The John F. Kennedy Song

They had all of us little Boomers shoved in portable buildings

Long metal boxes

When we filled the schools.

And we played and made noise and had fun.

But one day our teacher had us line up

In straight and neat little rows

And she told us President Kennedy

Wanted us to be be physically fit.

So we started doing jumping jacks.

And I remember thinking

"Hey, I thought President Kennedy was supposed to be a good guy.

What's up with this crap?"

Postcard - Seattle, Washington

"Waterfront, Seattle, Washington with the Space Needle and the Cascade Mountains catching the skyline."

In the 1970s, man. The Best Decade. Well, at least if you were 20-something at the time.

The Blue & Gold

Before middle schools we had junior high schools, grades 7-9. In Olympia there were two junior high schools, Washington and Jefferson. I started out in Washington but partway through my academic journey there they built a new junior high to absorb us Boomers. It was called Reeves Junior High. It was named in honor of Mr. Reeves, my grade school principal at Roosevelt Elementary. He was a nice man who lived a block away from me.

Reeves was the school for the tough, working class kids. It was not an easy place to learn from the classroom due to the anarchy. All of our lessons came from elsewhere.

The school newspaper was called The Blue & Gold (school colors) and was run off on a mimeograph. I have a scattered few issues from the first year. Many of my cartoons failed to reproduce to the point where they could not be read, but I found a few I could post here.

It was at Reeves that I first learned the power of cartooning in politics. The Olympia Mayor, Tom Allen, wanted to turn the downtown Sylvester Park into a parking garage. Even though I was a teenager, I met with him to state why this was wrong, and he treated me like a teenager. That is to say, I was brushed off and ridiculed by him as an "environmentalist." (The term "treehugger" had not been invented yet and The Evergreen State College had not surfaced in Oly at this time, so we were still living in an extension of the 1950s in Olympia). So I drew a bunch of cartoons about "Tommy Treecut" for the Blue and Gold. The principal, Ted Wynstra, called my parents to complain, saying Tom Allen was a friend of his, and my Mother responded by saying, so what? The kid has a right to free expression.

Yes! As I have stated before in this blog, I was very fortunate in the parental department.

And Tom Allen was later nailed in some scandal involving self-interest in the construction of the public library and left office under a deserved dark cloud. 

Anyway, part of digging into that mimeo gel to produce those cartoons meant I had to sit in the school office area. I quickly noticed that the central microphone for the school announcements was in the same room, as well as the stack of notices waiting to be read. So I started writing bogus notices and slipping them into the stack. I wonder how many people showed up for fake meetings?

Ain't I a stinker?

So, here are some of the cartoons I drew during that era, 1969-1970:

Norman, the Wonder Prune was regular character I used

Remember, the Moon landing was new thing in 1969!

 This cover was drawn by our art teacher, "Snuffy" Jenkins.

He died fairly young, only a few years after he drew this.

He was a squat, square, straight-talking guy who loved teaching.

This was the kind of Cold War paranoia nonsense we Boomers could not get away from, even in a junior high newspaper!

Buttons - Presidential Campaign - 1972

Nixon Now

A most impressive effort of the Nixon campaign trying to lure the youth vote, 1972 was the first where 18 year-olds could vote.

There was a real storm front between those who were raised during the Great Depression and World War Two as opposed to us Boomers who only saw the shadow of the atomic/nuclear cloud. We grew up with the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam, and the Cold War. Our protests had a sense of urgency since we were concerned tomorrow might never come. Something had to be done about this mess NOW! At the time this was recognized and dubbed The Generation Gap. This button was an attempt by the Nixon people to reach over that gap. Apparently, in terms being re-elected, it worked.

I find it humorous that in 1972 Nixon won by a landslide, but by 1974 when he resigned in total disgrace I could find few people who admitted they voted for him.

When I think about who was the worst president in U.S. history, I have a hard time choosing between Nixon, Reagan, Bush II, Harding or Buchanan.

Mini-Comics Day in McCleary, pt. 10

The Floating Head of Humptulips was a jam on Mini-Comics Day by Frank Young, Jim Gill,  Paul Tumey and Morty the Dog. The "occupency" sign (by Paul?) is a real-life typo from a public notice posted by the City of McCleary in the Community Center. Yes, Grays Harbor County is indeed in the Third World, where literacy is not first nature and dictionaries gather dust. It is even evident on street signs and newspaper headlines. On the public health index and unemployment, this county ranks dead last out of 39 counties in Washington.

Still, I love Grays Harbor County. This place is one of the last islands of the old Washington State, the real Washington we rural Boomer natives knew as we were growing up. Sasquatch is safe out here. We can still scratch where it itches. Wild Russian boars run amok.

Favorite Movie Quotes: Hollywoodland

"When it comes to publicity, what's true or false doesn't really matter."

[Comic art enthusiasts might want to check out this movie. It concerns the controversy surrounding the death of actor George Reeves, who we Boomers remember as the man who portrayed Superman in the television series of the late 1950s]

Should I Be Worried?

So I am spending today cleaning up and sorting through home bureaucracy. And in the meantime playing old LPs to smooth the way.

Here's what is worrying me. I just played John Lennon's final album, Double Fantasy, which I had not listened to in a long time and found that I actually enjoyed Yoko Ono's songs more than John's.

Am I going insane or what? I seek advice from fellow Boomers but perhaps later generations have a clearer reality check.

Washington State Cartoonist Laureate

This announcement was sent yesterday to my email. One of Washington State's last ditch efforts to keep culture alive as we all slide into the New Dark Ages:

POET LAUREATE APPLICATIONS SOUGHT

Applications are now being accepted for the 2012 – 2014 Washington State Poet Laureate position. The Poet Laureate serves to build awareness and appreciation of poetry – including the state’s legacy of poetry – through public readings, workshops, lectures, and presentations in communities, schools, colleges and universities, and other public settings across the state. The selected Poet Laureate will develop a two-year plan of activities, in consultation with the Washington State Arts Commission and Humanities Washington.

Qualified applicants must meet the following eligibility requirements:

· Be a current resident of the state of Washington;

· Have had at least one full-length book of poetry published by an established press;

· Be engaged in the poetry community;

· Be willing and able to promote poetry and the legacy of poetry throughout Washington State for a two-year period.

Applications must be submitted electronically no later than 5:00 p.m. PST on November 30, 2011. For more information about the Washington State Poet Laureate program, including application criteria and guidelines, or to submit an application, visit www.washingtonpoetlaureate.org or contact Julie Ziegler, Executive Director, Humanities Washington, at julie@humanities.org, 206.682.1770 x 110; or Kris Tucker, Executive Director, Washington State Arts Commission, at kris.tucker@arts.wa.gov, 360.753.3860.

OK, so I am providing this news release both as announcement for the few poets who read this blog and an opportunity to promote the idea of a Washington State Cartoonist Laureate.

In modifying the above guidelines to fit the world of cartooning, my nomination for Washington State Cartoonist Laureate would be the legendary Bob Cram, cartooning weatherman.

In the early 1960s, when he replaced cartooning weatherman Bob Hale on KING-TV in Seattle, Bob instantly became one of my cartoon heroes. In that early, primitive era of live local TV, Bob was second only to J.P. Patches in influencing us budding Boomer cartoonists in Puget Sound.

I loved the way he made cartooning seem so easy and improvisational as he enhanced the weather report with his comic illustrations. He actually flew as he drew. I'm sure I am not the only local comix artist Bob influenced. And he's a long time Washingtonian and part of our cultural history.

I nominate Bob Cram for Washington State Cartoonist Laureate!

[Update: Just had a nice phone conversation with Bob Cram. It is fitting that I had already put out the flag on my front porch honoring vets and was able to thank him for his WWII service. Bob is still cartooning to this day! Go Bob, very inspirational!]

Move Over Superman, Make Way for Morty / by Johnny Dodd

A profile piece on Edd Vick and Miscellanea Unlimited Press from the University Herald (Seattle, Washington), February 7, 1990.

The "comics aren't just for kids anymore" was an expression journalists liked to use a lot when describing our kind of comix. I first started reading that phrase in the mid-1970s. Today, I think it is pretty much taken for granted there is a huge bloc of Boomers who never let go of the medium and comic art has grown up right alongside us as we spin through the mortal coil.

Johnny Dodd, the author of this article, apparently went on to write for People.

Teaching Comix

Some time during my stay in Pullman, Washington (1983-1986) I was asked to give a class for junior high school (now called middle school) pupils about comic art. That started a whole sub-career for me of presenting lessons on comix technique and/or history to students from Kindergarten to college.

My favorite classes are for children from preschool to about 2nd grade. Generally speaking, the magic of comic art is still captivating for them. We cartoonists can communicate so well with this group of kids in classroom settings because we ourselves have never fully surrendered the kid within us to the outside world. Look at all the Oldwavers who are still active. We are now in the 55+ crowd, making us Senior Citizens in the eyes of Burger King and the Pre-Paid Cremation Services folks who send me junk mail (how do they find me? It's rather unsettling) , yet we still put a lot of energy into drawing funny pictures and being playful with lines on paper.

It probably helps that we are also the Boomers, the generation with the never ending adolescence.

I notice that around 3rd grade the children begin to ask about how to make a living at the cartoon game. The practical considerations begin early.

My most memorable presentation was to my daughter's 4th grade class. This is a very small town and most of the kids already knew me. At the end of the talk one little boy asked me to sing my underpants song, which of course I sang loud and proud. It has the tune of "She'll Comin' "Round the Mountain" and goes like this:

Oh, I haven't seen my underpants in weeks
Oh, I haven't seen my underpants in weeks
Oh, I haven't seen my underpants
Haven't seen my underpants
I haven't seen my underpants in weeeeeeeks!

All the girls covered their ears, except for my daughter, who crawled under her desk.

I don't know how many classes I've given over the years, but quite a few, including some at South Puget Sound Community College in Olympia, where I sometimes would print out special editions of As I Recall the 'Sixties not only as an example of how to make your own comix, but also for a couple history classes.

If you haven't already, I'd encourage my cartoonist comrades out there to take any opportunity you can to teach or talk about comix to your community. It's been my experience that people are predisposed to have fun when they know cartoons will be the topic presented, and who knows, you might awaken the sleeping cartoonist within one of the attendees.

The photo attached here is from a video of a cartoon class I gave at Lincoln Elementary, Olympia, Washington, April 17, 1987. That's Odd Dog on the easel.