By: Rita Butt

One of them was, “Nobody reads the newspaper until daddy is done with it.”  

There was not so much interest in the dailies but the weekend papers were a real treat and we all waited for my father to do all his reading, sighing at the world’s events and even laughing at the cartoons and the funnies.  

He removed and kept the crosswords as we weren’t clever enough to do them anyway.  

Sometimes, we didn’t even understand the cartoons, but the funnies were our very best treat.

I was thinking about all the characters we used to read about and thought you also might also remember.  

Here goes.

Alley Oop, Buck Rogers, Blondie, Brenda Starr, Beetle Bailey, Calamaity Joe, Charlie Brown, Casper Milktoast, Dick Tracy, Daisy Mae, Dagwood, Dennis the Menace, Ella Cinders, Felix the Cat, Fearless Fosdick, Henry, Hazel, Horace Horsecollar, Katzenjamma Kids, L’il Abner, Little Lulu, Linus, Little Iodine, Major Hoople, Mutt and Jeff, Mr. Dithers, Mamie Yokum, Mickey Mouse, Mandrake the Magician, Marrying Sam, Mark Trail, Mary Worth, Maggie and Jiggs, Nancy, Olive Oil, Orphan Annie, Popeye, Pluto, Pogo, Peanuts, Rex Morgan, Sweet Pea, Superman-Clark Kent, Sad Sack, Sadie Hawkins, Steve Canyon, Tillie the Toiler, The Little King, Tarzan, Wimpy and Mary Worth.

I think the only strip still going is Dagwood.

We never read Dorothy Dix on problems or Emily Post on manners.

Then, we all had “Big Little” books of our favourite comic serials.  They were two inches thick and four inches square with an ongoing story.  

They had pictures on one side and  writing on the other.  

They also had small pictures on the top right-hand corner, which you could flip to see action shots.  

It was greeat to see one of them in your Christmas stocking.

The weekend funnies were always coloured but the daily ones were just black and white and you could entertain yourself by getting out your crayons and being artistic.

Of course, there were a great many times we failed to get the point of cartoons and comic strips and we would ask for explanations of things we very often didn’t think were funny at all.

As we grow older, there are increasingly more cartoons and even straight news items I fail to understand.  

Sometimes, I don’t even understand jokes but I laugh anyway and pretend to be clever.

I wish my father was around now so he could answer my queries about, “What’s funny about this dad?”

He probably would answer the same way.  

“If you don’t see the point, there is not much use explaining it to you. Wait until you are older.”

How old do I have to get?