The New York covers: June 20, 1983

Over the years, there have been many magazines whose covers have featured the work of highly talented artists and illustrators. But probably no magazine has had more varied and memorable covers, over a longer period of time, than The New Yorker, which was founded in 1925.

Roxie Munro
(covers untitled until February 1993)

And now, a few words from . . . Harry Truman

I do not believe in shooting anything that cannot shoot back.

"What is art but a way of seeing?" Saul Bellow

"Snow Falls on Exmoor," 1939, John A. Park

Movie Posters, 1978: Two adults, please, and a large popcorn!

Today in the history of the American comic strip: August 30

American cartoonists and writers may not have invented the comic strip, but some argue that the comics, as we know them today, are an American creation. Clearly, the United States has played an outsize role in the development of this underappreciated art form.

8.30.1903: Oskar Lebeck is born in Germany. He was the co-creator (with Al McWilliams) of Twin Earths (1952-1963), a science fiction strip in which aliens from another Earth on the opposite side of the sun visit our planet.

 

8.30.1942: Fearless Fosdick, a parody of Chester Gould's Dick Tracy, debuts in Al Capp’s Li’l Abner,  as a strip within a strip.

8.30.2015: Brad Anderson, who brought the Great Dane Marmaduke into the comics world, dies in The Woodlands, Texas, at 91.

Marmaduke

Most of the information listed here from one day to the next comes from two online sites -- Wikipedia, and Don Markstein's Toonopedia -- as well as 100 Years of American Newspaper Comics, edited by Maurice Horn. Note that my focus is on American newspaper comic strips (and the occasional foreign strip that gained popularity in the United States). Thus, comic books and exclusively online comics are not included here.

The New Yorker covers: November 11, 1974

Over the years, there have been many magazines whose covers have featured the work of highly talented artists and illustrators. But probably no magazine has had more varied and memorable covers, over a longer period of time, than The New Yorker, which was founded in 1925.

Laura Jean Allen
(covers untitled until February 1993)

And now, a few words from . . . Warren Zevon

I'll sleep when I'm dead.

"What is art but a way of seeing?" Saul Bellow

"Jo-Go Way Moose Dream," ca. 1964, Norval Morrisseau

Movie Posters, 1964: Two adults, please, and a large popcorn!