The New Yorker covers: April 28, 1973

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.

Charles E. Martin
(covers untitled until February 1993)

And now, a few words from . . . David Letterman

Wherever we've traveled in this great land of ours, we've found that people everywhere are about 90 percent water.

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

"Portrait of a Young Woman," ca. 1797, Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun

Movie Posters, 1988: Two adults, please, and a large popcorn!

Today in the history of the American comic strip: March 6

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.

3.6.1917: Will Eisner, the creator of The Spirit, is born. He was named 1998 Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year by the National Cartoonists Society.

3.6.1938: Walt McDougall dies in Waterford, Connecticut, at 80. He illustrated Queer Visitors from the Marvelous Land of Oz, a comic strip that L. Frank Baum wrote to promote one of the Oz books.

 

3.6.1951: Charlie Brown plays baseball for the first time in Charles M. Schulz's Peanuts, but as the catcher, not the pitcher.

3.6.1960: Gene Ahern, the creator of Our Boarding House, dies in Los Angeles, California. He was 64. The strip ran from 1921 to 1984.

3.6.1961: Frieda, a character best known for her “naturally curly hair,” makes her debut in Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts.

 

3.6.2010: Don Sherwood dies in Huntersville, North Carolina. His cartoon, Dan Flagg, was the first nationally syndicated strip to star a U.S. Marine.
 

Our Boarding House

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: March 5, 1966

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.

Charles E. Martin
(covers untitled until February 1993)

And now, a few words from . . . Thomas Carlyle

Teach a parrot the terms "supply and demand" and you've got an economist.