Saturday, May 4, 2019

OT : Tales from the New York Daily News Sunday Comics (#6) : Happy 100th Anniversary to HAROLD TEEN by Carl Ed!




Happy 100th anniversary to the third comic strip to ever appear in the New York Daily News, Carl Ed's HAROLD TEEN!

The strip made its debut 100 years ago today, May 4, 1919 in the pages of the Patterson family owned Chicago Tribune (run by News publisher Joseph Medill Patterson's cousin, Robert R. McCormick) and joined Patterson's New York Illustrated Daily News on June 26th as a daily feature. From there it became one of the most influential strips ever on the popular culture of the roaring twenties.

The best portrayal of the feature's origins comes from author John Chapman, whose seminal "Tell it to Sweeney - The Informal History of the New York Daily News" recounts the trials and tribulations of the first 40 years of the country's first and most successful tabloid newspaper........


"The third comic in the News was "Harold Teen," drawn by Carl Ed - Carl Frank Ludwig Ed, who pronounces his last name Ead. No other strip had so wide an influence on the language, dress, and antics of American children.

Ed was born in Moline, Illinois, in 1880 and attended Augustana College at Rock Island, Illinois. He spent his early newspaper years on the editorial staff of the Rock Island Argus and was city editor when he resigned in 1917. In 1918 he went to the Chicago Evening American as a sports cartoonist. The same year he transferred to the Chicago Tribune and in 1919 he began "Harold Teen" as a daily and Sunday feature.

The comic made its debut in the News daily only, for there was no Sunday News. The News dropped "Harold Teen" in 1953 - for teen-agers had become a different breed of cat. During the 1920's, Harold Teen and his companions, including Shadow, either introduced or popularized such youthful phenomena as bell-bottom trousers, exaggerated plus fours, marked-up tin Lizzies, autographed sweat shirts, illustrated raincoats, broad-toed shoes, and the gedunk sundae, which was two scoops of ice cream in a glass of chocolate, to be taken with a bib. Teen's phraseology swept the land - "Fan mah brow!" "pantywaist," "lollypopsie," and "big hunk of stuff" being samples."

The HAROLD TEEN Sunday strip debuted in the New York Sunday News comics on November 3, 1923. For the sake of accuracy, research has revealed that HAROLD TEEN actually was dropped by The News in 1950, replaced with Dan Spiegle's HOPALONG CASSIDY, but sporadically appeared in 1950-51 coinciding with the expansion of the Sunday News "Country" Edition of the paper on September 17, 1950.

From the July 29, 1950 issue of EDITOR & PUBLISHER:

"In a bid for more pre-date sales, the New York Sunday News will add eight extra comic pages Sept. 17 for circulation outside the metropolitan area, Executive Editor Richard W. Clarke disclosed. The move will provide a minimum of a 24-page comic section for the country edition."

"The additional pages will include four Chicago Tribune - New York News Syndicate strips: "Timmy," by Howard Sparber, "Aggie Mack" by Hal Rasmusson, "Texas Slim" by Ferd Johnson; and "Harold Teen" by Carl Ed. The News had dropped "Harold Teen" to make room for the "Hopalong Cassidy," Los Angeles Mirror Enterprises comic. Two pages are being drawn especially for the expanded section: "Laughing Matter" by Salo, who does the daily panel for the syndicate; and "Rufus," new dog page by Jeff Keate."

The Salo mentioned above was cartoonist Roth Salo. The expanded Part 2 section looked like this......




I own a complete, unread, near-mint country edition collection of 1951 Sunday sections and I can report that the experiment appears to have been dropped following the January 14, 1951 section, leading to what I believe is the very last appearance of HAROLD TEEN in the New York Sunday News comics. The strip did carry on elsewhere until it petered out on November 18, 1959.

Allan Holtz reports additional facts in his indispensable tome, American Newspaper Comics....... 

Running Dates: May 4, 1919 to November 18, 1959
Creator: Carl Ed
Syndicates: Chicago Tribune, Chicago Tribune - New York News Syndicate
Notes: Sunday started first, followed by Daily on 9/25/19.

Jeffrey Lindenblatt reports that an extra daily ran in the NY Daily News in their Sunday edition 5/1/21 - 4/16/22, 7/16/22 - 2/18/23. It is unknown if they were "new" dailies created for the News, or recycled.

Bob York assisted in the early 1930's
Rick Fletcher reports he was an assistant sometime before 1950.
Alberto Becattini cites Bill Perry as an assistant on the strip (confirmed by John Chapman in "Tell it to Sweeney", p.152)

Carl Ed's obituary states the last strip would be published on 11/18/59 but nothing has been found past 9/26/59.

I currently have scanned in my files 183 samples of Carl Ed's HAROLD TEEN Sundays and 42 dailies which spans the years 1919, 1924-1951 in the NY Sunday News comics. I will present this below and keep the archive open as I continue to scan and add samples ongoing. The debut Sunday below from May 4, 1919, is from the Chicago Tribune and courtesy of my pal John Wells.

***  (I also have 9 samples of Carl Ed's short-running topper strip JOSIE, that rarely ever ran in the NY Sunday News comics. In fact, I've only seen 9 examples "ever", eight in the News, one in the Chicago Tribune. On both occasions, it ran as a separate strip on another page. Four samples of another topper is also below, THE ABSENT-MINDED PROFESSOR, in 1931 and 1933) ***


May 4, 1919



November 3, 1923
 - (New York Sunday News comics debut)

                 


January 17, 1924



April 20, 1924




May 4, 1924



May 18, 1924




May 25, 1924



October 3, 1926



October 31, 1926



August 10, 1930



October 5, 1930




May 17, 1931




June14, 1931



September 27, 1931



April 1, 1932



April 7, 1932



May 14, 1932



May 10, 1933




October 29, 1933



February 25, 1934




March 11, 1934



January 4, 1935

   
 

January 18, 1935



January 19, 1935



February 3, 1935



March 3, 1935



May 5, 1935



May 26, 1935



June 23, 1935



July 28, 1935



August 4, 1935

 

September 15, 1935



November 10, 1935



December 8, 1935



December 15, 1935



March 31, 1936



July 12, 1936



July 26, 1936



September 20, 1936



October 18, 1936



January 3, 1937




February 7, 1937



March 14, 1937



March 21, 1937



April 4, 1937


April 11, 1937


May 9, 1937




June 6, 1937




September 5, 1937




January 2, 1938




January 16, 1938




January 23, 1938




February 6, 1938



February 13, 1938



February 27, 1938





March 6, 1938



March 13, 1938




March 20, 1938





March 27, 1938



April 3, 1938



April 17, 1938




May 1, 1938



May 8, 1938



May 22, 1938



June 5, 1938



June 12, 1938



June 19, 1938



June 26, 1938


July 3, 1938


July 10, 1938


July 17, 1938


August 7, 1938


August 14, 1938


September 4, 1938



September 11, 1938


September 18, 1938



October 2, 1938



October 16, 1938



October 30, 1938



November 6, 1938



November 13, 1938



November 20, 1938



November 27, 1938



December 11, 1938



December 18, 1938



December 25, 1938 



January 1, 1939



April 9, 1939



May 28, 1939



June 11, 1939

                   

July 23, 1939



August 13, 1939

                    


January 14, 1940



January 21, 1940



January 28, 1940



May 12, 1940



May 19, 1940



June 2, 1940



June 9, 1940



June 16, 1940




June 23, 1940



June 26, 1940



July 7, 1940

                   


July 14, 1940



July 21, 1940



July 28, 1940



August 4, 1940



August 11, 1940



August 18, 1940



August 22, 1940



September 8, 1940



September 15, 1940



October 13, 1940



June 1, 1941



June 22, 1941



June 29, 1941



July 20, 1941



August 3 1941



November 23, 1941



December 7, 1941



December 8, 1941



December 14, 1941



December 21, 1941



December 28, 1941



March 13, 1942



May 31, 1942



June 7, 1942



June 14, 1942



June 21, 1942



June 28, 1942



July 12, 1942



July 19, 1942



August 21, 1942



October 11, 1942




October 18, 1942



October 21, 1942



October 25, 1942



December 5, 1942



December 13, 1942



January 23, 1943



March 7, 1943



July 26, 1943



August 24, 1943



September 4, 1943



September 9, 1943



September 26, 1943



December 5, 1943



December 21, 1943



January 23, 1944



January 29, 1944



February 6, 1944



February 27, 1944



April 16, 1944


June 4, 1944



June 6, 1944


June 7, 1944

    

July 13, 1944



January 28, 1945



April 8, 1945



April 30, 1945



August 5, 1945
 

 
August 7, 1945



August 8, 1945



August 9, 1945



August 14, 1945



August 15, 1945



August 18, 1945



August 27, 1945



October 14, 1945



December 16, 1945



March 17, 1946



May 12, 1946



July 21, 1946



August 25, 1946



September 19, 1946



October 20, 1946


December 21, 1946



February 23, 1947



April 13, 1947



May 18, 1947




August 26, 1947




November 23, 1947



December 28, 1947



January 11, 1948



June 6, 1948



June 25, 1948



August 8, 1948



August 16, 1948



August 17, 1948



October 10, 1948



October 17, 1948



October 24, 1948



November 7, 1948



November 14, 1948



November 28, 1948



December 5, 1948



December 12, 1948



January 9, 1949



January 16, 1949



January 23, 1949



February 6, 1949



February 20, 1949



March 6, 1949



March 12, 1949



March 13, 1949



March 20, 1949



March 27, 1949



April 10, 1949




May 8, 1949



May 31, 1949



June 19, 1949



July 3, 1949



July 20, 1949



September 4, 1949



September 11, 1949



October 9, 1949



October 16, 1949



October 23, 1949




October 30, 1949



November 13, 1949



November 20, 1949



October 15, 1950



October 29, 1950



December 17, 1950



January 7, 1951



January 14, 1951




Josie topper running as a separate feature:


July 3, 1938



August 21, 1938 (Chicago Tribune)



October 30, 1938 (Chicago Tribune)




December 25, 1938 
   

January 1, 1939



July 30, 1939

Add caption

July 20, 1941



December 28, 1941



May 31, 1942






SOURCES:

  1. The Vassallo collection of The New York Sunday News comics sections spanning 1924-present.
  2. Chapman, John; Tell it to Sweeney (1961), Doubleday & Company, Inc.
  3. Editor & Publisher, July 19, 1950
  4. Holtz, Allan; American Newspaper Comics (2014), University of Michigan Press













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