Birmingham Historical Comic Strips -- Birmingham Post, The Forties
Where the '30's had been stable or stagnant, depending on your point of view, the latter half of the '40's were a time of great upheaval for the Post comics page. The Golden Age of the adventure strip was winding down, and the war years brought in strips that, thankfully in the real world, had a built-in expiration date, so there were quite a few chances for new strips (or, in cases like Nancy, strips that had been around a while but hadn't played in this market before) to be tried out.
1940:
No changes.
1941:
In March, they dropped Barney Baxter, as the flying ace adventure strips were kind of winding down or morphing into something else overall.
1942:
No changes.
1943:
In April, Wash Tubbs was re-named to Capt. Easy, in one of the classic cases of a secondary character taking over a strip.
1944:
No changes.
1945:
In September, they added Judge Wright, a low-key adventure strip about, well, a judge. In October, they added the syndicated run of Mauldin's Willie and Joe.
Judge Wright,Bob Brent and Bob Well,United Features Syndicate
Willie and Joe,
Mauldin,United Features Syndicate
1946:
In January, they dropped Willie and Joe, as the pair hadn't made the transition to civilian life all that well, and picked up the two-fisted adventure of Vic Flint. In October, they picked up Nancy.
Vic Flint,
Michael O'Malley and Ralph Lane,NEA Service
Nancy,Ernie Bushmiller,
United Features Syndicate
1947:
In 1947, they moved from what had migrated down to just over half a page of comics due to shrinkage over the years back out to almost a full page by adding four new strips during the year. In January, they added Bruce Gentry, an adventure strip that was kind of a mishmash of a too-late aviator strip and Terry and the Pirates. In April, along came a couple of humor or near-humor strips: Priscilla's Pop, which was about a little girl who was sort of a forerunner of Dennis the Menace, and Abbie and Slats, an Al Capp-written teenage strip. Finally, in June, they added Jack and Judy in Bibleland, wherein two contemporary kids watched Biblical stories unfold. This was better than it sounds but still wasn't great.
Bruce Gentry,Ray Bailey,
none listed
Abbie 'n' Slats,
Raeburn Van Buren,United Features Syndicate
Priscilla's Pop,
Al Vermeer,NEA Service
Jack and Judy in Bibleland,Robert Acomb,Sun and Times
1948:
Sometimes you get the feeling they're either asleep at the wheel or just messing with you. In November, a decade or so after Captain Easy had taken over the strip and five years after their original rename, they starting running the strip as Wash Tubbs again.
In April, they had dropped Judge Wright and started running Gordo, the long-time Mexican-based strip (which started off running heavily on stereotypes but turned into a real gem over the years). In November, they dropped Red Ryder (just in time to miss the TV Western boom of the '50's) and picked up the Bugs Bunny strip, which didn't really work all that well.
Gordo,Gus Arriola,
none listed
Bugs Bunny,none,
Warner Bros. Cartoons
1949:
In February, the name switched back from Wash Tubbs to Captain Easy. In December, they dropped Jack and Judy in Bibleland.
1950:
There were no changes in 1950, other than the one big one -- the last edition of the Post was published on May 13, 1950, with the first edition of the merged Post-Herald running on May 15. Freckles and His Friends managed to run in the Post for the entire run of the paper.
Last Updated: August 9, 2010