Showing posts with label Nuts and Jolts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nuts and Jolts. Show all posts

18 January, 2011

18 January, 1944

No letter today.    Just this:

* TIDBIT *

Wilma sent this comic to Greg from the Boston Traveler, dated 18 January, 1944. Her annotations are even better than the comic! Her additions include: an "A" over the garage, the car defined as a "convertible", a sun drawn in with the words "sun always shining for us", clouds scribbled out and labeled "no clouds", an arrow pointing to "our house", and the dog labeled "a scotty, perhaps?", Harvard Square pointing to the trousers. When she sent this, Wilma had not yet learned to drive, adding to the joke between them.

CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE

Nuts and Jolts, 18 January, 1944

Syndicated for three decades, Nuts and Jolts was a stand-alone panel cartoon featuring an ever-changing cast of everyday people doing silly things.

Bill Holman took over the panel in July of 1935 upon the death of Gaar Williams, originally using a number of different titles. The gag panel began to be called Nuts And Jolts in July of 1939 and was syndicated by the Chicago Tribune - New York News Syndicate until 1970.

Bill Holman was perhaps best known for his fun-filled strip Smokey Stover, featuring the wacky adventures of a fireman. Holman loved word play, and all of his features were flush with puns. The panels of Smokey Stover regularly included sight gags, humorous mishaps, absurd vehicles and bizarre household items—including oddly-shaped furniture, clocks, vases, and personal items. Crazy framed pictures which change completely from panel to panel, with subjects literally jumping out of the frames — added to the overall lively foolishness that pervaded the strip.

His most frequent nonsense word by far was "foo". Holman peppered his work with "foo" labels and puns. Smokey often called himself a "foo fighter" rather than a "firefighter." Holman also used the word "foo" on signs, lists, license plates, and the character remarks randomly yet frequently. The phrase "foo fighter," also taken from Holman’s strip, was used by Allied aircraft pilots in World War II to describe various UFOs or mysterious aerial phenomena seen in the skies over both the European and Pacific Theaters of Operations. Today, “Foo” is used as a ubiquitous sample in all forms of writing software, including for use as class names, variable assignment, database username/password combinations, temporary filenames, and the like.


Back of Comic advertising a Woman's Suit for $24.50