City Limits Gazette # Glue a frog on your head and teach it to sing (July 1993)

Logo by Oli Newsome, Zines in Grays Harbor County and coverage of The Bil Keane Watch by Michael Drummond, Naked Preacher update, American Libraries threatens to boycott Harper's in fallout from the Avoiding Librarianism piece (I have included a scan of the editorial itself), Tiki Lounge Mystery-- solved!, Bil Keane Watch by Ken Clinger - Wayno, Suspended Animation, Beef with small press comix by Sean Wilson, Apology from Mark Campos, Alternative Reading Room of Asheville NC, Underground cartoonists sacred cows of the '90s by Bruce Chrislip.

City Limits Gazette # Zizz (Mar. 1993)

Logo by Maximum Traffic, Harper's magazine subscribes to CLG, 20 years ago by Gary Usher, WSU comix collection news, Fighting City Hall in Toronto by Crad Kilodney, Chad Woody poetry, Bil Keane Watch with Dusty Rhodes - Andrew Roller, an actual photo of McJacksonstein, Footnote to Obscuro press 1961 by Gary Usher, Maximum Traffic rant, Comics Journal small press index by Gary Usher, a final cartoon word from Jeremy Pinkham.

Publishing Crad Kilodney's essay was a special highlight for me as CLG editor.

City Limits Gazette # ... (Feb. 1993)

Logo by Dockery and Salzbach, Sean Bieri joins us, Maximum Traffic responds to Ricardo Nancy McJacksonstein, Bil Keane Watch by Dusty Rhodes, Obscuro press 1961 by Gary Usher, Bil Keane Watch comes this close to being picked up by Harpers, Bil Keane Watch by Mike Lee, Emergency Horse folds up, Comics Journal small press index by Gary Usher.

The Crapper Point Journal

The Crapper Point Journal was a response to the official student newspaper for The Evergreen State College, The Cooper Point Journal.

Here's how I got roped into this. During my very last quarter at Evergroove a faculty member who shall remain anonymous but is named Margaret Gribskov contacted me and asked if I would be willing to participate in a spoof of the CPJ. Of course I would. So she introduced me to a fellow named Ken Silverstein.

Ken was a new arrival to TESC and was struck by how pompous and lockstep the place had become as contrasted to the earlier reputation the school had enjoyed as a more libertarian institution. His idea was to create a newspaper for the college set in the future. That's why even though the paper was really released on June 6, 1979, it carries a date of December 12, 1985.

So I drew the masthead and a couple cartoons. Ken, I think, did all the writing. Margaret bankrolled the project. For most of the humor in this publication all I can say is you really had to be there at the time to get it. The jokes were extremely local and topical.

In the brief time I worked with Ken I was impressed by his sharp observations and energy. Today he is a well known journalist and writer, mostly known his work in the Los Angeles Times and Harpers. Today he appears to be in freelance transition. Definitely an engaging journalist to follow.

Bil Keane Watch run amok

CLG readers had a lot of fun deconstructing Bil Keane's Family Circus in a running feature I called "The Bil Keane Watch." I understand the Keane family came to regard our treatment of Family Circus as their favorite satire of Zen Master Bil's work.

One weird and complex spinoff from covering Keane's work resulted in CLG getting a mention in Harper's Magazine. Originally they were interested in the Watch, but they shifted their focus to something else. Mike Lee of Eugene, Oregon's Emergency Horse tells the tale.

From City Limits Gazette # Zoop (Apr. 1993)