He campaigned for Lyndon Johnson in 1964. He took an openly gay man to The White House. He gave money to needy students and widows of cops slain the the line of duty. He resigned from the National Cartoonists Society when they wouldn't induct a woman. “Lil' Abner”, however, was at or near the top, at least for awhile.Ĭapp seemed pretty cool, too. “Out Our Way” and “Gasoline Alley” had funny-looking old jalopies that I thought were cool, too.įor some reason, “Prince Valiant” put me off (I think it was the rococo lettering) but for an equally unknown reason, I loved “Our Boarding House with Major Hoople” (the way he said Fap! all the time, the top hat and fez, and his housefrau, Martha). Plenty and that two-way wrist radio gadget. I also liked “Steve Canyon” (man, that cartoonist could draw an eyeball) “Terry and the Pirates” “The Phantom” “Alley Oop” and “Dick Tracy”, with its oddball characters like B.O. In my mind, the strip easily held it own with my other favorite, “Pogo”. The adventures of Abner and his girlfriend, Daisy Mae, got my attention and it was burnished by Capp's other comic characters like Mammy and Pappy Yokum, Stupefyin' Jones and Moonbeam McSwine. I grew up with “Lil' Abner” in the Sunday funnies (that's what we called the color comic section of the newspaper). University of Alabama officials, however, wanted him ridden out of town on a rail. He'd made “Sadie Hawkins Day,” “hogwash” and “double whammy” part of the language. Capp made weekly appearances on TV's Today show and he was a frequent Tonight show guest.Įverybody knew about Capp's mythical Dogpatch. He and his comic creations were depicted on paperbacks, clocks, watches. Its principal character was the subject of a musical.Īnother Capp character, Fearless Fosdick – a parody of Dick Tracy – was almost as popular.Ĭapp had been profiled in The New Yorker. His Sunday comic strip, “Lil' Abner”, was syndicated to hundreds of newspapers. By the time he came to Tuscaloosa in 1968, Al Capp was sitting on top of the world.
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