grotesque, squint-eyed child (a possible Pop- children. Since his brothers and sisters were the W.L. Evans Cor- ELZIE CRISLER SEGAR (1928) then hired Segar to eye prototype) saying, “Who’s your baby?” older half-siblings, Segar’s upbringing was respondence Course A photograph from the trade magazine take it over. He had By May 1917, the two were married. Years like that of an only child. His father, Amzi in Cartooning (as What’s in the New York Evening Journal, which gone from projecting later, Segar summed up his time at the Chi- describes the artist as a master in creating Andrews Segar, was first married in 1870. did in the with a side-splitting wallop. Charlie Chaplin films cago Herald: “Drew Charlie Chaplin’s Comic His second marriage, to Irma Irene Crisler, 1917). For 18 months, to drawing the Little Capers daily and Sunday for two years. It occurred in 1894 in Randolph, Illinois. Elzie he toiled on the lessons late at night after pro- Tramp in a syndicated comic strip. had me going. Hope you don’t remember it. Crisler Segar was their one child and bore jecting the last show at the Opera House. Segar drew the daily version of the Chaplin I had two readers that I know of. They were his mother’s maiden name as his middle In early 1916, having completed the Evans strip from February 28 to July 16, 1916, and my mother and father. Then I got married. moniker. course, Segar packed his pencils and pens produced the Sunday page from March 12 to That made another follower.” Amzi Segar worked as a house painter and and moved about 350 miles north, to Chi- September 16, 1916, at which point the se- In May 1918, paperhanger. On occasion, Segar helped his cago. His 32-year-old half-brother, Norris, ries ended. Segar began his two-year stint bought the Chicago Herald and combined father, who planned for his son to take up lived there, working as a clerk at the Con- on the Chaplin strip by creating his first it with his Chicago Examiner to create the his trade. However, young Elzie moved in gress Hotel. According to at least one ac- original character, Luke the Gook, an em- Chicago Herald and Examiner. Out of a job, a different direction. Segar began to draw count, it was Norris who connected Segar bryonic (with a name akin to Alice Segar looked around and found nothing. He when he was ten years old, copying George with Richard F. Outcault (Buster Brown), the Goon). But in this early work, Segar’s wrote a letter to Dorothy Keeley, daughter McManus’s Panhandle Pete. Starting at age at the time one of the most famous cartoon- art is tentative, unpolished and derivative. of the Herald’s owner and a friend to both 12, in 1906, he worked for fifty cents a day ists in America, likely in Chicago to manage His writing is flat and heavy-handed, often Elzie and Myrtle. Segar and Keeley had at the town’s center of entertainment and worked side by side at the paper, and she culture, the Chester Opera House. lent him five dollars to get married. His Segar’s duties included putting up posters letter, presumably illustrated with his car- and drawing showbills to display at the front toons, was composed in format on of the theater. In time, he worked his way a long roll of paper. Keeley showed the spir- into becoming an official projectionist, crank- ited creation to , managing ing the films by hand. So great was his pride editor of the New York Evening Journal and at this accomplishment, he had “M.P.O.” tat- William Randolph Hearst’s right-hand man, tooed on his arm, for “Motion Picture Opera- who was impressed and hired him on at the tor.” Jessie Lee Huffstutler, a young school Hearst-owned . teacher who played piano accompaniment to Brisbane ordered the creation of a new silent films ­at the Chester Opera House— daily series to run exclusively in the Ameri- Segar sometimes joined her on a trap drum can’s entertainment section, in the same set—recalled Segar drew cartoons on slides “film strip” format as his letter to Doro- shown on the screen during reel changes. thy Keeley. Brisbane gave Segar the strip’s “For one such slide he used a local young title: Looping the Loop, “the Loop” being man knocking on the door, calling on his Chicago’s downtown business and enter- girlfriend. Of course, everyone knew who the tainment district ringed by an elevated young man was because he made the face to train. Brisbane directed Segar to “Go out look just like him.” Huffstutler remembered around and get some ideas and make the the young Segar as “shy, very quiet and frail. one column as long as you want.” The re- His eyes were large but very soft and I could sult was a long, skinny cartoon column, see kindness in them.” different every day, promoting and lam- Segar’s employer at the theater was Bill pooning the new features at their host the- Schuchert, a sleepy-eyed, portly man with ater. It proved to be the best possible outlet a mustache and a well-known love for ham- for Segar, allowing him the freedom to de- burgers. J. William Schuchert was likely velop into a highly original humor cartoon- a partial inspiration for Thimble Theatre’s ist, something not unnoticed by his boss. J. Wellington Wimpy. According to Huffs- Segar’s editor at the American, Bill Curley, tutler, Segar modeled other characters on convinced the head office in New York to some of Chester’s more colorful inhabitants. take the promising young cartoonist into Dora Paskel, the wife of the general store the Hearst cartoonist stable. Curley put owner, could have served as the inspiration An illustration for the Chicago Herald Sunday Fiction Magazine story, Looting the Ventura. Segar on a train with a note for the comics for . Most significantly, a possible October 7, 1917. editor of the New York American and Eve- ning Journal, Wexford “Wex” Jones.

Loops, Gooks, and Desert Madness: The pre-Popeye life of E.C. Segar— 5 The Santa Monica Pier (c. 1931), Segar’s source of many an odd character in Thimble Theatre.

A full-page drawing from Circulation magazine, May 1926

To get to his meeting with Jones, the fu- while drunk as a sailor: ture creator of Popeye the Sailor had to “Curley sent me there with a letter to Wex, a “walk the plank.” The increasingly crowded big six foot six… I got lost a couple of times, newspaper office had relocated the cartoon- walked across the fire escape to get over there… ists into an office in the building next door. into Wex Jones’ office and I waited for oh, three, Rather than take elevators down and back four hours. Wex Jones was out drunk and drunk up, the cartoonists traveled on a board ap- as hell, as only Wex Jones could get. So he kept parently placed across the fire escapes be- calling up his secretary there and the girl would tween the two buildings, four stories above tell him yes, I had been waiting a long time… the concrete sidewalk. Well, he finally came up. Curley had told him Segar recalled his fateful first meeting with what I’d been doing in Chicago. He knew I had A featurette from October 1, 1924. This sporadic syndicated column featured several other Wex Jones, who apparently named one of been doing theatrical stuff. He had a good head King Features cartoonists, including , James Swinnerton and others, all the most famous comic strips in history on him. He gave me the title, ‘Thimble Theatre.’” offering up their favorite anecdotes. Segar’s story was the only one that was obviously fictional.

6 — Loops, Gooks, and Desert Madness: The pre-Popeye life of E.C. Segar In Thimble Theatre, King Features Syndi- gags, however, is on cate—with their abiding interest in movies full display. In the and practice of duplicating successful strips first Sunday page, a —likely sought to emulate their feature, comically paranoid Midget Movies (1918-1921), by . Ham Gravy is seeking In 1921, Wheelan took his feature to a rival a clerk for his syndicate and renamed it Minute Movies. In store who won’t steal 1923, King Features launched yet another from him. He hires a cinema-based comic strip with an allitera- man who has no feet tive title, Fillum Fables, by a young Chester and bizarrely stands Gould. It must have made sense to assign on wooden boards Segar, who had drawn the Chaplin strip and strapped to his legs. burlesqued films in Looping the Loop, an en- The punchline comes tertainment-themed comic. when Castor declares The first Thimble Theatre appeared in the he will use the same daily papers on December 19, 1919. The strip approach when hir- started out as a take-off of schmaltzy dam- ing a clerk in his hat sel-in-distress plays and serial movies. How- store. The page offers ever, Segar’s knack for character-driven an escalation of inter- comedy emerged, and the series quickly shed locked gags as care- its original concept. Olive Oyl appears from fully structured as a the start. Ham Gravy shows up soon after, Chaplin two-reeler. and in a few weeks Castor Oyl joins the cast, It had taken nearly his I.Q. as short as Ham Gravy’s nose is long ten years, but Segar (Segar once said he was eating a banana had finally matched when he first drew Ham Gravy, which gave Chaplin’s humor in him the idea for the extended proboscis). In the funny papers. time, Segar brought Olive’s parents into the In 1926, King Fea- strip, Cole Oyl and—in a nod to Milt Gross tures ordered their and his Banana Oil comic strip—Nana Oyl. Sunday page cartoon- In the late 1920s, Castor took a wife, Cyl- ists to add a new, inda Oyl, and an uncle named Lubry Kent smaller strip to their Oyl showed up in 1928. pages. These were In the first years of Thimble Theatre, Segar’s called “toppers,” even art improved. His rendering, brushwork, though they some- lettering and ballooning, background de- times ran underneath tails and use of cartoon conventions such the main attraction. as sound effects grew more sophisticated. The change allowed His characters and objects slowly acquired King Features to ef- the familiar, humorous rounded aspect of fectively double the his mature work. Segar also developed as a number of titles they writer and storyteller, experimenting with sold, without any in- longer stories. On July 31, 1922, the first crease in page space. Thimble Theatre madcap adventure began— For his new 1926 a three-month story. The strip announced: strip, Segar “GREAT GOBS OF GOLD lie hidden in the brought John and jungles of Africa and Hamgravy, Oliveoyl, Myrtle Sappo back and Castoroyl are going to search for it.” (In (The Five Fifteen the early days, the characters’ names some- had been canceled times ran as single words) about a year ear- From to sometime in 1923, lier) and named the Segar worked in the Hearst art room in New strip Sappo. Except York alongside George Herriman, Walter for a few short peri- Hoban, Harry Hershfield, Tom McNamara, ods, Sappo ran above and . There were also younger, Thimble Theatre from newer cartoonists, including Walter Berndt, 1926 to 1947. E.C. Segar, c. 1931 Jack Callahan and John Paul Arnot. Segar By 1928, the Segars loved the outdoors and fishing. (Hunting had permanently set- and fishing became a recurring theme in the tled in Santa Monica, about 15 miles west sions of whom often ended up in the strip. the more chance for humor.” Segar’s 1928- soon-to-come Thimble Theatre Sundays.) He of Los Angeles, on the Pacific coast. In the Here Segar befriended an artist who gave 1930 desert saga would almost certainly took to ducking out of the office with Ber- 1920s, Santa Monica became an oceanside him lessons and cultivated in him an inter- have been hailed as a comedy classic had it ndt to take a ferry to New Jersey and fish haven for Hollywood movie stars and other est in painting and sketching. It was in this not languished in the long shadows cast by along the Hudson River. When manage- wealthy pleasure seekers, including Marion pleasant seaside town Segar created the Segar’s even greater later work. The ment noticed this, they decided Segar had Davies, love interest of Segar’s boss, Hearst. 1928-1930 Thimble Theatre pages included in Thimble Theatre comics have seen multiple time to produce a second comic strip, and so Bordering on the Pacific Ocean, Santa this volume, Popeye the Sailor, and the rest printings over the decades, but the earlier The Five Fifteen was born. Monica boasted a 1400-foot fishing pier, of his comics up until the time of his death Sundays appearing in this volume are re- The Five Fifteen ran weekdays between Feb- which appealed to Segar, who had grown from portal cirrhosis, October 13, 1938, at printed for the first time in almost ninety ruary 9, 1921 and February 17, 1925. The up near the water. He became a member of the age of 43. years. Tell the whole popeyed world: there strip often turns on the conflict between the Santa Monica Rod and Reel Club and The Sunday pages in the years just before are more great Segar comics! short, potato-nosed Sappo and his taller, mentioned the organization in his comics Popeye came aboard are very nearly as good plump wife, Myrtle, named after Segar’s several times. In 1932, Segar got ink in the as Segar’s Popeye-era pages. (Though he spouse. A growing middle class was moving local paper—not for his comic strip, but for appeared in the dailies starting in January Paul C. Tumey is the author of Screw- out to the suburbs, and the strip, named for catching forty-eight yellowfin in a session at 1929, his first Sunday funnies appearance ball! The Cartoonists Who Made the evening train home, was likely designed the pier. occurred March 2, 1930.) In particular, the Funny (IDW Library of American Comics, to be read by these commuters. The gags Santa Monica offered Segar a vibrant play- two-year epic in which Castor Oyl, Olive 2018). He contributed to Sunday Press’s often take place on the train. ground, which enhanced his work. He be- Oyl, and Ham Gravy madly wander around Society Is Nix; : Colorful Cases of Sometime around 1923, Segar left New longed to local duck and skeet clubs, where the vast American desert, encountering the 1930s; and Foolish Questions & Other Odd York City in search of more pleasant sur- he hung out with movie stars like Clark cowboys, Indians, dinosaurs, and a movie Observations. He co-edited The Art of Rube roundings. After a short time in Florida, Gable and Gary Cooper. The Pleasure Pier, production company, is a lost treasure. As Goldberg (Abrams ComicArts, 2014) and was the Segars moved to Hollywood for a few an amusement center built in 1916 as an they battle desert madness and all manner a contributing editor and essayist for King of years. The New York office noticed Segar’s adjunct to the fishing pier, featured a giant of life-threatening situations, Olive, Castor, the Comics: One Hundred Years of King Fea- steady improvements on his signature strip roller coaster, a carousel, attractions like and Ham become funnier and funnier. Segar tures Syndicate (IDW Library of American and assigned him a Thimble Theatre Sunday bowling and billiards (a Segar favorite), and once said, “I claim that pathos is the best Comics, 2015). He lives in Seattle with his page starting on January 25, 1925. The early seaside burger joints of the type later run background for humor. Tragedy and com- family and several piles of crumbling old Sundays are low key compared to pages from by Rough-House in Thimble Theatre. It regu- edy are so closely related it is only a step newsprint. the 1930s. Segar’s penchant for outlandish larly drew all manner of odd characters, ver- from one to the other. The deeper the plot,

Loops, Gooks, and Desert Madness: The pre-Popeye life of E.C. Segar— 7 often hunting for gold or other hard, tangible goods. Even when they search for love, Segar’s characters are very interested in the physi- cal manifestations of desire rather than spiritual con- nections. The title of the strip is the key: Thimble Theatre. Segar was the cartoonist as the- ater director. The “Herri- man rocks” were part of the A Herriman nod to Segar, September 13, 1928 stagecraft. They were what Segar needed to suggest the setting, along with the conviction that cartoons were, at the end of recurring bleached bones the day, nothing but lines on paper, Segar (often the horns and ribs would create situations where his charac- of some long-dead cattle), ters do and say just about anything. Sappo, the scattered shrubbery, at one point, fakes his own suicide to fool his the odd cactus, the sandy wife. Castor Oyl’s unsentimental streak can ochre foreground, the big be seen in the way he lops off the head of a blue sky. With a few simple dinosaur that annoyed him. elements, Segar was able to Segar liked to push his characters in crazy suggest a vast, overpower- situations to test their limits. In doing so, ing landscape. he sometimes showed that a seeming scoun- It is a measure of how far drel has limits, as Castor Oyl and Ham Segar had come that by Gravy discover in their ill-fated attempts to 1928 he was able to rein- become bandits. vent a landscape already With his pint-sized frame and outsized used by so many formidable emotions, Castor Oyl vividly embodied the cartoonists. Segar’s own Segarian life-principle of unfettered appe- mastery was hard-won. He tite. Castor’s hucksterism also made him a had perhaps the longest ap- perfect vehicle for one of Segar’s greatest prentice period of any major gifts, his verbal gusto. Fittingly, it is Castor cartoonist. His early work who pays most eloquent tribute to the great displayed only minimal com- desert that Segar made his own. petence. As the late critic “The desert does not give up its beauty to Donald Phelps noted in his those who are blind to nature but to the 2001 book, Reading the Fun- thinking eye all things are glorious,” Castor nies, “From the mid-1910s declaims, while standing on rocks that serve until the beginning of the as his pulpit. “I love the great open spaces ’20s, the drawing remains where boys are boys, and men are men, and hesitant and gawkish; tim- women are – are – are – mirrors, reflecting idly arranging and direct- the marvelous beauty of nature‘s handiwork.” ing the doodle-ruled forms Castor’s speech is over-the-top, but what of the characters, who seem other words can capture the goofy grandeur always on the threshold of of Segar’s world? reverting to the linked jel- lybeans, or semi-collapsed Jeet Heer is a senior editor at The New balloons, of the their basic Republic, the author and editor of many Segar announces the birth of his daughter with an homage to George Herriman; from Circulation magazine, September 1922. shape.” books, and a frequent Sunday Press contrib- Indeed, even when he utor. With Chris Oliveros and , achieved his mature style he’s co-edited the series in the late 1920s, Segar from Drawn and Quarterly, which so far has continued to be amazed at seven volumes. the fundamental cartoonist trick that a few squiggles Segar “Rocks” can be transformed into thimble theatre tours coconino county a recognizable form. The magical mutability of car- By jeet heer toons was a recurring sub- ject that bewildered John In the Thimble Theatre Sunday page for April was admitting he was working on well-trod- Sappo, the title character of the top strip 8, 1928, Castor Oyl, brother of Olive and fu- den ground when he moved Castor Oyl and Sappo, as he pondered the craft of Segar’s ture business partner of Popeye, haggardly the rest of the Thimble Theatre troupe out alter ego, the genial cartoonist Mr. Squeem. sweats it out in an unnamed desert. With a West for a two-year sojourn. In using the “That’s the trouble with you wisecrackin’ tip of his hat to the master, cartoonist E.C. western desert as a backdrop, Segar was cartoonists,” Sappo laments. “You say one Segar lets the audience figure out exactly following in footsteps that he revered. Her- thing and mean another.” where Castor is. “@!!** desert,” Castor riman was more to him than just an elder Sappo, like Castor Oyl and so many of complains. “Nothing but bones, cacti, sand, colleague in the Hearst stable. Segar once Segar’s characters, has no irony or guile. and ‘Herriman rocks.’” With that wink to said of Herriman, “He is the greatest artist He’s baldly naked in pursuit of his goals the creator of , Segar let us know that ever lived.” (poker winnings, a share of the fortune his that Castor wasn’t in any old desert: he was As much as he worshipped Herriman, Segar wife has inherited). Segar loved low-minded in Coconino County or its near environment. didn’t dare imitate him. Segar borrowed the schemers, characters who relentlessly and For comic strip fans, Coconino County is the landscape of Krazy Kat, but put it to very dif- remorselessly pursued their agenda, even to home of Herriman’s animal menagerie, most ferent ends. Partly this was a matter of good the point of viciousness. To be sure, Segar famously Krazy Kat and Ignatz Mouse. Her- sense: Herriman’s idiosyncratic work, as per- wasn’t the only cartoonist who dealt with riman’s genius owed much to the actual Co- sonal as a fingerprint, couldn’t be copied. amoral riff-raff. Thimble Theatre belonged conino as well as to Monument Valley. The But more than that, Herriman and Segar had to an entire tradition of sporting strips that of Krazy Kat, with its ever-shift- polar opposite narrative sensibilities. Herri- included , Barney Google and ing backgrounds, its weird rock formations, man was a night-time artist: dreamy, ethe- . its flights into Navaho patois and mythol- real, fey, unmatched in his ability to capture What set Segar apart from this tradition ogy, was a product of Herriman’s deep love ineffable moods. Segar was a daylight art- was his sheer audacity. He was willing to The Segar family took regular camping trips in the West, yielding a series of oils and watercolors. for the great American desert. ist: a materialist, whose grabby and grubby push his characters to the edge of absur- Comics influenced by these trips can be seen in By using the name “Herriman rocks,” Segar characters all act out of sordid desperation, dity and beyond. Perhaps empowered by the the Thimble Theatre Sundays of March 1928.

8 — Segar “Rocks,” thimble theatre tours coconino county A Segar Card Collection Segar often drew one-of-a-kind postcards and greeting cards for his friends and family, such as the elegant and elaborate birthday card (left) for his wife and Christmas cards (below) for his parents. From the collection of George Michalski

A Segar Card Collection— 9 A year after the stories printed in this volume, Castor Oyl returned to the desert with his sister, Olive, and her sailor boyfriend; a sojourn from the daily comics of 1931. (Courtesy of Bernard Mahé/Galerie du 9ème Art) How the West was ’Tooned By Michael Tisserand

When, in 1928, E.C. Segar sent Castor Oyl ploring its lights and shadows, its mysteries York City and its bad habits. Hearst placed desert plains. Panels included flora and into the great American desert, he was plac- and its humor. Swinnerton on a train headed straight into fauna drawn with loving detail and his- ing him on a trail that had seen more than its In doing so, Swinnerton reached far beyond the pure, dry air of the desert, and Swinner- toric landmarks—some of which had only share of plops and spins and zip-pows. the simple adventure tales that dominated ton never looked back. In a letter published been recently “discovered” by white explor- Movie director John Ford usually gets credit other Westerns of his day. A sharp satirist, he in the New York Evening Journal in 1911, he ers—that were rendered with archeological for introducing the desert to audiences in would lampoon the mythologies of the West compared breathing city air to breathing oil precision. It was in that most films such as Stagecoach and The Searchers. at the same time that he celebrated Native and said a visit to the desert would make Americans first glimpsed the cliff dwell- Cartoonists, however, were there first. More- American cultures and art traditions. His de- anyone forget the “slops and false perfume ings of the Ancestral Puebloans, pondering over, comics offered early views of the West votion would influence many others, includ- of the big town.” with Jimmy how the “magic men could do that were richer and more complex than most ing , George Herriman and Much humor in early Swinnerton comics many very wonderful things.” anything in early films. And, with a few pos- Segar, and point the way to other Western such as And Sam Laughed! emerged from In nearly three months’ worth of Little sible exceptions, such as Buster Keaton’s Go tales to emerge in comics generations later. his skillful mockery of the hypocrisies Jimmy Sunday episodes, Swinnerton chron- West and Laurel and Hardy’s Way Out West, Swinnerton’s desert sojourn began with a baked into society’s upper crusts. Swin- icled, with both humor and marvel, his own they were funnier. diagnosis of tuberculosis. His failing health nerton expanded his comedic horizons observations of Navajo (or Diné) culture. In Early Western cartoonists include C.W. prompted William Randolph Hearst to ban- when he brought his popular feature Little them, he offered a remarkably nuanced view Kahles, who in 1906 introduced the cliff- ish one of his favorite employees from New Jimmy out of small towns and onto the of Native Americans—especially for nine hanger comic Hairbreadth panels in a newspaper comics Harry with a Western tale of supplement in 1913. Harry saving a prospector. As That same year, Swinner- shows in his ton’s friend George Herriman book Comics of the American started adding Indian charac- West, Kahles was followed by ters into his daily comic, The Western yarns in Harry Hersh- Dingbat Family. Generally, field’s Desperate Desmond these were little more than and Rube Goldberg’s Boob Mc- stock of hook- Nutt, as well as in both Rudolph nosed men wrapped in Navajo Dirks and Harold Knerr’s ver- blankets. Yet within a few sions of The Katzenjammer years, Herriman’s masterpiece Kids. Still more comical de- Krazy Kat would show how sert adventures would be seen much Herriman, like Swinner- in Sidney Smith’s ton, had immersed himself in and in as written the Southwest. The self-effac- and drawn by the Utah-born ing Herriman rarely spoke too . seriously about Krazy Kat, but But the story of comics and the he made an exception when West really begins with James asked about his desert land- “Jimmy” Swinnerton. Born in scapes. “That’s the country I California in 1875, Swinnerton love and that’s the way I see was the first cartoonist to de- it,” he told journalist Mary velop a deep, personal and abid- Landenberger. “I don’t think ing relationship with the West. Krazy’s readers care anything Swinnerton was as enraptured about that part of the strip. by the face of the desert as one But it’s very important to me is by the face of a beloved, and and I like it nearly as well as he devoted his twin careers of One of George Herriman’s tributes to E.C. Segar; from the Krazy Kat daily comic, September 14, 1928 the characters themselves.” cartooning and painting to ex- Herriman traveled west as

10 — How the West was Tooned ate nods to each other in their work, with After Castor Oyl’s multiple misadventures “Herriman rocks” showing up in Segar’s and the return of Ham Gravy to find Olive world and “Segar Mountains” in Herri- Oyl in the arms of—oops, no spoilers—Segar, man’s. Visually, Segar’s desert formations aside from a brief series in the Thimble The- owe much to Herriman’s vision of the des- atre daily comics, would leave the desert to ert. A sly Segar story about Castor Oyl and Swinnerton and Herriman and a few select Ham Gravy’s botched attempt to make a others. These included , who few bucks off tourists by showing them a drew a remarkable Arizona series in Gaso- “Ham Gravy Canyon” ends with a of a line Alley that included the Wetherills as Ham Gravy-like rock formation that is one characters. More complex views of Ameri- of Segar’s most Herriman-influenced draw- can Indian life in comics would be later seen ings, calling to mind an animated desert in with the emergence of Indian cartoonists Krazy Kat in which Joshua trees might sud- such as Ricardo Caté, Marty Two Bulls, and denly dance and the giant shale-and-sand- Phil Hughte, whose A Zuni Artist Looks at stone Mittens break out in applause. (Segar Frank Hamilton Cushing is a minor classic offers yet another nod to Herriman when he in cultural table-turning. The two-volume has Castor Oyl stealing a calf and promis- collection Moonshot would also highlight in- ing its mother that Joe Stork will bring her digenous cartoonists and their work. another.) In the hands of cartoonists, the story of the In one brief but regrettable tale, however, West is a complicated tale of promises made Segar reveals he is not immune to the casual and promises broken, of dreams and dust, of racism and sexism that is part of the DNA outlaws and greed and city stooges chasing of many of our most treasured comedies. down the next mirage. And, if we’re really The introduction of “Little Minnyhoho” lucky, we might still hear a few loud laughs and subsequent jokes based around her per- echoing off the Ham Gravy Canyon walls. As ceived unattractiveness call to mind the un- once said of the desert, fortunate slapstick sequence in John Ford’s “It’s a great place if you know how to treat it.” The Searchers in which an Indian woman, re- cently married to a white man, is violently kicked down a hill—for laughs. Though no- Michael Tisserand is the author of often as he could. In Kayenta, Arizona, he and hunts for “mirage water”; if fool’s gold tably in Segar’s desert stories, it is the West- the Eisner Award-winning biography, stayed with close friends John and Louisa did not exist already, it’s likely Segar would ern interlopers Castor Oyl and Ham Gravy Krazy: George Herriman, a Life in Black and Wetherill, who were famed explorers, trad- have invented it. who are usually the hapless ones, getting White. His website is www.michaeltisserand.com ers and independent scholars of the region Segar and Herriman would offer affection- bum deals from ranchers and Indians alike. and its cultures. In 1922, on what must be one of the grandest adventures ever by a group of cartoonists, Swinnerton, Herri- man, Dirks, and other friends (including photographer Dorothea Lange and her hus- band, painter ) undertook a five-week journey on horseback into the des- erts of northern Arizona and southern Utah through what is now the Navajo National Monument. Being who they were, they also engaged in hijinks along the way. At one point, Dirks dashed ahead to scratch Hans and Fritz Katzenjammer onto a small rock, leaving it on the trail to be “discovered” as an ancient artifact. One can imagine Segar jealously listening to tales of this trip when, the following year, he sent Castor Oyl out on his own desert misadventures. From the start, however, it did not go well for Segar’s hero. “Noth- ing but sand,” Castor Oyl pants in an early strip under the blazing sun. “Nothing but A 1905 New Year’s celebration, by John T. McCutcheon rocks. Nothing but cacti. Nothing but bones! Bones! Bones!” Segar never acquired Swinnerton’s or Herri- man’s personal knowledge of the Southwest and its secrets. Yet the region would serve as the perfect backdrop for Segar’s singular talent for creating little of masculin- ity. “I know the great open spaces—I know the ways of this ‘he-man’s land,’” boasts Castor Oyl right before falling on his face in one misadventure after another. Segar’s TOP: Rube Goldberg’s Boob McNutt arrives in the Southwest (December 18, 1922); ABOVE: tour the Grand Canyon (August 22, 1915) desert is a place of nose-tweaking vultures

In 1913, James Swinnerton took his popular Jimmy character to the Southwest, where the artist celebrated the home of the Navajo with magnificent detailed artwork and stories of humor and pathos.

How the West was Tooned — 11 Segar and The Little Tramp

Charlie Chaplin’s Comic Capers was origi- nated by Stewart W. Carothers in March of 1915. E.C. Segar took over the daily strip for six months in 1916 and penned the Sunday page from March 1916 to September 1917, when the strip ended. Compared to his later work, Segar’s stories were simplistic and the artwork rough and derivative, but his work on a seven-day strip with recurring characters gave him the foundation for his Thimble Theatre success. A series of popular paperback books reprinted the daily strips within a few years of their first publication. The first book, seen here at left, featured the earliest Segar daily comics. On the fol- lowing pages are Segar from July and September, 1916.

12 — Charlie Chaplin’s Comic Capers

Segar and the Movies

Segar began his comics career in the mov- ies. Literally. As a teenager he drew car- toons for silent movie theater slides. His first regular comic strip series was Charlie Chaplin’s Comic Capers. When Segar left the Chicago Herald, Arthur Brisbane enlisted him to draw “Looping the Loop,” a daily strip about the city’s movies and entertainment for Hearst’s Chicago American. Then, in 1919, he penned his own “small screen” cre- ation for the , Thimble Theatre. For the first few months, the strip used a movie theater premise, including listing the “cast.” Other movie-based comic strips of the era included Ed Wheelan’s Midget Movies (later Minute Movies) and Fillum Fa- bles, by another young Chicago cartoonist, Chester Gould, creator of Dick Tracy.

Segar, the Movies, and “The Loop”— 15 A full entertainment page from the Chicago American weekday newspaper, with E.C. Segar’s popular commentary strip, Looping the Loop. "Looping the Loop"

Since the 1890s, Chicago’s downtown busi- ness district, circled by a ring of public transportation, has been called “The Loop.” The Loop was also the center of entertain- ment, with the city’s main theaters, music halls and movie houses within its perimeter. E.C. Segar’s Looping the Loop got its name and most of its content from this district. The title for this feature was suggested by William Hearst’s right-hand man, Arthur Brisbane, who was looking for a one-col- umn comic for the entertainment section of Hearst’s Chicago American. Brisbane direct- ed Segar to “Go out around and get some ideas and make the one column as long as you want.” The result was a long, skinny pictorial daily covering a wide range of top- ics, different every day. It proved to be the best possible outlet for Segar, allowing him the freedom to develop into a highly original humor cartoonist. After a few months, the strip was primarily used to promote movies and other entertainment at specific venues. With Looping the Loop, Brisbane was likely less concerned with creating enter- tainment and more focused on generating ad revenues. Segar’s regular, eye-catch- ing coverage of the city’s entertainment venues spurred advertising sales. In at least one instance, Segar provided art for a local vaudeville show (Walter Hoban also supplied a cartoon ad for the same show.) At least one film studio included a Loop in a full-page trade magazine ad. Looping the Loop ran exclusively in the pages of the Chicago American from June 1918 to at least November 1919. The strip covers a dizzying array of topics, including silent movies, plays, vaudeville acts, night- club shows, the laziness of the first days of spring, the effects of riding crowded train cars, war bond rallies, and the National Apple Day parade. Most significantly, Segar took a new, highly appealing approach to cartooning in this strip. Instead of awkward- ly drawn caricatures, he reduced his char- acters, who occupied narrow boxes, to their core essentials, with clear lines and simple forms. This approach allowed Segar to play to his strengths as a writer and humorist while developing a singular visual style. The series also features the first use of Segar’s smoking cigar pictorial signature (report- edly later on, he signed checks this way). For Popeye fans, Looping the Loop contains familiar figures and themes. Ani- mals, including a polka-dotted horse, have the face of Eugene the years before his creation. Frequently appearing in these skinny strips are the long, slender forms of women who look like Olive Oyl. In his good-natured kidding of movies and shows, Segar was also working out his spin on romances, Westerns, adventure stories, and melodramas—something that would serve him well in the Popeye years. – PCT

Looping the Loop ran from June 1918 to late 1919. On December 5 (facing page), Segar added a feature that would create characters out of names sent in by readers. The strips featured here and on the following page are from, in order, November 20, 21, December 4, 6, 26, 27, 29, 1918.

The Dailies

In just a few years, Segar’s Thimble Theatre underwent great changes in style and concept. Originally, the strip was a series of miniature plays with the cast including members of what became a more conven- tional strip with established characters a few months later. In the late 1920s, the period of the Sundays in this volume, the characters, storylines and artwork became more complex. (Above, left to right: the first daily strip, December 19, 1919; original artwork from March 15, 1921 and the daily strip for January 23, 1928.) Artwork courtesy , Prints and Photographs Division

Just over a year after Thimble Theatre began, Segar drew a second daily strip, The Five-Fifteen, chronicling the life of commu- ter Joe Sappo. After two years, the strip was retitled Sappo the Commuter in some papers, then simply Sappo. The daily strip ended in February of 1925, and a year later Sappo became the topper strip for the Thimble Theatre Sunday page. (Left: April 2, 1921. Right: December 17, 1921.)