WHEN AL CAPP SANG OUT OF TUNE

 

Folk Singer Joan Baez 

(somewhat) immortalized in Li'l Abner

by Rick Marschall

Al Capp and his Li'l Abner character Joanie Phoanie

The year was 1967. The times have been a-changin' -- because those days of protests, riots, free love, folk music, the "sexual revolution," and the drug culture seem like a world away from us today. In fact, those days were a world away from, even, 1963. Yeah, the Sixties, man.

Well, a bit of a personal tale will pop up here. My "mind" raced back in time because last week the iconic folk singer Joan Baez had a birthday. I was in college and to paraphrase a Bible verse, I was in that generation but not of that generation. But the counter-culture, especially its music, was hard to avoid.

Whatever fertile ground there was for a cultural paradigm-shift was suffused by the Vietnam war. One of the leading "protest singers" was Joan Baez. Other singers included her on-again/off-again lover Bob Dylan. Hippies and Yippies would make courtroom-headlines the next year. And drug advocates like Dr Timothy Leary infested campuses and airwaves. 

And, oh yeah, cartoonists. A growing generation of Underground artists congregated in San Francisco, Seattle, and New York. But this is a story about the poster girl of the era, so to speak -- the folk singer Joan Baez.

... at least that is how the cartoonist Al Capp perceived her. The creator of Li'l Abner for years had been a noted liberal. He typically upset the apple cart of the Establishment; he aimed at the personalities and policies of the Right; and enjoyed the blowback. In the late 1960s he changed -- although he later told me that he never moved: society changed, and he just kept attacking hypocrisy and absurdity.

Whatever. When the hippies were ascendant, Capp determined that Baez was their muse, and he built storylines in Li'l Abner around her. He depicted hordes of flea-bitten hippies who belonged not to SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) but to SWINE -- Students Wildly Indignant About Nearly Everything. And their heroine was an ugly, haggish, odoriferous folk singer named Joanie Phoanie. 

Subtlety, never a long suit of Capp, had abandoned him. But he was also being asked to run for the US Senate (from Massachusetts, against Ted Kennedy) and he was looking for bludgeons, not rapiers. Was Joanie Phonie a caricature of Joan Baez? TIME magazine reported:

Joan Baez thinks so. In fact, she’s so sure Al Capp’s cartoon character is a take-off on her that she has demanded an apology and the immediate execution of the comic strip abomination. “Either out of ignorance or malice,” she wailed, “he has made being for peace equal to being for Communism, the Viet Cong and narcotics.” Just as captiously, the cartoonist growled that Joanie wasn’t Joan. “She should remember that protest singers don’t own protest. When she protests about others’ rights to protest, she is killing the whole racket.”

 

Racket or not, the character and storylines were frequently in the headlines, beyond the comic pages. Capp's political temptations were derailed by temptations of another sort; allegations of sexual assault -- ironically, of young college girls -- soon subsumed much of his attention. But he remained firmly on the Right, and politics generally permeated the last years of his hillbilly picaresque.

I had connections with Capp at the time that were, ironically, separate from the comics world. I was active in national college youth groups, all political. Swimming upstream, we might say, but instructive and invigorating. Capp was sort of a hero of ours. So I saw him at conferences and speaking events, and helped arrange meetings. Not too many years later I became Comics Editor at his syndicate; and eventually I conducted the last interview he granted. 

At one time John Steinbeck wrote that he thought Al Capp deserved the Nobel Prize and was the greatest satirist since Laurence Sterne. At the end of his career even his unabashed comics fans were rather embarrassed by his comic-strip work. In my interview, however, when I asked what period of his career he thought was the best, he said, "The stuff I did last week." But then, still self-aware, he added, "Every creator has to believe that. If he doesn't, he should quit."

In fact Al Capp did quit, shortly after the interview.

He was morose; he had trouble breathing (yet he chain-smoked); his wooden leg no longer fit properly. His work lives on -- overall, an astonishing body of clever and quality... satire. Magnificent blowin' in the wind, Joanie's friend might say. She lives on too, still singing, at age 84.

A self-caricature Al Capp drew for me when I interviewed him. He was hardly as cheerful as here. He gratefully accepted the encomium "satirist," but I have written where other writers and artists have satirized people and philosophies and movements, Al Capp satirized human nature.

     

PANAMA CANAL BACK IN THE NEWS. A HISTORY WITH CARTOONS

 

A MAN, A PLAN, A CANAL -- PANAMA!

Back in the day, every schoolkid knew this palindrome. The US, and Theodore Roosevelt, the man with a plan, specifically, were associated with a Wonder of the Modern World, the Panama Canal. It looks like the Canal will once again dominate the news... so we present a capsule history of the Canal's construction... with some contemporary cartoons .

One of America's forgotten cartooning greats was W A Carson of the Utica (NY) Saturday Globe. For decades he drew front-page editorial and political cartoons, always in color. Here he commemorated Roosevelt's trip to Panama in 1906 to inspect progress on the Canal's construction.

After the victory in the Spanish-American War, much of the Old World assumed that America would retain Cuba as a possession. Yet Theodore Roosevelt initiated straightforward initiatives to assist the island nation toward independence.

In the Caribbean basin, in Central and South America, there seemingly were local revolutions within countries and wars between countries; centuries-old turmoil. But European powers were being drawn into them at the turn of the century, giving rise to previously unfamiliar aspects. Regional flash-points tempted Old World powers to test the mettle of the United States as an emerging world power. Also, Latin countries were growing ever more irresponsible in international trade, as many of them defaulted on debts and violated trade and customs rules with European powers, chiefly England and Germany.

To promote statecraft in the hemisphere, and to keep European nations from fishing in troubled waters, TR established what came to be known as the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. This stated basically that America would intervene to schedule debt payments of rogue nations to outside powers, and would perform other such acts to promote regional order and national responsibility.

Many people opposed Uncle Sam acting as a hemispheric policeman, especially the dictators and military strongmen whose schemes were thus thwarted. These interventions were generally bloodless, and were accompanied by no-nonsense diplomacy explained with no ambiguities.

In the case of the Panama Canal, Theodore Roosevelt did not restrict himself to speaking softly; he spoke as required, acted as he saw the need, and took responsibility as he should.

A canal through Panama, joining the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, saving weeks and vast distances on the seas (some of them dangerous), had been dreamed of for centuries. The construction of a canal through the relatively narrow strip of land connecting North and South America had actually been attempted in the 1870s and abandoned by the French, after expenditure of a quarter-billion dollars and substantial numbers of deaths from yellow fever and malaria.

In the United States, the concept of an isthmian canal was not new. Before Roosevelt took office, the United States had negotiated with both Nicaragua and Colombia, and Congress had appropriated funds for possible leases of land.

Roosevelt needed no convincing. He realized the canal would be beneficial to commercial shipping, private sea travel, and potential military uses. But he also felt that building an isthmian canal was a historical imperative. TR wrote that “building of the canal through Panama will rank in kind … with the Louisiana Purchase and the Annexation of Texas.”

A cartoon by Victor Gillam in JUDGE Magazine, when Nicaragua was still under consideration as the best route for a "Path Between the Seas." Uncle Sam carries symbols of commerce, defense, and colonies, while ships gather in the Caribbean, and world powers press their arguments for a canal too.

The actual region (Panama, Columbia) in which the canal was to be built was in a constant state of unrest. The area's countries were small, with often-shifting borders; they dealt with deadly rivalries, ethnic and tribal competition, corruption, uncountable government overthrows, revolutions, and counter-revolutions. Colombia (and Nicaragua before it, in similar fashion) frustrated U.S. diplomats, who felt that the Central Americans seldom negotiated in good faith, and continually solicited bribes.

In 1905 a faction within a province of Colombia rebelled yet again, and declared independence as the Republic of Panama. The United States recognized the new republic, and immediately concluded a treaty to lease land and build a canal through the middle of that new country.

It is not clear whether TR was aware of back-channel machinations between Panamanians, French representatives of the previous leaseholders, and nation-building brokers working, in effect, on commission; or that many of the diplomatic details of Panama’s independence occurred in a New York hotel room, not in the jungles of Central America. In any event these would have been nothing more than details to TR at that moment.

A US Navy ship sent near Colombian waters, ostensibly to protect Americans in the Panamanian province, doubtlessly influenced events. What was important was that a new nation had achieved its independence, and America—indeed, the world—was to have a significantly important canal.

Joseph Keppler Jr of PUCK Magazine drew "Roosevelt's Rough Diggers" -- depicting the energetic President and his men with shovels at the ready.

TR viewed the Panama Canal as the most important achievement of his administration. To naysayers of his actions and rationale, he was unapologetic: “I took the Isthmus, started the Canal, and then let Congress, not to debate the Canal, but to debate me.”

An unprecedented achievement then took place: in less than a decade, the Americans cleared land and jungles and dug across a 50-mile wide swath of resistant land; they moved mechanical devices of mammoth proportions and set them in place; and they developed many important innovations in the process (as would happen in America’s later space program). Cuba redux: deadly diseases traditionally considered incurable were attacked and conquered.

Today the Canal Zone is virtually free from yellow fever and malaria. Roosevelt worked through a few false starts and consultations, enacting solutions that would ensure the construction’s success. For instance, he decided on a system of locks instead of a sea-level approach, and he appointed directors with authority and competence, men like Colonel George W. Goethals of the Army Corps of Engineers; and doctors Walter Reed and William Gorgas.

The workers used massive bulldozers and cranes, dynamite and portable double-track railroad lines. They established workers’ colonies with mosquito-netted buildings, social events, and even a newspaper. Construction proceeded, foot by grueling foot. Rusting equipment from previous failed endeavors littered the landscape where they worked, but the Panama Canal opened two years ahead of schedule. Ironically—or significantly (since military contingencies were concerns important to Roosevelt)—it commenced operations in August 1914, the same month that World War I began.

In 1906, Theodore Roosevelt became the first president ever to leave U.S. soil while in office. He sailed to Panama to inspect progress on his pet project. Of course, he was not content merely to observe the progress. Ever the exuberant boy, TR was caught by photographers in the operator’s seat of a gargantuan steam shovel.

The popular Theodore Roosevelt was celebrated in cartoons -- probably more often than any president before or since -- and toys, games, cards, and merchandise. Here, a commemorative plate of the time depicted TR watching iconic Teddy Bears digging the Canal in Panama.

More than a million vessels have passed through the Panama Canal since it opened. In every respect it is one of the wonders of the world’s mechanical age. As TR predicted, his decision to move forward in building the canal was debated while the project itself proceeded... but he held firm.

This astounding personal achievement of Theodore Roosevelt’s never has been sufficiently recognized. It is unlikely that many other presidents could have managed the events and overseen such a bold project. Under his oversight, the jungles of Panama were transformed, a mechanical marvel was realized, ahead of schedule, without cost over-runs, corruption, or scandal. At the same time, the Americans conquered diseases in the region, benefitted maritime trade, and confirmed the primacy of the United States.

The late President Carter "sold" the Canal to the government of Panama for one dollar, ahead of the treaty's schedule. Today China has been outsourced to operate the locks, anyway the two ocean terminuses. And American shipping is sometimes charged triple that of other countries. The Panama Canal seems destined to be in the news again. But history books cannot change the role of Theodore Roosevelt... especially when cartoonist were there to document it all!

A cartoon in JUDGE Magazine about the time the Canal opened to world shipping and sailing in 1914. "A design for the lighthouses at the entrances to the Panama Canal."

Little Jimmy in a Big Book

 

Meanwhile:

The Modest Pioneer

Jimmy Swinnerton

by Rick Marschall

Comics fans and scholars, and everyone in between, will be happy to learn that the latest production of Sunday Press Books has been released. JIMMY! is the multi-tasking title, referring to one of the Founding Fathers of the American comic strip, Jimmy Swinnerton, and his major creation, Little Jimmy.

There is everything major about this book, as it is a typical production of SPBooks and its genial genius Peter Maresca -- oversized, many pages, in all color, chock full of rare artwork, and chocker full of information, dates, and critical appreciation.

Swinnerton was hired by the young William Randolph Hearst when the latter no-yet newspaper mogul was commencing his empire -- not the least as Godfather of the Comics -- in San Francisco. It was in the '90s, and Swinnerton was to live, himself, into his 90s. In the years in between he created cartoons and strips based on California bears and New York City tigers; animals on the Ark and Mount Ararat; the irrepressible Sam and his laugh; the irascible Mr Batch; the Canyon Kiddies of the Far West (whose adventures took them to color magazine pages and animated cartoons); and even an adventure Western strip, Rocky Mason. 

There is more, far more, in Swin's colorful life and career. Sent to the desert in a doctor's attempt to ameliorate his death-sentence of TB, Swin lived there for many decades -- legendarily the sixth White man to settle in Palm Springs -- and became as one with nature and Indian culture. Along the way he became a respected painter of Western landscapes. And he lured his cartooning friends to visit; Rudolph Dirks passed through, George Herriman remained.

I once talked to, but never met, Jimmy Swinnerton (Milt Caniff asked me to help Swin sell his artwork) as I had briefly met Rudolph Dirks. The Sunday Press book JIMMY! fills in the gaps of things we might have talked about. Despite my voluminous collection of Swin's newspaper and magazine work (and paintings my son now owns, and collects), Pete Maresca has characteristically discovered treasures including sketches, photos, and personal drawings. More, his selection from decades of Sunday pages expertly chose the funniest and (yes) visually stunning examples.

 Somehow escaping inclusion in JIMMY! is this drawing from almost 130 years ago, 1895. It has been on my wall for years and I take  delight in appreciating its youthful and random spirit. Presumably the man with the hat is young Swinnerton -- who ought to have been smiling, as Hearst plastered this poster all around San Francisco, making the young artist a star.

As I say, there is a cornucopia of surprising and excellent artwork and information in this book. Swinnerton's reserved style managed to mask humor and even mayhem whose comic excesses easily rivalled that found in neighboring strips like the Katzenjammer Kids and Happy Hooligan. In addition he quietly made substantial contributions to the nascent art form of the comic strip -- like parallel action ("Meanwhile -->") and flat blacks and areas of colors, likely inspired by poster art and Japonisme, which look was adopted by George McManus. 

JIMMY! and other Maresca Masterpieces can be found at www.SundayPressBooks.com  An imprint of Fantagraphics Books. 

Political Cartoonist Quashed For Expressing Political Views

 

More Than Democracy

Dies in Darkness

by Rick Marschall

Political cartoonist Ann Telnaes, long a fixture on The Washington Post's editorial page, and winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Cartoonists Society Reuben Award and other honors, recently chose to end her association with that iconic paper. 

Her decision, announced publicly and inspiring debates (not enough of them -- me) in the print and electronic media, was due to the newspaper's "spiking" of her cartoon depicting media moguls kowtowing to a statue of Donald Trump. They bow, and several of them offer bags of cash; her statement refers to Big Media's quiet and newfound tolerance of Trump during his successful campaign for president, and subsequently. To her collateral point, some media companies have donated money to Inauguration events.

To her larger and more substantial point, these media giants do significant business with the federal government -- most prominently Jeff Bezos, who owns Amazon, which does amazonian amounts of business with the feds. Most pertinent in this controversy is the fact that Bezos has other distinctions. The cousin of country singer George Strait? No, guess again...

Bezos is the owner of the Washington Post and some people, his cartoonist Ann Telnaes chief among them, will wonder whether he found, in her cartoon, a reason to violate his promise not to interfere with his employees' independence at the Post.

The history of political cartooning in America, indeed of journalism in general, is strewn with examples -- not corpses, except metaphorically; unlike some countries where cartoonists have been persecuted and jailed -- of cartoonists' disputes with their publishers and editors. We shall prepare a historical essay on this for a future column in Yesterday's Papers / NEMO...

In the meantime, there is a need for debate on the questions raised by the cartoon, the Post's action, and the reaction of Telnaes. A screaming necessity. 

~~ In a democracy (such as Bezos pledged to defend as he adopted the credo "Democracy Dies in Darkness") should political cartoons ever be suppressed?

~~ In a free-enterprise society, can an owner decide what appears in his own newspaper?

~~ Are there practical questions? Could the Post have moved the cartoon's placement on its Op-Ed pages? Could it have run a disclaimer ("We do not necessarily endorse the view...")? Could Telnaes -- as I understand, a freelancer, not an employee -- have been offended at her treatment, but been satisfied with separate and internet dissemination?

~~ Should the larger political and civic community begin debates about the policies of newspapers (that is, their news pages, apart from their Editorial and Op-Ed pages) that have famously been skewed Red or Blue? Major print media have been overwhelmingly liberal for years, in terms of staffers' viewpoints, choices of coverage, and occasional subtle mistreatments of facts. In the latter regard there are even cases at The Washington Post where stories (even prize-winning stories) have been proven false, but not corrected. 

Surely these issues are related to a free press, freedom of expression, the responsibilities of owners, publishers, editors, and writers.

... and cartoonists? Maybe not. 

While it isn’t uncommon for editorial page editors to object to visual metaphors within a cartoon if it strikes that editor as unclear or isn’t correctly conveying the message intended by the cartoonist, such editorial criticism was not the case regarding this cartoon. To be clear, there have been instances where sketches have been rejected or revisions requested, but never because of the point of view inherent in the cartoon’s commentary. That’s a game changer…and dangerous for a free press. -- Cartoonist Ann Telnaes

I am a retired political cartoonist, occasionally still throwing bricks when issues tickle me. Cartoonists and columnists are a special breed. It is almost a job description to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. Readers know that we have points of view and will employ exaggeration, hyperbole, and even prevarication if we intend to persuade (or dissuade). 

If we fib, going off the reservation of rational discourse, we will pay the price. But -- I maintain -- it should be a price of readers' opprobrium, not an owner's arbitrary guillotine. Especially an owner who specifically pledged not to do what "his people" did to Ann Telnaes. In my own case, I drew cartoons for a major newspaper chain and I often designed outrageous concepts. But I was somewhat blessed to work for an owner whose views I shared. In fact he sent me fan letters and pats-on-the-back; so I have been spared Ann Telnaes's dilemma and an undoubtedly painful decision.

My motto as a cartoonist, and as a historian of the art and as a cultural critic, is the comment by caricaturist Henry Major:

"In the past, some cartoonists were jailed for what they drew. Today, cartoonists should be jailed for what they don't draw."  

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Here is a link to Open Windows, the web page of Ann Telnaes, and her thoughts on this issue:
https://anntelnaes.substack.com/p/why-im-quitting-the-washington-post?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR0H6ajLBlBYZ2ikQ-oJreBmLlnm2xDYHKvM67o4TOscBGkFs_XUxH086nU_aem_zVodeMsVLvlGTXlfBBsxkA