Virtue Magazine

Co-star of the comic strip Blondie, Dagwood and his beautiful wife are celebrating their 75th anniversary as a part of the funny pages this year. And while old age generally manages to creep up on people who reach 75th anniversaries, Dagwood and Blondie remain as chipper and attractive as they were in 1930, the year the strip debuted.

Like most strips, Blondie has undergone some major changes throughout the years, including various efforts to “modernize” the strip. Moreover, the artist who originally created and drew the strip has long since passed away, having died in 1973. But despite these factors, Blondie remains surprisingly similar in both content and style to the creation that Chic Young honed and perfected throughout the 1930s and ‘40s. In a day when many cartoonists are turning to more “risqué” and “cutting edge” material to draw readers in, Blondie has always remained centered around more traditional themes, most of which involve family and day-to-day routines.

Perhaps this is due to the fact that the strip has almost become a family business in itself: after Young’s death in 1973, it was his son Dean who took over the writing of the strip. Dean continues to write and direct Blondie to this day, over the years collaborating with several artists, all who have carefully preserved the original style of the characters and the strip. Some of these collaborators include Jim Raymond, Stan Drake, and the current artist, Denis Lebrun.

When it first began, the strip largely focused on Blondie Boopadoop—a kind of flighty, carefree gold-digger flapper*—and her on-again, off-again relationship with beau Dagwood Bumstead. Despite being something of a klutz and rather inept in the courtship department, Dagwood was heir to an extremely large fortune, including Bumstead Locomotive Works, his father’s lucrative business. But like many extremely wealthy families, Dagwood’s parents (the venerable J. Bolling Bumsteads) were also a bit snooty, and they did not approve of Dagwood’s relationship with someone of a much lower class.

The strip revolved around this storyline for its first two years, but a change was needed. This was the 1930s, in the heart of the Great Depression, and struggling readers faced with constant hardships were not interested in the antics of a spoiled rich kid and his wealthy family. Faced with the possible cancellation of his strip, Chic Young agreed to his syndicate’s suggestion that he go ahead and marry Dagwood and Blondie.

Young did so in grand style. Dagwood’s parents threatened to disinherit him of the family’s entire fortune were he to marry Blondie, but on February 17, 1933, Dagwood married Blondie anyway. True to their word, his parents disowned him, and Dagwood and Blondie moved to a modest house in middle class America. No longer a wealthy child with money to waste, Dagwood was forced to work for the tyrannical Mr. Dithers at the office of the J. C. Dithers Construction Company to support his family. He has remained there ever since, although he still hasn’t gotten the raise he regularly asks for.

It was at this point that the strip finally began to take off. As cartoonist Brian Walker noted in his book, The Comics Since 1945, “[Young] had discovered that Blondie readers experienced vicarious pleasure from observing Dagwood coping with his fatigue by eating, sleeping, or soaking in the bathtub. They saw their own lives reflected in the struggles of this common man. Strong reader identification with popular characters was the bedrock upon which all modern humor strips would be built.”

Over the years, various characters have been added to the Blondie cast. A son called “Baby Dumpling” (later named “Alexander”) was born Apr. 15, 1934, and a second child, “Cookie,” was born in 1941. The name of the second child was decided through a readers contest, and despite the fact that the prize money was only $100, nearly half a million readers submitted suggestions. Over the years, both Alexander and Cookie have grown into teenagers, and both closely resemble their parents.

Other reappearing characters include the dog Daisy; the Bumsteads’ next-door neighbors Herb and Tootsie Woodley; Mr. Beasley the mailman; five-year old pest Elmo Tuttle and the previously mentioned Julius Dithers and his domineering wife Cora Dithers.

As Blondie continued to grow in popularity, the strip began to transcend the newspaper pages it appeared in every day. The character Cookie became the feature of a weekly radio series, and was also the subject of a children’s book that chronicled her adventures. Columbia Pictures later produced a series of feature films based on the strip in 1939, with Arthur Lake and Penny Singleton playing the roles of Dagwood and Blondie. Two television shows also popped up, with the first debuting on January 4, 1957, and the second on September 26, 1968.

In 1948, Chic Young was awarded the National Cartoonists’ Society’s Rueben Award for his work on Blondie. In 1995, Blondie was one of twenty comic strips honored in the U.S. Postal stamp series “Comic Strip Classics.”

Like Charles Schulz’s Peanuts, Blondie has even contributed a new phrase to the English language. Webster’s New World Dictionary describes a “Dagwood” sandwich as “a thick sandwich with a variety of fillings, often of apparently incompatible foods.”

Today, the 75th anniversary of the strip is being honored in a unique manner. Blondie, normally a gag-a-day strip that does not use storylines (the last exception being in 1991, when Blondie started her catering business in a story that also made national headlines), is running a summer long storyline about Dagwood and Blondie’s preparation for their big “anniversary.” What makes this storyline even more unique is that Blondie will feature cameo appearances of numerous characters from other strips. Many cartoonists will be returning the favor, as they “invite” the Bumsteads into their own strips. Garfield, Beetle Bailey, Dennis the Menace, Dilbert, Hagar the Horrible and Zits are some of the strips that we know will be participating in this event.

This type of switch-characters-switch-strips idea is part of what cartoonists sometimes refer to as “self-referential humor.” It is not a new idea: as early as the 1960s Mort Walker (creator of Beetle Bailey and Hi and Lois) did a surreal comic strip called Sam’s Strip that was based almost entirely on self-referential humor and the guest appearances of characters from other strips. More recently, several cartoonists have pulled off similar organized jokes, usually taking place on April Fools Day. Cartoonists also like to honor other cartoonists and comic strips in their own strips, as was the case when Charles Schulz announced his retirement, and when he later died on the morning his last strip ran.

However, nothing has ever been attempted on the scale of the current Blondie celebration. As the Associated Press reported, “[A] virtual who’s who of the funnies will drop in and out as the Bumsteads plan a huge party for an unspecified wedding anniversary . . . . President Bush and wife Laura are also set to make an appearance.”

Little more has been said about what kind of “appearance” Bush and his wife will make, and in what form. But while spoofs and unflattering caricatures of presidents have appeared in comic strips before (most notably Walt Kelly’s portrayal of Lyndon B. Johnson in Pogo), the AP’s vague statement seems to point to something new and certainly unprecedented in American art and culture. Never before have a president and his wife been portrayed in a comic strip under such circumstances.

The day this huge celebration culminates? Sunday, September 4th. On that day, Blondie’s 250 million readers, and millions of other readers will have the opportunity to witness an event that will probably never be repeated again.

Unless, of course, Blondie and Dagwood reach their 100th anniversary. And as youthful and timeless as the lovely pair appears today, perhaps 100 years is not out of the question.

*The term “flapper,” which became popular in the 1920’s, referred to young women who showed disdain for conventional dress and behavior, while “gold digger” refers to a woman who associates with or marries a man because of his wealth.