Roy Crane "The Rise and Fall of the Comic Strip!!"

America has been going to hell in a handbasket since the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

There is no shortage of yellowing, old diary entries, newspaper editorials and books bemoaning that this age will be, once and for all, mark my words, the ever lovin' blue eyed end. OK? Right now. It's all over. The "good old days" are lost.


With this thought in mind, here is master cartoonist Roy Crane, writing "The Rise and Fall of the Comic Strip!!" The comic strip, you see, died in the 1970s; specifically, the December 1973 issue of Cartoonist PROfiles.



Here's the text of "The Rise and Fall of the Comic Strip!!" including a peek into the future of 1983:



1895

• First Daily Strip

1905-20

• Joke Era ... daily strips 15" wide (7 Cols.)
• Full Sunday Page

1920-30

• Development of continuities into story strips, adventure strips.

1930-40

• DEPRESSION ... Golden Age of the adventure strip ... ALL THAT SPACE ... wonderful fights, action, BACKGROUNDS!
• Publishers amazed that circulations doesn't stop. Publishers find readers want to know what will happen next in adventure strips.
• Throw out the joke strips!
• Buy MORE adventure strips!
• Gratitude ... papers kill goose that lays the golden egg, cut dailies to 6 columns.
• Cut Sundays to 1/2 page and tabloid!

1940-45

• THE WAR! Comics play a big part. Price of newsprint soars.
• Cut dailies to 5 columns.
• Cut Sundays to 1/3 page!

1945-65

• U.S. Comics in the Louvre ... called ART!
• Cut dailies to 4 columns.
• HELP! HELP! They're after the old goose again!
• Cartoonists in serious trouble! Not enough space for adventure and story strip lads to get characters' feet into pictures.
• Not enough room for action shots.
• All strip artists go from 4-picture strip to 3-picture strip!
• Adventure and story strip guys have 72 fewer pictures to tell 12 week story.
• Readers squawk!
• Stories drag!
• Lose wallop!
• Gag strips take over market.
• TV Competition.
• 1965-73
• More troubles!
• Newspaper reduce size of he column which takes another chop out of comics.
• OFF WITH THE LEGS!
• Fewer action shots!

1973

• STRIKES! Shortage of newsprint.
• They're going after the old goose again!
• PAPERS GOING TO 3-COLUMN STRIPS!!
• Yes ... THREE!! And demanding larger lettering!
• Gag strip fellows draw strip in only one Picture.

1974

• Papers cut strips to 11/2" deep.
• NO MORE BREASTS. Only heads are left.
• Last story strip folds! Last adventure strip!

1975

• Papers chop comics to 2-columns.

1977

• Papers chop heads off: leaving only the balloons.

1978

• Polls show no one is reading bare balloons any longer. Editors wonder why. Last comic disappears.

1983

• NEW ERA in American Journalism!
• Editors drop the news!
• TV blamed!
• Issues appear twice weekly ... the supermarket special on Thursday, want ads on Sunday.
• Let us thank God we can still get the news on TV. Also sports, weather, recipes. In fact, EVERYTHING the newspapers carried except the COMICS!

A big hat tip to Don Orehek for this issue of Cartoonist PROfiles!