History
Virgil McNitt (1881–1964) first tried his hand at publishing a magazine, the McNaught Magazine, which failed. [1] He then, in 1910, started the Central Press Association syndication service, with offices in Cleveland, Ohio. [2] In 1920, McNitt founded the Central Press Association of New York City. (Although both services had the same name, they were separate operations.) [3]
In 1922, McNitt and Charles V. McAdam (1892–1985) absorbed the operations of the New York City Central Press Association [3] and co-founded the McNaught Syndicate, with headquarters in The New York Times building. [4] [5] Will Rogers' weekly column started in 1922 in 25 newspapers. By 1926, his daily column ran in 92 newspapers, and it reached 400 papers three years later, making him one of the best paid and most read columnists of the United States at the time. [6]
From 1925 until 1951, Charles Benedict Driscoll was one of the editors and contributors for the syndicate. [7]
Writers syndicated by McNaught in those first years included Paul Gallico, Dale Carnegie, Walter Winchell and Irvin S. Cobb. [8] By the early 1930s, the McNaught Syndicate had a stable which included columnists O. O. McIntyre and Al Smith and at one time even syndicated a letter by Albert Einstein. [9]
Other successes included columns by Dale Carnegie and Dear Abby by Abigail Van Buren. At the time of McNitt's death in 1964, the syndicate was still led by McAdam, providing contents to 1,000 newspapers. [4]
By 1987, McNaught had only 24 features left, making it the tenth largest comic strip syndicate in the United States at that time. [10] The syndicate eventually folded in September 1989. [11]
Comic strips
One of the first syndicated artists was Rube Goldberg. McNaught's line-up of comic strips included Mickey Finn and Dixie Dugan . Ham Fisher's Joe Palooka was at first rejected by McNitt, but Fisher was hired as a salesman for the syndicate, offering McNaught's features to newspapers. After having sold his comic to 20 newspapers, McNitt had to change his opinion and added Joe Palooka to the syndicate, becoming one of the big successes for it. [12]
By the mid-1930s, McNaught's stable of cartoonists included Fisher, John H. Striebel, and Gus Mager. [3]
In 1933, just as the concept of "comic books" was getting off the ground, Eastern Color Printing published Funnies on Parade , which reprinted in color several comic strips licensed from the McNaught Syndicate, the Ledger Syndicate, Associated Newspapers, and the Bell Syndicate, [13] including Ham Fisher's Joe Palooka . Eastern Color neither sold this periodical nor made it available on newsstands, but rather sent it out free as a promotional item to consumers who mailed in coupons clipped from Procter & Gamble soap and toiletries products. The company printed 10,000 copies, and it was a great success. [14] [15]
In 1937, the McNaught Syndicate partnered with Frank J. Markey (formerly a McNaught executive) [16] and the Register and Tribune Syndicate, as well as with entrepreneur Everett M. "Busy" Arnold, to provide material to the burgeoning comic book industry. [17] For this reason, from 1937 until 1939, many of the syndicate's comic strips were reprinted in the comic book anthology Feature Funnies (published by Arnold). In 1939, Cowles Media Company (the Register and Tribune Syndicate's corporate owner) and Arnold bought out the McNaught and Markey interests. [18]
In 1939, the syndicate hired Vin Sullivan, then editor of Action Comics , to start a new comics publishing company, Columbia Comics, which would carry both new comics and reprints of McNaught syndicated comics like Joe Palooka. The company existed until 1949 and is best remembered for their publication Big Shot Comics . [19]
The syndicate continued columns and strips which were already successful when acquired, but it also was active in creating and suggesting new content, from the Will Rogers columns to comic strips like Don Dean's Cranberry Boggs. [20] In one case, McNitt supported a crossover between the comic strips Joe Palooka and Dixie Dugan, a feat which was commented upon by Editor & Publisher . [21]
Their last success came with the comic strip Heathcliff , which they syndicated from the start in 1973 until the late 1980s. Heathcliff appeared in some 1,000 newspapers, and the McNaught Syndicate became the production company for a few Heathcliff movies, including Heathcliff: The Movie from 1986. [22]
Joe Palooka is an American comic strip about a heavyweight boxing champion, created by cartoonist Ham Fisher. The strip debuted on April 19, 1930 and was carried at its peak by 900 newspapers. It was cancelled in 1984.
Heathcliff is an American comic strip created by George Gately in 1973, featuring the title character, an orange cat. Now written and drawn by Gately's nephew, Peter Gallagher, it is distributed to over 1,000 newspapers by Creators Syndicate, which took over the comic from McNaught Syndicate in 1988.
United Feature Syndicate, Inc. (UFS) is a large American editorial column and comic strip newspaper syndication service based in the United States and established in 1919. Originally part of E. W. Scripps Company, it was part of United Media from 1978 to 2011, and is now a division of Andrews McMeel Syndication. United Features has syndicated many notable comic strips, including Peanuts, Garfield, Li'l Abner, Dilbert, Nancy, and Marmaduke.
The Funnies is the name of two American publications from Dell Publishing, the first of these a seminal 1920s precursor of comic books, and the second a standard 1930s comic book.
Feature Comics, originally Feature Funnies, was an American comic book anthology series published by Quality Comics from 1939 until 1950, that featured short stories in the humor genre and later the superhero genre.
The Los Angeles Times Syndicate was a print syndication service that operated from c. 1949 to 2000. Owned by the Times Mirror Company, it also operated the Los Angeles Times Syndicate International; together the two divisions sold more than 140 features in more than 100 countries around the world. Syndicated features included Pulitzer Prize-winning commentators and columnists, full news and feature services, editorial cartoons and comic strips, online products and photo and graphics packages.
Dixie Dugan is best known as a long-running syndicated newspaper comic strip published from October 21, 1929 to October 8, 1966. The title character was originally modeled after 1920s film actress Louise Brooks and early stories followed Dixie's exploits as a Hollywood showgirl.
The Bungle Family is an American gag-a-day comic strip, created by Harry J. Tuthill, that first appeared in 1918. Originally titled Home, Sweet Home, it first appeared as part of a series of rotating strips in the New York Evening Mail. The strip ran until June 2, 1945.
Funnies on Parade is an American giveaway publication of 1933 that was a precursor of comic books. The eight-page publication featured reprints of such popular syndicated comic strips as The Bungle Family, Joe Palooka, Keeping Up with the Joneses, Mutt and Jeff, Reg'lar Fellers, and Somebody's Stenog. Creators included F. O. Alexander, Gene Byrnes, Al Capp, Clare Victor Dwiggins, A. E. Hayward, C. M. Payne, Al Smith, and Harry J. Tuthill.
Famous Funnies is an American comic strip anthology series published from 1934 to 1955 with two precursor one-shots appearing in 1933–1934. Published by Eastern Color Printing, Famous Funnies is considered by popular culture historians as the first true American comic book, following seminal precursors.
Big Shot Comics was an American comic book series published by Columbia Comics during period in the 1940s that fans and historians refer to as the Golden Age of comic books. An anthology title, the series included a mix of superheroes, costumed crimefighters, crusading district attorneys, heroic magicians and others, both in original stories and in reprinted newspaper comic strip from the McNaught Syndicate, including Dixie Dugan, Joe Palooka, and the movie-series spin-off Charlie Chan.
A comic strip syndicate functions as an agent for cartoonists and comic strip creators, placing the cartoons and strips in as many newspapers as possible on behalf of the artist. A syndicate can annually receive thousands of submissions, from which only two or three might be selected for representation. In some cases, the work will be owned by the syndicate as opposed to the creator. The Guinness World Record for the world's most syndicated strip belongs to Jim Davis' Garfield, which at that point (2002) appeared in 2,570 newspapers, with 263 million readers worldwide.
Columbia Comics Corporation was a comic book publisher active in the 1940s whose best-known title was Big Shot Comics. Comics creators who worked for Columbia included Fred Guardineer, on Marvelo, the Monarch of Magicians; and Ogden Whitney and Gardner Fox on Skyman.
Allan Holtz is an American comic strip historian who researches and writes about newspaper comics for his Stripper's Guide blog, launched in 2005. His research encompasses some 7,000 American comic strips and newspaper panels. In addition to his contributions to Hogan's Alley and other publications about vintage comic strips, he is the author of American Newspaper Comics: An Encyclopedic Reference Guide (2012). He is a resident of Tavares, Florida.
The Bell Syndicate, launched in 1916 by editor-publisher John Neville Wheeler, was an American syndicate that distributed columns, fiction, feature articles and comic strips to newspapers for decades. It was located in New York City at 247 West 43rd Street and later at 229 West 43rd Street. It also reprinted comic strips in book form.
The Central Press Association was American newspaper syndication company based in Cleveland, Ohio. It was in business from 1910 to 1971. Originally independent, it was a subsidiary of King Features Syndicate from 1930 onwards. At its peak, the Central Press supplied features, columns, comic strips, and photographs to more than 400 newspapers and 12 million daily readers. Notable comic strips that originated with Central Press include Brick Bradford, Etta Kett, and Muggs McGinnis.
The Register and Tribune Syndicate was a syndication service based in Des Moines, Iowa, that operated from 1922 to 1986, when it was acquired by King Features to become the Cowles Syndicate affiliate. At its peak, the Register and Tribune Syndicate offered newspapers some 60 to 75 features, including editorial cartoonist Herblock, comic strips, and commentaries by David Horowitz, Stanley Karnow, and others.
The Frank Jay Markey Syndicate was a small print syndication service that distributed comic strips and columns from the mid-1930s to c. 1950. Although small in size, the syndicate distributed strips by a number of notable cartoonists, including Ed Wheelan, Rube Goldberg, Boody Rogers, and Frank Borth. The syndicate also provided material for the burgeoning comic book industry, for companies like Quality Comics and Columbia Comics.
The New York World was one of the first newspapers to publish comic strips, starting around 1890, and contributed greatly to the development of the American comic strip. Notable strips that originated with the World included Richard F. Outcault's Hogan's Alley, Rudolph Dirks' The Captain and the Kids, Denys Wortman's Everyday Movies, Fritzi Ritz, Gus Mager's Hawkshaw the Detective, Victor Forsythe's Joe Jinks, and Robert Moore Brinkerhoff's Little Mary Mixup.
