Classic Cartoonists: George Baker
D. D. Degg
tearsheets of "The Sad Sack" by George Baker.
http://community.livejournal.com/scans_daily/4216485.html
as pointed out by http://www.tcj.com/journalista/
>From the Sad Sack home site comes these Yank strips
http://sadsack.net/OriginalComicStrip.htm
and these newspaper strips
http://sadsack.net/SSNewspaper.htm
and this essay about The Sad Sack by George Baker
http://sadsack.net/GBAutobiography.htm
D.D.Degg
racs...@gmail.com
> >From Yank magazine of World War Two come these
>
> tearsheets of "The Sad Sack" by George Baker.http://community.livejournal.com/scans_daily/4216485.html
> and this essay about The Sad Sack by George Bakerhttp://sadsack.net/GBAutobiography.htm
Good to see the newspaper strips again. I'd seen it as a kid, but
didn't remember them, and, sadly, it fills in a kind of disconnect --
the Yank strips (my father had the collection) were so much funnier
that, for years, I've thought I simply was too young to appreciate it
when I was seeing it in the paper or in the comic books. But I think
Baker's move from the Army to civilian life, plus the addition of
dialogue, killed the humor. Sad Sack, in Yank, was a scaled down
version of Willie and Joe, and while it didn't have Mauldin's wit, it
shared much of the immediacy that made both comics matter at the time
and made them still funny all these years later.
And, had Mauldin come out and continued Willie and Joe as a comic
strip, instead of turning to political cartooning, I'm sure the result
would have been disappointing, too.
Mike Peterson
http://nellieblogs.blogspot.com
D. D. Degg
> And, had Mauldin come out and continued Willie and Joe as a comic
> strip, instead of turning to political cartooning, I'm sure the result
> would have been disappointing, too.
He did, and they were.
http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/swann/mauldin/mauldin-mufti.html
Though it seems that the syndicate weakened his panel
because newspaper editors who hired Mauldin for their
comics pages didn't really want Mauldin on their comics
pages.
Also Leonard Sansane's The Wolf tried to make it on the
comics pages after the war, and couldn't..
Of course, he had to change his character for the American
public, from having a wolf's head to a completely human
character. http://www.juniperbooks.com/cgi-bin/juniper/8041
I guess the only character from the military papers to make
it on the civilian funny pages was Dave Breger's G. I. Joe.
http://www.toonopedia.com/breger.htm
Pvt. Breger translated into Mr. Breger better than the others.
Willie and Joe was the best comic the military papers had
to offer during World War Two. Their front line distress
endeared them to all GIs. The Sad Sack was more behind the
lines but always seemed to be getting into dirt, the
everyman GI. The lecherous Wolf was what all the GIs
either saw themselves as or wanted to be when they met
a lady. None could move to the newspaper pages without
major modifications.
Pvt. Breger was the nice, clean, but stepped on GI as
the family back home saw servicemen. The most boring
of the lot, and the one that lasted in the comics for
25 years after WWII. The others less than 5 years.
D.D.Degg
Who grew up reading the Harvey Sad Sack comic books.
They, and artist Fred Rhoades, were wonderful for children,
and many of them had George Baker covers.